Aspire with Emma Grede - The Founder Playbook: How Michael Rubin Built Fanatics by Betting on Obsession

Episode Date: May 13, 2025

Emma is joined by the relentless entrepreneur Michael Rubin, founder and CEO of Fanatics for a deep dive into his extraordinary journey from a self-described "god-awful athlete" to one of the most successful business minds in the sports industry. Michael pulls back the curtain on the mindset and drive that fuels his success, revealing how outworking the competition has been a cornerstone of his career.   From launching his first business at age 8 to building Fanatics into a global powerhouse, Michael shares how his obsession with business—and his ability to thrive during the toughest times—has shaped his rise. Whether it's pushing through failures or seizing opportunities in the face of adversity, Michael’s relentless work ethic and ability to pivot when needed have been crucial to his journey. He talks about the sacrifices he's made, the lessons he's learned about leadership, and how his obsession with staying ahead of the competition fuels both his personal and professional life. Emma and Michael also explore the importance of being in tune with your audience, identifying untapped markets, and building a team of game-changers who share your vision. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I am so excited to share my debut book with you or Start With Yourself, which is available now. You might have seen the headlines, you might have seen the social, but this book is exactly what I intended, a conversation that will make you think, and it's a blueprint for anyone who wants success without the toxic positivity. Start with yourself is about self-leadership, because wherever I go, women ask me how I got to where I am. But what you really want to know is how you can get there. So I'm doing what I do best, sharing and navigate keeping what's works for me in the hope that you can borrow from a philosophy that has served me so well. The truth is I'm not an expert. I've just lived it. I've made the mistakes. I've had the

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the book, also available on Amazon, your favorite audio platforms and all good bookshops. Welcome to the Aspire podcast with me, Emma Greed. If you're serious about doing something big, today's episode is so for you. Whether you're launching a brand or scaling a company or just dreaming about your first move, my guest today is someone who's done all of it over and over again. He's not just a founder, but he's a builder, a visionary and a complete master of culture. And one of the most relentless entrepreneurs that I know. We also happen to be in business together on my new sports apparel brand with Christy Newscheck off-season. I'm talking about the one and only Michael Rubin. Michael started his first business at just eight years old and since then he's built and sold

companies worth billions of dollars. He's now the founder and CEO of Fanatics who are a global digital sports platform valued at over $25 billion. What makes Michael difference is his ability to spot opportunity where others don't, to move fast and to build with precision at massive scale. Welcome to the show, Michael. Today we helped a... Latte for Sam. Coffee shop get an insurance quote simply and easily. And made sure...

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Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak and get your trip right. That advice. You're talking to me. Kayak. Got that right. I am so happy to have you on the Aspire podcast. I cannot tell you how happy I am when I text you the immediate, unsurprising, but immediate yes that came back just like made me die. Like totally die. Well, first of all, I'm honored to be here with you.

Number one. Number two, you get the fastest yes of anybody because I have so much respect for you. You're a beast. And I like to learn from you. So I'm looking forward to having fun today. Honestly, what I really want to get out of today, and I think that so many of the people that will be listening, just want to understand how you've been successful. And what I love about you is that you talk, like, no BS, you're extremely truthful, extremely transparent. And I think in this

time where it feels like people are so careful and so deliberate about what they say, it's really refreshing to hear from someone like you. Well, you know, first of all, I think authenticity is so important. I think you have to be yourself. And I think I couldn't be. anything other than that because people would see through and say he's full of shit. So, you know, for me, it's just like always telling you what I think, how I feel being real about. And I think people then trust you and a lot of good things happen. No, that's true.

And what's really interesting is how that extends to your customers as well. I think that what you do feel so authentic to you. But I want to kind of get into a bit of your origin story and understand it, you know, and I'm sure you've told this so many times. I don't want to belabor. I don't want to belabor. I don't want to belabor the point, but I do want to understand a little bit. You grew up in Philadelphia.

It feels like you were just a born hustler. But you have been in business for a very long time and since you were a kid, essentially. Yeah, look, I really believe people gravitate to what they do best at. And I think a lot of people think I'm being self-deprecating when I say, like, I really was an awful student. Like, I had every learning disability you could possibly have. My mom was a psychiatrist, dad was a veterinarian. So they were, like, used to, like, sophisticated smart people. And I just came out of the room different.

So I really struggled in the school. Always, you know, couldn't speak well, couldn't read well, you know, struggle with my grades. And so for that reason, I hated school. Like I hate, I didn't dislike it. I hated it. Yeah. And by the way, as bad as students as I was, I was a pretty shitty athlete, too. Like, I just, you know, I didn't have good hand-eye coordination.

I just wasn't what I was good at. So at a really young age, I loved business. I loved it with every bit of my heart. And so I remember, you know, I can go back to when I was eight years older, I probably had four or five different jobs. I mean, I was, you know, buying seeds, like in a catalog and selling them door to door. When it would snow in Philadelphia, I would hire five, six kids to work for me. And I would sell the snow shoveling for 20 bucks of driving and then, you know, pay the guys

to work for me. And I was, you know, buying and selling trading cards. And I was making stationering the computer. So I was good at that. So I gravitate to what I was good at. And, you know, for me, I absolutely loved it. And when you were that young, like when you're eight years old, what was the thrill for you then?

Because it's obviously so different when, you know, you don't have bills to pay, you don't have anything. What was the thrill of actually going out and making those, like, you know, partnerships of, like, people in your neighborhood? Yeah, I think the biggest thrill was being good at something. It was like, you know, if you're not a good student, you know, if you're not a good athlete, you know, that might not make you feel good. But, like, if you're really good in business and you see you have

that superpower, even at a really young age, it makes you feel good. And so I've worked nonstop since I've been eight years old, and I felt like it's the greatest honor in the world. And even today, people say to me, like, people, like, I've always had an incredible work ethic. It's one of my best skills. But like, I'm working the hardest I've ever worked, and I love it and it doesn't feel like work. It's like, I'm honored to get to learn and grow every single day. And I'm just picking up tidbits in every conversation I have. So it's like, you know, I go back to when I was eight years old and just know it felt good to get to do what I do. And it doesn't feel any different today. It just feels great. I love that you say you actually work harder now. So at this level of

success, when you have a company that's worth $25 billion, you think you're working harder than you did in your, you know, in your 20s, in your 30s and your early 40s when you were actually like building. Yeah. Even though, you know, we're, you know, our business would be over $9 billion this year, over $11 billion in revenue next year. We have 22,000 people. I feel like a startup. And I, And I want to always have that mentality. One of the things I hate... You feel like a startup with a $25 billion valuation. Yeah, I feel like a startup.

I feel like we're just getting going. And look, here's the reality. That's humble. I have so much fear about... And fear in a good way, like fear that drives me about what are all the things we're not doing right. And by the way, when I go through our business, there's a lot of things we do well and there's a lot of things we don't do well.

I don't want to talk about what we do good. I want to talk about what we don't do well so we can make it better. And so, you know, I think you have to have that startup mentality that entrepreneurs mentality that's always driving, I think you lose your edge. And then, quite frankly, I think somebody takes you out and it's over. So, I mean, I would imagine that keeping that mentality, that start up mentality and that kind of drive, I get that you can have that as the founder, but how does that actually manifest within the company? How do you make everybody else? Because when you have a company with that, you know, that many people, what you're 20,000,

22,000 people. So I get it, but you're going to have an executive leadership team and senior leaders, how do you create the conditions and the environment for them to all feel like that too? So first, our company is not for everyone. Like we tell people, you know, this is an intense company. You know, we're going to keep pushing. You know, it may not be for you. When do you tell them that, like in the interview? Definitely.

But by way, when I go to hire people at my level, level down, I try to scare people away to see what they're made of. I know you know exactly what I'm talking about. Like, you know, are they going to think? you know, you're crazy when you call them at 6 o'clock in the morning or, you know, 11 o'clock in the night, or when they get email, I don't call people in the middle of the night, but I send emails in the middle of night. Are they anything that's crazy? They're going to like that. Is that going to drive them? Are we going to like inspire people together? They're going to not be made for it.

And so, you know, to me, I think it starts with leadership. Leadership is really important. You've got to have a vision and get people to buy into your vision. Communication is so important. Like, it's not like we have 50 people. When you have 22,000 people, you have to communicate and get your message out to everybody, make sure you've got people aligned and working together. And I think that's where a lot of big companies, you know, they get off track. They're more concerned with like the different corporate bullshit that you're supposed to have a company of like, you know, the memos from the different departments that tell you the things you want to know.

I'm like, I don't even read any of that shit from us. Like I'm focused on how do we grow our business? How do we keep pushing? And if you really think about why am I working the hardest I've ever worked, you know, we were only in the business that we call finance commerce. That's the Fangue business. That's where I started. We were only in that business until 2020.

Now we have three businesses. We have the fan gear business, which is buff and ex-commerce. We have the collectibles business, which is primarily trading cards. And we have the betting and gaming business. We only launched the betting and the gaming business. Our first dollar of revenue was last year. This should have been close to a billion dollars in revenue. Year two.

Okay. Years who? Our collectibles business. Is it profitable? Gaming business is not profitable. We're investing aggressively. It's all right. because I know you're profitable and in the other two.

You know, look, the collectibles and trading card business is a very good business. Commerce business is a big business that's grown as profitability. But, you know, for us, like, think about the trading card and collectibles business. That idea popped in my brain the day before Thanksgiving of 2020. That business next year will be a $3 billion business. That's great. So it shows you when you get something right, how quickly you can do it. But we really gone from one business to three businesses.

And then how do you bring it all together? for the fan. And so that takes, you have to be on top of it. Like, one of the things that we don't probably talk enough about, I think one of the key jobs of a leader is to stop dumb shit from happening. Okay. And you know I'm right when I say this. Like, how many times you're like, what the fuck? Like, why is someone thinking this? Why is someone doing that? So as a leader, you need to be on top of your business. You need to make sure you're working with your team, you're paying attention to what's going on. And sometimes you need to stop dumb things from happening. So it's like, one, you need to lead the organization.

You need to have the right vision, get everyone bought in. But then when you're growing very fast, when you go from one business to three businesses, you go from 8,000 people to 22,000 people, like, you know, kind of crazy shit can happen. So you've got to be on your business to stop that from happening. So there's so much to do in any given day for what we do. I love the way that you talk about that actually, like stopping dumb shit from happening because I feel like as a leader, and you spoke about it as well, like this idea of being this excellent communicator, right?

My job is to paint the vision, make sure everybody understands what are the three most important things that we're doing and how we all collectively go in towards those things. And that takes you being a really amazing communicator, being an excellent, like, almost like a salesperson to your own organisation. I know what like my strengths are is that I can tell everybody like, hey guys, we're going this way. This is how we're going to get there. All come with me. When you think about your strengths as a leader and what's got you ultimately to where you are today, with really, I mean, quite unbelievable success. And I really want to talk about what's happened to you earlier in your career to get to where you are. But what do you think the leadership qualities are that have got you to where you are today? Well, I think I have some really good ones. I also think I have some bad ones as well. Of course.

We all do. Yeah. So I think the first thing is you do need to have, like one of the things I think I'm pretty good at is coming up with a big idea and then sizing it up. Like you need something that's good for the consumer, in our case, good for the fan, but also something that's a good business. So I'm pretty good at figuring out, is this a big and good idea and is it also a good business? A lot of people come up with great ideas, but they're bad businesses. Yeah, totally. And by the way, you and I've seen these things before. You know,

they have a great idea. It seems like it's a great thing, but actually it's not a good business. So I'm pretty good at first having the common sense to figure that out. I think we go back to, like, as a founder, a CEO, you do need to be a really good communicator to let people know, you know, kind of what are we doing, what are we going after? Bringing teams together is Really important. That's something I've got a lot better over the last 10 years because as a decent size company now, like, you need the greatest people in the world to do what we do. And if you don't, you absolutely fail. So I'm unrelenting from that perspective. Like when I think someone can make a different star company, I'll fly anywhere in the world to recruit them. The amount of people have said to

me like, hey, Michael, like, hey, you know, I made so much money. I'm not into doing this. I don't want to do this. I'm like, watch this. Yeah. I'll get on a plane. I'll go see them. I'll convince them why this is a great idea. And before you know, we're building together. So, you know, unfortunate, a lot of the people that are my senior leaders, they've been really successful in their business career and financially before they joined me. They didn't need to do this. They bought into the vision, the idea of what they want to do together with us.

And so I think being able to sell that vision, be able to get somebody aboard is so important. But if you don't get the right people at the top, you have no shots. So when you look at your team, if you don't have, you know, your direct reports, your key people that are really A's, then you're. you're dead because A's don't go to work for B's. Okay, never going to happen. And A person is never going to go to work for B. And if a person goes to work for B, they're going to move on. Okay. Pretty quickly. So you need A's in the top. I think when shit's not working, I know how to rip the band-aid off. Like, I am not scared about that. Are you quick with that? You're like, yeah,

like, I will throw shit against the wall. But when it doesn't work, like, fuck it, move on. Like, I don't care at all. And so I think part of being, you know, having had so many failures in my life, having learned from so many of those failures, it gives me great confidence to go for things and, you know, not have any fear about, if it doesn't work, we're just going to rip the Band-Aid off. I mean, think about what we've done in the past four years. We were only in the, you know, Fangier business, which now is, you know, this year it's about a $7 billion business.

And we started the Collectibles business. We started the gaming business. But in the Collectibles business, we started a live commerce platform, a marketplace. We started Fanatic Events business. We started, but by the way, I started an NFT business. Four months into that, I was like, this isn't a real business. It's a bullshit business. And I knew, okay, we're getting out of it.

I got the investors the money back. I'm like, I'm moving on. But I love that you would do that within four months, right? Because in that moment, like, what was this? Just after COVID, we were in NFT madness. I wonder, like, because you've had so much success, have the failures become easier to deal with? Do you just fail less now? because I know earlier in your career, you really, I mean, you have come really close to the line with a couple of businesses, right?

It's like, it's not all being like billions and billions of dollars and you making great decisions all over the show. I've seen death in its eyes. Death in its eyes. So many times. I'm sorry. I got to tell you something, that's fun. Oh, stop it. Wait a minute.

You are going to seriously sit here and tell me that when that's happening, did you, I mean, when you say I saw death in its eyes, did that mean like everything's on the line for you? Like your home's on the line or is it like you're just... Many times. No. How is that fun? That can't be fun. It's fun. It's fun.

It's like because I remember even recently, the last time that I really thought I was done was 2009. We're in the middle of the financial crisis. My stock and my company had been worth $250 million. So went down by 90%. Oh. So you're sitting there with like $25 million. In stock, which wasn't sellable, by the way, because the market, okay. And then I had.

maybe my total net worth in 2009 was $10 million outside of the $25 million stock I had. And by the way, I probably had $15 million in real estate. So I had a negative net worth. Okay. I remember coming home, I was calm as a cucumber. Get out of it. Are you serious? Yeah, because you know what is it?

Okay, so tell me. Because I wasn't scared of failing. Here's what I knew. If I fell apart and it was all over, I would just do it again. And it would be fun. First of all, I have absolutely no doubt. But where does it come from in you that you could have, you could be right on the brink like that, right?

If you trace it back and think, okay, I could build it all again. I get it because you've shown that you can do it over and over again. And you can find these pockets of billion dollar businesses seemingly everywhere. But where do you get that from? What in your life has signaled to you that you can just bounce back? I think ever since I was a little kid, I have not had fear in business. I've just always been fearless like that.

And so it doesn't even seem off to me. I think a lot of entrepreneurs think that way. I mean, it doesn't, you know, no matter what you tell me, I'm like, okay, how do we deal with it? Because you want to keep everyone calm, cool, and collected all the times. Think about Tom Brady when he was down 283 against the Atlanta Falcons. Do you think he was in there saying like, I'm dejected, I'm quitting?

It's just like, fuck that. I'm going to figure out. Is that what you think about in those moments or you just like you go into yourself? It's when I work the absolute hardest is like that's when you need to step up and, you know, when the game's on the line, when you're losing, that's when you have to work the smartest and the hardest. And I always work hard, but that's when like nothing's getting in the way. It's like you have tunnel vision.

So what are you doing in that moment? Your stock is worth almost nothing. You owe more than you're actually worth. You're sitting there with a company that's been essentially completely devalued by the crash. Then what goes through your head? Like, what do you do next? So I owed. JP Morgan, $50 million from 2008.

I kept paying them back and I got it down to $3 million. I couldn't get the money. Like, I had called friends. No one, like, there was no... No one's coming out. 2009, nobody's coming out. Sorry, mate. I'm broke.

Yeah, and I had one fund that I had invested in. I was his first investor. It was worth like maybe $5 million. And I kept calling the guy asking them for the money back. I probably called the guy 50 times to get the money back. He's like, Michael, if I give you... you your money back, I'm going to have to give every investor the money back. And I can't do that or I'll go out of business. And literally, like, on the 51st time when I call this guy,

I'm like, man, like, I'm going to lose my company. I'm going to go bank. Like, I need this fucking money. He's like, I'll give it to you if you just stop calling me. I like, I know the guy's so bad. He gave me my investment back at what it was worth then. And that saved me from being margins out of the company. By the way, 18 months later, eBay bought that company for $2.4 billion. 18 months later, not five years later, not 10 years later, 18 months later. And I'm telling you, you can think I'm like crazy, I enjoyed experience of thinking that I was going to be pushed out of my company. I was going to be fall apart because it was like an adventure to go on.

I mean, why do I like roller coasters? Like I still today at 52 years old, like going on a roller coaster with my friends, with my kid because it's the adventure's fun. You're just made of something different. But the resiliency to actually call someone 50-odd times is enough for me. I mean... But it doesn't bother me. And there's no embarrassment there.

There's nothing in you. You're like zero. I just want to go back because, obviously, to sell a company for $2.4 billion, 18 months after it was essentially worthless, this is GSI, right? GSI commerce. But you held on to a piece of that company that eventually then becomes fanatic. So did you have... First of all, how did you...

managed to extract the most, like, I guess, the most valuable part of the, you know, company out, because that feels like unbelievable that you could even do that. And did you have a vision for fanatics at that point, or are you just, like, I just want to understand how that comes together, because to have a sale like that, we're going, what, how many years ago? 2011. Yeah, so it's like, it's a long time ago. Two point four billion dollars is a shit ton of money. So I just want to understand how do you manage to get away with the bit that ends up being worth $25 billion. Well, two things.

It would be wrong for me to not say. When I sold the company to eBay for $2.4 billion, I think I had screwed up a lot of pieces of the business and I had actually been a better CEO then. I think the company could have been worth $100 billion. Like, if you think about what we built, we built one of the first e-commerce technology engines. Think about what Shopify is for us today. We built an incredible email platform.

Think about what, you know, exact target that was bought by CET. Dallas force. So if you go through each of the pieces of what I built, you know, I didn't do a great job. So I actually think I failed up by selling it for $2.4 billion. But I think you're actually giving way too much credit to me. In 2011, FNAX was nothing, okay? It was a completely undifferentiated e-commerce site of licensed sports

merchandise. And eBay didn't want it because they're like, look, we don't want to be in the inventory-owned business. It wasn't a good business. It was nothing business. When I bought it and it's the only thing I focused on, That allowed us to think about how to really build a strategy. So the only thing I really thought when I bought the business, I had one giant fear,

which is there's this little company in Seattle called Amazon. You've heard of them. You've heard of them? Yeah, Amazon. I thought if I didn't completely differentiate ourselves against Amazon, we would be dead. So it was really when I bought it, it was like, how do I differentiate the business? And then the strategies kind of evolved as we've gone. So yes, I know we had to be highly differentiated or we wouldn't be in business because I watched

what Amazon did to Toys Ross and Sports Authority, all these other retailers we worked with. So that fear was very helpful. But I think the reality is, no, I didn't know what I was going to do with the business. I bought it and just like, it was just that natural compass. Like, I'll figure it out. But it's so interesting to me that you had this thing and you were going to figure it out. Because to me, I look at fanatics as such a differentiator in the marketplace. You own your space.

You own the relationship with sports fans across all of the leagues. and their purchases bar none. It's not like you have so much competition. It's like fanatics, fanatics, fanatics. And indeed, when I was partnering with Christine Eusecheck and we were going to start off-season, all roads led back to fanatics. If you want to be in the team sports business,

if you want to sign with a league, you have to come back to you guys. And so I'm so interested in how you've been able to ring fence this incredible company and you've been able to keep everybody else out when seemingly it doesn't feel like it was this big strategic part of your plan. It was like essentially what you were left with

and you had to focus on that. Yeah, so first, I don't think what you're saying is accurate at all. Oh, good. All right, tell me. Like, I feel like... Because you feel like you're constantly under attack. In our entire business, across the board,

collectibles business, trading cards, sports betting, merchandise, there's tons of competition. What our job... But you're number one. We are number one. You're number one. You're the market leader.

Every day, everyone's coming to kill number one. Well, listen, yeah, that's just your mentality. Like, that's unbelievable. That's not my mentality. That's the truth. Wow. And the second I get confident is when it's over. Like, I really feel like the second, like the second of the company, like,

that's why you're so successful. They kill you. And so I feel like I want to run this business like we're a startup. Like, I'm only looking and saying, what are all the things we're doing wrong? And I got to tell you something, in each business, we have things we're great at, we have things we suck at. We have so many things we need to do to be better. We think, you know, our biggest thing we need to do is keep growing the categories that we're in,

keep innovating. Let's take the example of the business that you and our partners in. Okay. Talk about off-season. Talk about Kristen. Kristen reached out to our company for years and she couldn't get anyone to kind of respond to her, give her the love. Because we acted like a big company. Okay.

Then one day she did something, she put, you know, she dressed Taylor Swift. I saw it all over. I started following. Hi. No, I started following her back. I'm like, wow. Like, I love what she's about. I love this.

And then small world, I find out that she's partnering with you. And by the way, at that point, I had to chase her and chase you to say, let's partner together. That didn't bother me. I didn't mind saying, hey, I love it. You're like, what can I do for you guys? How do we partner together? How do we do something great for sports fans? So, like, you know, a lot of people would say, like, is the CEO of a 22,000 person, you know,

$11 billion revenue company next year going to chase a start. That is literally what we said. And, you know, I was like, I loved it because I had so much respect for her, vision, so much respect for you, I'm like, these guys are killers. Like, what could the three of us do together? And what could we do for sports fans? So the second you get comfortable and think, like, look at like all the changes that are happening in their parallel footwear business today.

And you say, like, nothing's forever. And you know what? We have to keep figuring out how to do what we do better. And there's so much that we can be better at. And so, you know, one of the mistakes I think I made, you know, in the first decade of the business, we were so worried about competition. We weren't focused enough on how is everything we do going to make it better for the fan. And now, like, we actually, I'll tell you, I'll tell you, talking about turning a failure into success.

We had, obviously, it's well-known at this point. We had a pretty, you know, tough experience in baseball last year with the jersey. And, you know, as everyone knows, we're partners with Nike. We're partners with MLB. We make the jerseys together. And, you know, everyone in the desire to innovate want to kind of change the baseball jersey. And it's not what fans wanted. And during that period of time, and by the way, we got, you know, fanatics took the brunt of most of the, and there was a lot of consumer noise.

You know, hey, these pants are C-3, these series you suck, this, that. And what do we do, number one? We listened and we revert it back together with Nike baseball and ourselves. We got to revert back to what fans loved, number one. Number two, how do I use that to make my company better? And literally, we had been talking about brand purpose for the last year. And I was like, what is this brand purpose bullshit? is this just like, you know, consult noise?

And then it hit us. It's like, we need to relentlessly enhance the fan experience in everything we do. And if you ask us, when you go to do things and we do a lot of things, is this going to relentlessly enhance the fan experience? If the answer is no, don't do it. Well, I could look back to a bunch of things we did in the past where it didn't relentlessly enhance the fan experience. And now we're going back and we're saying, we're we questioning everything we've ever done

to say, how do we be better? So you feel like everything is anchoring back into that round pair? Everything has to go into that. brand purpose of relentlessly enhanced the FedExpress. When we started the sports betting business, we said, hey, if we give you back money in every bet that you make, you can use anywhere in our platform. The other thing we do is players get injured in sports all the time. If a player gets injured in the first quarter of a game, we cancel that bet.

We're the only person does it. So what are people saying? Finax is the most rewarding sportsbook. And by the way, they're the fairest sports book. Why? By the way, we've picked up, as of this month, I just saw this morning. We have about 7, 7, 7% of the market. We've been live for two years.

Wow. Okay. And we're now the distant third, but we're the third biggest online sports betting platform. From people telling me two years ago, I had no chance. Now, talk about sports betting. We made a gamble. It's my biggest gamble ever. I had no idea whether it would work or not. Still not 100% sure it's going to work or not. I said to people, hey, I'm making a billion after $2 billion gamble. I think I'm going to be right, but I don't know. But you have to have the company to say, is this a big enough business I want to go after? And am I comfortable with what happens if it doesn't work? And so I know I'm a little all over the place in this answer.

I'm kind of walking you through how my brain thinks. But I think it's so interesting to think how your brain thinks because there will be so many people listening to this podcast who want to start a business or have started business and your mentality is what makes you so interesting. It's your approach and your, like the idea, like it kind of makes me laugh that you still feel like you're being constantly chased. And I get it.

And for you, listen, I believe you. You're being constantly chased. But I think it's really interesting that you've orientated all of these businesses around this mission. And when you're starting out, do you think it's really important for young people or for people that are just like getting into something?

Is it important to orientate yourself around a mission? Because I feel like we hear so much about purpose, about mission, about purpose-driven companies. And what does that even mean when you're beginning? Yeah. So I would say if I had the chance to start over again in 2011 with Fanatics, I wish I had that brand purpose then. Right.

Because I think we'd be a better company today. Fair enough. I think in our online sports betting, I gaming business, we started with that mission. In the collectibles business, we started with that mission. In the Fang Good business, we were starting in 2011, we didn't have that mission. And I think now that we have that mission of everything we do

has to relentlessly enhance the fan experience, we keep going back and saying, well, what doesn't and how do we change it? And so I think that's the fun part of building a business. Like, let me ask you a question. Skims is roughly how big today? It's big. Okay, it's big. How many people didn't care about you five years ago

and I was saying they want to kill you? Oh, a lot. Right. Right now when we're doing this podcast together, you got people out there, look at it, what's Emma doing, what's Jen's doing, what's Kim doing, what are you guys doing? How do we kill these guys?

Because you guys are winning. 100%. So that's your lucky to be in that position. But if you don't stay on your A game, you're going to be dead. And how much do you look at the competition? Because I am always looking at the competition. I look at everything.

And let me tell you something. When I see something I like, I copied as well, okay? I'm proud of that. I'm so happy that you're honest about that. When I see a great future, we're not doing that? I'm getting a straight. You do that?

Do you think everyone should do that? Because I don't think many people are honest about that, right? Then they're dumb. The entire fashion business works on the premise. Everybody cross shops, everybody's brand, everybody looks at everything that's happening. And yet, we all pretend that we don't. So I'm so interested in you just going, you see a feature on someone's website. You're like, I'm putting that in tomorrow.

I pay attention to everything. I look at social media for one reason. So I see what's going on from my... Like, I look at it. I follow every one of my competitors. I follow everyone is interesting. I follow everyone I can learn from. And I'm sending stuff to people.

I probably send 20 or 30 posts of different shit to, you know, people who I work with every single day. So that's how we learn. That's like, if you don't do that, you're dead. Now, that doesn't mean, like, if someone's got something really original and apparel and it, like, they're known to own it. I may not want to... Of course. I may not want to copy that, but let me just take like we're in the business, like our original business, all the fan gear that we sell.

We sell more than 100 million units of fan gear this year. Okay. If we see something great in another business, we're absolutely going to find a way to bring that to our sports fans. Okay. And one of the things that interesting about the fan gear business, what we were really good at was servicing the average sports fan. Why did I call Kristen so many times?

Why I call you so many times? Because you were doing something different. You were saying, how do I cover that fashion forward, higher-end sports fan that I knew we weren't doing a good enough job with? Why did we start bringing in Lulu Lemon merchandise in hockey? Because we knew our fans wanted that merchandise. Why are we expanding with Nike and so many products that we didn't carry before that we're not carrying today? We keep figuring out how can we do things better for the sports fan. So I think if you don't pay attention closely to your competition, you're dead.

I think when your competition does something good, in a lot of cases, don't be proud. Like, I learn from my competition all the time. Yeah, just get in there and do what they're doing and try and make it better. Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes. At First Citizens Bank, we roll with your goals because we're built for what you're building. Fit for your ambition for Citizens Bank. The start with yourself tour kicks off on April 15th in New York City. Tickets are on sale now at emigre.com.

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Monopoly is a trademark of Hasbro. Hasbro is not a sponsor of this promotion. What else is it about you that makes you successful? Look, different people can be successful. Like, I know so many, like, I'm always studying people. You'd see somebody who's like wicked smart, but they don't have great people skills. I'm the opposite, right? I'm honestly not that smart. I mean, people think, again, oh, he's being self-deprecating.

I got a 780 combined on my SATs. I think that's really bad, isn't it? I mean, I'm English. Let me tell you, it's really bad. It's not the score from the movies. Most people will listen to this. I bet you 80, 90% of people got better than a 780 on their combined SATs. Okay. It's bad. Okay. And you know what? I embraced it.

So what do I do? I'm going to outwork my competition all the time. I'm going to use common sense. I'm going to use relationship skills. And I'm going to have a will to win that nobody else can stop. And you know what? I know that will gets things done where everybody else would give up. I'm never fucking giving up. Let's talk about the work ethic. Because one thing that I know about you is when I text you, wherever I am in the world, you usually text back, if not in the same minute that the text has gone, but within an hour, right? Like, you're very much like, there's a lot of immediacy around the way that you communicate.

You know, I feel like you've got this sort of band of peepa part around you. You have a very specific way of working. But when I think Michael Rubin, I think the work. I think the person picking up the phone, sending the email, making the communication, making the connection. You do that feverishly, furiously, all. the time. And I just wonder if you feel like the amount of work that you put in has a direct correlation to how successful you've been, or you could have, you know, could you have done this like working three days a week for a zero chance? What I'm trying to figure out is how I can

get an eighth day in the week that only I get. Okay. I can get a 25th hour in the day, only I get. Let me know when you figure it out, will you? So look, I've had a couple of changes in my life. Interesting. I realized that I can't be. glued to my phone the way I have been because it's actually screwing my brain. Smart. So now what I'm learning to do is I put my phone down for an hour here, an hour there. My oldest daughter's 19. She does it.

It's not like where, you know, she called me. She'd need me right away. So I'm actually learning to put my phone down, you know, for periods of time, you know, generally like an hour at a time. Because I don't want, I don't want my concentration to be broken. I think I can have a much better discussion with you. I'm 100% focused on you and not having my phone with me. That's a change.

That's a new thing. for me in my life. And how often are you doing that? Are you doing that every day? I'd say each day I'm probably putting my phone down, probably 20 to 30 minutes during dinner with them with my kids. I try to do it because I just think I shouldn't be it. Like that's the 20, you know, we're fast eaters. Like I grew up like a like a laboratory retreat, which is I eat quick. So, but in that 20 minute dinner, you know, 30 minute dinner, I want to focus on, you know, my family. I don't want to focus on work. And the other 16 to 18 hours you're working. And then I'd say maybe a meeting or two a day. I'll just leave my phone on my desk.

Now, I also have a crazy OCD habit about myself. I cannot go to bed without responding to everybody in my phone and deleting every message I've dealt with. So my phone, okay. I do that. I don't delete the messages, but I have to deal with everything that's in the room. So ever since I've been a kid,

like if you looked at my phone right now, I wouldn't have more than 20 or 30 total messages, none unread, okay? Because that's why I keep myself in order. So before I go to bed, I can't fall asleep. no matter how fucking tired I am. I can't fall asleep if I don't just respond to everybody. That's a nightmare, right, isn't it?

I don't always respond during the day, but I'll always respond before I go to bed, because if not, it actually tortures my brain. I need my phone to be completely organized. So then I know the next morning, what are the things I have to do that are in my phone from the day before? So that's like some crazy OCD thing about my brain.

Also, if you walk into any of my offices, there's no paper, they're perfectly organized. Like, I'm very OCD like that. I've always been. that way. But I do think, you know, you got to figure out like what works for you. This works for me. Okay. And I do like, I'd like to be in touch with the people that are around me. I like, even like there's probably like, there's this guy in Philly who used to be like a complete detractor fanatics. And we tell us all the shit we were fucking up and doing wrong. And then like our company was too

dumb before we didn't bring the tractors. And now anyone who doesn't like us. Oh, bring him in. We want to bring them in a long from them. Yeah. Okay. So this guy now texts me all the time, but I pick up good things. I'm always like, It's this customer I just built this relationship with. And I'm like, always this, this, I love the guy, by the way. It's like, like, I'm learning from the guy. He's like he's, he's, but sometimes there's things the news he sends me before. So it's like, like, I'm glued to information like that and I think it makes me better.

No, and I think it probably does make you better. But going back to the work, is your expectation that everybody else is going to work like that around you? Because it can't be 22,000 little Rubin's running around 18 hours days. No, I don't think that's realistic. I don't think that's realistic for 22,000 people that I work with. I think that would be. illogical, not real, like living in a fairy tale. What I would say to you is, if you want to be a fanatics,

you have to have a will to win, okay? And if you just like, if you just want to come in, you know, hit the clock, be nine to five, this ain't for you. Okay? That said, people have lives, people have families. Like, you know, I'm not a big work balanced life person. That's not who I am. You and I've talked about that before.

I'm like, people are like, how's your work life balance? Like, I don't have any. Okay. Because it's all work. Because I love it. And not everybody could live up to the expectations of being like that quick all the time. Look, I would tell you, if you look at my direct team, the people I work day in

and day out, that six or seven people that kind of run the business with me, they have that intensity. And that's your expectation that on that level, the most senior leaders in the company have to be like that. They've got to be glued in like I am, have that intensity, love it, be here for the action. No one that I'm with is in it for the money. Like they don't want to see the report cards. They want to see they're doing well, but they're in it to work.

win in a big way and to make it better for the fan. And so we're so obsessed with like, if you just saw the emails every day, it's everything that we could do better at. It's everything we could build to be better. It's like, we're always just trying to do better. So that takes a relentless, you know, kind of focus. If I didn't have it for my key, you know, team, then how would that go down the organization? It never would. The person that works, you know, in a warehouse or, you know, you know, a lid store is going to have the same intensity of a top executive at the company. No, but by the way, some of our next leaders work in the warehouse. Some of the, you know, maybe the future CEO fanatics when I'm dead one day is in a lid store today.

They're in a where I'll say. You don't know. Roger Goodell started in the mailroom. He's been the commissioner of the NFL for whatever since, you know, the last 15, 20 years. So, like, to me, like, I love that story of like you can will anything to happen. But I'm realistic as well. No, I feel like it. Let me tell you, I'm somewhat real.

I was going to say, you're somewhat realistic. But the point is that your work ethic is completely unrelenting. Like, that, that is what has got you to where you. are now. 100%. And if I didn't, we'd be killed because there's so many, we were in three different businesses with lots of competitors, all figuring out how they can beat us. And so we have to be better. No, and I understand that. We have to keep doing things for the fan that are better. And if we're not unrelenting about that, we're done. Yeah, and someone else will be. I want to talk about the money, because you just mentioned money that no one in your executive leadership team is in it for the money.

Were you ever in it for the money? Because I think about so many people that, you know, they're in jobs, they're thinking about starting a business and they're like, I just want to make more money. I want things to be better for me. Is that a good reason to want to become an entrepreneur or to start your own business? No. That's a very simple answer. I mean, like, look, it's easy. And so before anyone's going to shit all over my answer, let me just preempt it, okay?

Obviously, I've had more than a financial success where I'm never thinking about money. Okay. That said... Does that make you happy, by the way? Is that to you some sort of like, is there a sigh of relief when you say that or is it just so normal now? I just don't care. I don't act any different today than I did in 2009 when I didn't have enough money to pay the mortgage on my house. I know that that's the truth.

I am the same exact person and that's what makes me me. And so I think if you look at the people that are the most important people in our company, they're driven by the mission. They're driven by making it better for the fan. they're driven by trying to do the unthinkable. They're driven by like just winning at the highest level. And then generally the report card is money does follow, but that's not what they're driven by.

For me, I don't care about it at all. Now, again, I know people can say, well, it's because you've been so financially successful. So do I think as an entrepreneur you should be in it for the money? No, I think you should be in it to build to disrupt something, to build something great, to do something awesome. And by the way, to have so much fun, do you really like, let me ask you question, how much fun do you have doing what you do?

Oh, first of all, I think that I am the luckiest girl in the world. I feel so happy that my job is to come to work every day and I get to work with like jeans and undies and I work with the, to me, I work with the best people in the world. I absolutely love it. Having said that, I am someone who if, I wouldn't, I mean, I wouldn't come here if I wasn't making any money. Like that has been an important part of what has driven me. I've never gone after something purely for the money, but it's like, I'm happy that I've made some at this point. And I definitely feel like there was a time in my life where I was like, okay, I have this job and I'm not making enough money. If I get another job, I'm not going to get paid that much more money.

So taking it into my own hands and going, do you know what, I'm going to try something for myself was why I became an entrepreneur. I was like, I reckon I can do better and pay myself more than where I'm getting paid. That was the primary reason for me going, I've got to get out of the place when I'm being paid 30 grand a year. For me, I was born an entrepreneur. I came out of the womb with those instincts. And by the way, it's kind of weird because, like, my family, there's no signs of business anywhere else. So interesting, isn't it? Yeah.

I got to do a DNA check, I think, or something. But, you know, like, I, like, even as a kid, you know, what I always loved was to be, be able to play the sportive business. That's what I've always loved. And today, what drives me more than anything is trying to do things better than we do it today or better than our competition and to try to keep, you know, just like I want to build the most important brand in sports. Yeah.

I want to build one of the most important consumer companies in the world. We're not remotely there today. Like, I was just telling some of this story. I think I was telling your husband is. Like I watched the Nike movie. I think it was called Air. Oh, yes, yes, yes. And I watched it like when it first came out two years ago.

And I remember going to Google Phil Knight. How old was he? He was 85. I'm like, I was 50 at the time I Googled him two years ago. And I thought to myself, wow, I have 35 more years to do kind of what he's done. Like, what can I do over the next 35 years? Wow. I really do think of ourselves in the startup phase today.

I think we have so much opportunity to, you know, build each of the three businesses we're in to make them so great for consumers and to build something global that every sports fan needs. And by the way, we'll think about what other businesses do we want to be in over time. Not today, but over time, once we get better at all the things we're doing. So to me, that learning is so fun. So when I think about, you know, kind of what's in it from kind of, you know, a job or a career perspective, I think the learning is what turns me on. Yes.

That is the thing that gets me most exciting. I think if you as an entrepreneur go to build a business, if you just go to build something great, great shit follows. And by the way, sometimes it won't work. sometimes you're going to fail. And then you learn from that. Like I could go back and chart some of my biggest failures and say, man, I learned so much from that.

And that helped me for my next success. And so, like, each of my big failures, like, I don't know, they could have been disastrous, but they leaned to something next idea that was great.

No, and I mean, it's so clear to me. It's interesting that you say you were born to be an entrepreneur. And it's so, it's so interesting because I feel like, I don't even think I knew what an entrepreneur was. I had no ambition to ever start my own business. And it's, do you, I just wonder if you think that

can be people become entrepreneurs. I feel like, you know, it's like I worked a corporate job until I was 24, 25. And if you are one of those people that's thinking like, I just need to do something different, what does it mean? What is it going to take? Like, what do you need? Like, what are those key things when you boil it down? And this is not necessarily just about, you, but what are you looking for? Yeah. So first, I think it was in you. It just never came out before. I only wish I met you when you were 24, 25. I would have had you on the fanatics team would be that much better. Now I had to partner with you to build off-season to be to be on the same team. We got there eventually. Thank God. It took you until you're 26, 27. Thank you very much.

Look, I have seen lots of people that were in different jobs, find that entrepreneurialism within themselves and then go out and do absolutely amazing things. I've seen lots of people go out and fail miserably and then do amazing things afterward. So, you know, to me, I think it's about having the self-confidence to not be scared to fail. It's about having the ability to come up with the right idea and test the idea and make sure it's big enough to go out and put your energy into it. And it's about doing things you love to. You have to love this.

If you don't love it, like, why do it? But do you ever deal with, like, pain? Like, do you have that in your business? Are there times when you're really taken aback by something that it actually, it hurts? No. Never. I'm going to tell you why? Because I'm immune and numb to it.

Like, I've had so many, I could go through like every week of this year. And there's always disasters. There's always, you're like, this year, for sure. By the way, I'll give you an example. Someone walks in and say, hey, this tariff thing came, is going to cost $100 million. I'm like, what are we doing about it? How do we turn this into an opportunity? Like, you can use these things.

But you wouldn't, as someone who's so ambitious, right, if you're going to take $100 million of revenue out of the company this year, that means you've made... Profits? Yeah, profits. Oh, my love. All right. I mean, first of all, even worse, right?

But then that means that you then can't do something else or something else has to slow down. That doesn't pain you being as ambitious as you are. Sometimes there's going to be really good things because you build up. Like, right now here's the way... So you go straight to like opportunity. Take the existing crisis we're in right now, the tariff crisis. Okay.

I got together with my team, that business. $7 billion. business. We have 8,000 employees in that team, actually more than that in that team. And I said, guys, this is a great opportunity. Like, we have to reinvent our supply chain. We have to be fast. And by the way, the CEO of that business is amazing. This guy, Andrew. He's so good. He's been talking about like, well, now we have to do these things faster. Like, we need to own less inventory. We need to turn faster. We need to change how we actually make goods. Like, I'm almost excited by it. I will tell you I had not one negative feeling to someone saying, we're going to

lose $100 million in profits, not revenue. This year, great. How do we help that to be better in the future? I could give you 10 examples right now of different things like that. I mean, you know, probably the only thing where I feel pain. Probably I came up with one thing where I feel pain. I'm so glad you got there because I was going to try and do get this one. A site outage. That is one thing. That's painful for you. Yeah. Yeah. Like the customers can't get in the shop. No, no, no. No. I'm being serious. Like, I remember Super Bowl like five or six years ago. There was so much traffic. The site went down. I feel like someone. stabbing me and then I'm caught and like you know you if you keep calling the guy runs technology he's not

actually no he's actually he's trying he's trying to fix the problem with his team if the sports book is down like something like that that actually that that kills my inner soul okay because I just want to fix it I think I feel pain maybe something goes wrong for for my kids yes you know but in business no because like I think one of the things is a good leader someone who can deal with whatever comes at them in a calm and thoughtful way I calm down during the most difficult period. So when like shit's going crazy, that's why I think we have to be calmest, most focused, like game on. No, it's such a brilliant piece of entrepreneurial advice, actually. And I heard Tom Brady once say that when everything's going crazy, you've got to slow down

the play. You just got to like slow it down. And I think that it's really interesting because you can be in these moments of overwhelm where everything goes on top and you just have to make everybody feel calm and as a leader that is such an important component of what we do. Because I will tell you that this week in our companies, it is sheer panic. These tariffs have completely upended everything that we do. And it changes the entire face of the company. And if we were to all just ascend into panic, I mean, people wouldn't know. They'd start leaving, right?

Your best people would be like, oh, my goodness, like she's panicking, what's happening. So you really have an opportunity to show what's type of leader you are. You can't panic because the reality is every consumer company that makes, merchandise is dealing with this issue. And by the way, you're getting able to reinvent your supply chain. Like, look, China's probably not going to be a place where a lot of American companies make merchandise because of the, you know, relationships right now. And so, and by way, China's, you know, they're a really good, you know, partner in making

merchandise. But you'll figure out how do I shift that? How do I make my company better? Like, I know in 2006, skims will be a better company from what you went through in 2020. Absolutely no doubt. I'm sure that. Absolutely no doubt. And even know many companies are taking a drop in value,

that good ones will be more valuable next year because they forget out how to take advantage of this opportunity. So you naturally have a very long-term view. If you're, when you're building something, you're thinking about these new divisions, are you thinking in five-year increments, 10-year increments? What does that look like these days? Yeah. I say I generally try to think about what things look like in the period of five to 10 years.

Like, I don't think about what's it going to mean over the next year or two years. Because I think that's too near-term focus. I think it's what can you do over five to 10 years? After that, I'm like, okay, I hope I'm here. So, you know, like, I think five to 10 years. years is kind of periods of time that I think about. I think you can do a lot five to 10 years. You can go something that's really, you know, a leader. You can do something that's just so good for the fan if you take that kind of long-term mentality. As a chef, I know flavor doesn't begin in

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Learn more at Schwab.com slash trading. You talk about pattern recognition all the time. Can you explain that to me a little bit? Yeah, I think history is a great prediction of the future. So, you know, one example that I've used is I interview more people in a given year than anybody at my level. The reason is I realize how important people are to our company. That is the most important asset. How much of your time are you spending interviewing people? You know, I bet you in a given year. And I work, you know, probably 80 hours a week on average, 70, 8 hours a week, every week, probably 8 hours a week. I'd say 10 to 20% of my time, okay?

And during that period of time, I've never asked somebody for a reference in my life. Why? Because anyone I meet, I'm going to figure out who I know that knows them. I'm going to do backdoor chat. If you ask me for reference, I would call the people that I gave you and say, hey, make sure you tell Emma this about me. Definitely. Anyone who's listening to this, when someone asks you for a reference, if you don't, if you don't, anyone, when someone asks you for your references,

if you don't give them the three or five references, then call each reference and tell them what you want them to say, you're not thinking very clearly. Okay? So for me, um, what are you doing instead? Because I know you're calling around. I'm calling around and I'm checking on how they've been. What's their history? Sometimes I'll meet someone like, this person's fucking incredible.

I found the person. What questions are you asking? you reference someone, what are you asking? How old are you know this person? Are they a killer or not a killer? How smart are they? How do they work with other people? And I got to tell you something of people that I interview that I love, two-thirds of the

people I hear bad shit about, okay? And I'm hearing stuff, they don't work well with others, okay? Someone can be so smart, but they're going to be disruptive. That doesn't work, okay? Another thing that I would hear is they're kind of like they're political, the big company. I don't want politics. I want, you know, entrepreneurial. Yes.

What's a non-negotiable for you? When somebody is interviewing with you or you're going through that like referencing period, what is an absolute no-go? Someone has to have a track record in the past of being a winner. Okay. Track record is the best prediction of the future. So what are the pattern recognitions you want to see? How is the person done?

Are they a winner? Okay. Do they find out how to win? So you can always find that by talking to people that they worked with in the past. And I think the second thing is how do they work with others? Because when you interview somebody, you can't see how they work with others. And you really can't see, like, take anything great. How many, what's the best products can make?

The number one product. I mean, there's just so many. What's the number one product? Okay, that ultimate bra. How many people do you think in the world say they invented that ultimate bra? I think there's quite a few. 50 people? Maybe.

Yeah. They're all going to run around. I promise you. There are dozens of people saying, for sure. For sure. I invented the ultimate. Brow?

Yes. Okay? So if I interview the person who invented the ultimate bra, I'm going to Emma or Jens or Kim and saying, who invented this? Yes. Okay? I'm figuring out to figure out, are they full of shit? Are they real?

Okay. So one, I want to figure out, you know, are they a real winner? And two, I want to understand their track record. And then how do they work with others? It's pretty damn good. I like that. One of the things, like, you are so you, like in every single room. I was very fortunate to be.

No, no, I mean, you really are. You don't change for anyone. And I find that such an appealing, like, it's just, it's a very attractive quality in someone that you just, like, remain the same. And I came to your Super Bowl party, right? And it was like the who's who of everyone, everyone that was important in sport plus me. And so I just. That means you're important in sport.

Apparently, I'm about to be important in sport. You are important in sport. But, you know, the thing that was interesting to me is that you are just being you. You're being you around the commissioner of, the NFL, you around all the players, the celebrities, the talent, the media moguls, like the whole thing. Like, I feel like there's such a, people feel like they need to be a chameleon. They feel like as they climb the ranks, whether it's corporate or they start something that they have to like change themselves. You have clearly not done that at all. Was that purposeful?

Like, I'm trying to understand like where that level of authenticity and you being able to always be you, like where it comes from and why it just feels like such a big part of your brand. I love putting great rooms together because what happens when we put great rooms together? Great things happen.

I remember seeing some of the people you went up to talk to. Oh, yeah, me. I was like busy. Correct. And by the way, I said, I came over a face sheet. Right.

And I said, who do you want to meet? Let's go see these people one by one. And to me, when you put great people together, great things happen. But for me, if I'm not just me, then I think people think

like he's full of shit. He wants something for me. see through it, they know you're not authentic. So, like, I can't even, like, I don't ever, like, I dress like this every day. I don't ever, like, I think I wear a suit, like, you know, once a year for me. Yeah, you didn't have a suit on then. A wedding, you know, a funeral or something. Like, you know, I'm a casual guy.

Like, I don't try to speak more properly because it's not me. I curse because I want people to know, like, you're not cursing here, but I am because that's who I am. So I think, like, owning who you are something is really important. And by the way, like, I just try to be my, like my best self all the time. And I think it does work for me. And I think people know like that they can trust that.

And I'm also like, you see in those rooms, I'm still picking things up from people like crazy learning. But you know, you're picking things out, but you're also putting people together consistently. But you do it without. And here's the thing, people love a favor for a favor. You don't ever ask for anything back. And I find that so interesting.

I feel like you've hooked me out with so many people at this. point. And I'm waiting for the phone to ring and you to be like, hey girl, like, I need this thing. But that doesn't seem to be your style at all, whoever I speak to. Well, first off, I would call you for anything I need to know you would do it for me. That's true. Well, I would now. That's true. But look, I think when you try to be calculated about if I do this for that person, this is what they'll do for me. I think you're dead before you start. Like, I always think if you just do great things, it comes back. And so I think I've been fortunate that I, like, look, I have guys, Robert Kraft.

It's one of the, you know, he's one of the most important owners in sports. You know, he and his son, Jonathan Kraft, they took me, like,

they kind of took me in like 2008, 2009, and they helped me so much in business, both with advice and relationships. They never wanted a thing for me. And by the way,

they would kill for me and I would kill for them. And like, I wouldn't be here today. There's some very sick. Without the two of them, I would not be here today. Okay?

There were a number of people like that. But I want to do that for everybody that I can. And I don't ever want anything, but I also know, like, people always, like, friends work for each other behind the scenes. Yes, they do. And so, like, you know, to me, I remember saying to you when you were in the corner, you know, who do you want to meet? And, you know, I remember taking you to a couple of different great people. And, like, I was honored to do that, never thought about it again until right now.

And what's going to make me happy is to see you do something great with, you know, one of those businesses. And, you know, whether it's Nike or Target or whoever it is, it's, like, great things to come. And that makes me, like, so proud and happy that I could create a room in a room in a, environment where people could come together and look, I love bringing great people of all different backgrounds together and watching great things happen. Okay. And that is something that I'm actually pretty good at because I have such a diverse group of friends and people trust me and then they come in here and I think they're open mind and know you knew everyone in that room. Definitely. So whoever came up to you, you're like, hey, it's going to be good. No, you know, it's like,

it's worth your time. It's going to be a great contact. So I can completely see that you authentically do that and it's become a great part of your business, if your brand and and it completely works because you really are. And it does feel back in karma, by the way, for sure. Oh, if you never were. It's comically beautiful. Of course it does, right? Because I feel such a warm feeling to you because of the way that you've behaved.

And again, when we did our deal, and I will say this because I think it's such an incredible trait, took us six months to get through the legal. But what you told me in the first meeting, what we would do, how we would do it, the deal that you were prepared to make is exactly what we did. And I think when you can take someone on their word like that, that says, everything you need to know about that person. And so if you did call me for something, I'd be like, yeah, Michael Rubin, he's the real deal. Like, he's a great guy.

And that is, like, so seldomly the truth. Like, me moving from England to L.A., like, I have not seen that very much. Well, first of all, thank you. It's the truth. Number two, I will eventually call you for something, and I know you help me. I don't know what it will be, but, like, that's just what family does. I'll be waiting for the call. That's what family does for each other.

I'll tell you, it's funny when we were talking about offseason yesterday, and your husband and I were talking about this. He's like, yeah, you know, a lot of this is sourced in China. China's completely, I said, whatever it is, we'll figure it out. Like, it's all good. Totally. And by way, we're partners. We need to lose money, you know, on the next launch or the next two launches, who cares? Like, we're a big believer in your wife. We're a big believer in Kristen. We're big believer. Like, it's just like, we'll figure it out. Like, you always think long term in these things. And I think it's so interesting just going back to offseason and thinking about like what's happening in, like, really specifically around women's sports at the moment. And, you know, our business. is about all sport, but I feel like there's like a time and a moment where things happen in culture and it collides and it makes the right environment for you to do business. You've been around for a long time. Are you as excited by women's sports and the business opportunities that sit

adjacent to that as everyone else? Or are you less excited? Like, I really want to understand because you have the customers, you see what's happening. You have the sales figures. Like, what's the, what's actually happening? Yeah, I'm the most excited I've ever been. And the reason is for since 2011. I've always been saying it's coming, it's coming, it's coming. But it wasn't really here. Right.

Now we have two major, where we have a couple of major opportunities. The one is women's sports in general has so much interest from the whole world. And so it's become a real business. Like if I think about the WMBA's business five years ago versus today, I mean, what an incredible league it's become.

I look at what's happening in each of the women's sports. I think there's never been more excitement separately. Think about the woman's category of merchandise. We have sucked in that category. There's been so much. I'm glad you know. Yeah, you know, as I used to call, shrink it and pink it. Okay.

And so when I... We know the people that did that. Right. So when I look at, you know, what you and Christian are doing, when I look at, you know, the Lula Lemon product that we're now carrying, when I look at, you know, the work we're doing with other people, it's because there's such a big, untyped opportunity. Totally.

Again, what I think Fanatics was best at originally was taking care of the average sports fan of which there's billions of. But the problem is, when you have billions of people that are sports fans, there's so many niches. And what we didn't do is a good job is in the niches. Now we're so focused on thinking about each customer segment separately. And that's a big opportunity itself. That's a big growth opportunity for us. Yeah, it feels like it's going to be a massive unlock. When you can get women's sports of power, right, and I really believe that offseason has a huge part to play here. I mean, women love buying clothes. They love buying clothes with a a frequency that is very different from how men buy them. So I'm just very excited by the space and

the opportunity. But how do you think women, because of course, look, sports is still at the kind of epicenter and where the decisions are made and more importantly to me, where the money's made, it's still super male dominated. How do you reckon that women can actually get involved in what's about to become like a really important business, like a really big money generating business? First of all, in our biggest business, the Fang Group business, our business is only about 15% women's and about 12% kids. It's 50% bought by women. Yes. Okay. So they're controlling the purchase power. They're all the purchase power. So let's not forget they are, I'd say, the most important person, you know, in the household. Thanks. Okay. I'm interested, actually,

having worked with you a little bit now and some of the people in your company, but more importantly that the women in your company, you've really got a lot. of very incredible senior women that work around you as well. Like, has that been purposeful for you to cultivate that? Do you think about, I've got this many male leaders? Maybe I need to balance it with women. I just wonder, because there is such an intrinsically different way that women operate to men.

And I just want to understand your opinion about that and how you see it in terms of leadership and then more thoughtfully, like, as it extends to women and women's sports. So the way I think about it is the population represents our families, right? because we have 115 million customers. And so we have every type of customer, you know, buys, bets, collects with fanatics. So we need to have a workforce that represents our fan base. Okay. Yes, you do.

And by the way, if you think you're going to get there without working at it, NFW, like, it takes real work. And we're not near good enough at it. Like, we have the workforce that most represents our fan base today than we ever have. We're not near enough good at it. Like we got to keep getting better. We got to keep developing people. So, yes, we work very hard at it because I think it's in our best interest of how we build a better company. It will be more successful if our workforce resembles our fan base.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. When you, I'm so interested because I do see your daughter around you so much. And I wonder what you hope that she'll learn from you by being around you so much. So I want them to learn work ethic from me. I wanted them to see how fun what I do is. And what my daughter said to me And it was actually one of the proudest moments I've had with her.

She said last year at the end of the summer, we went and grabbed dinner one night. She's like, I just want you know, like we have so many friends that are like influential. She goes, I want to build. She actually,

she's dying to do what you do. She wants to build a fashion brand. She wants to be an entrepreneur that builds it. And she wants to be well known for building a great business. And for me, what I wanted to do is just live out her dreams.

Okay. Of course you do. That's all any father wants. Yeah. She just hit me in the way and two co-ops we have to do. She's always told. me about co-labs that we should do together. And by way, she'll tell me, like, this person's

hot. You've got to check this person out. You should do stuff with them. So, yeah, like, I'm learning from all the time. And I love those conversations. And I do want to ask you a question before we get to, like, a final, final questions. Just give me an idea of the things that you think about from a habit point of view that have become non-negotiable and just the things that, like, form the most important parts of your life. And really, I really want to understand them as they, as they link to you being successful. Like, what are those things that you just have to do?

Yeah. So I think the first thing that links to my life is owning who I am. Like, I'm not trying to, you know, be a fake person. Hey, like, you know, I put my kids to bed every night or like, you know, I'm like, by right, with Kylie when she was younger, I was in a situation where I did put it about a lot of nights, but like, Camille is the most incredible mind. And you know, Camille's like, hey, I got the kids, you go do your thing.

We, you know, we find the windows. But like, like, I love working. I'm like owning how much I love to work and it's what I do and not trying to like. Apologize for it. Apologize. That's number one. I see that. Number two, you know, non-negotiable.

You got to work with great people. And like, I will not negotiate on that. And when someone, when I think someone's a liability, see you. And by the way, certain people can help you get to one place that can't get you to the next level. you got to know how to just like, I love you. Move on. Move on. One of the biggest pet peeves I have is like someone who tries to bullshit me in any way

shape or form. And one of my biggest strengths is I have great bullshit detection strengths. So like if you're trying to bullshit me, I will pick it up. I hear like I hear everything. I pay attention to everything. So I will very much. The second I don't trust somebody, gone. Gone.

Yeah. You're just decisive. A. I'm very decisive. You are, right? You're cursed by that. It's okay. I know.

I keep feeling like I'm on the tilly. Yeah. You are decisive as fuck. I am. There you. Thank you for enabling that. I'm here for you. We're going straight to the rapid fire questions.

Okay. I'm here we go. Rapid fire. All right, first of all, what's the first thing you do when you wake up? That's the most obvious answer to the word. No, come on. What do you do? You pick up your phone.

For the fourth time since I've been asleep. You are not supposed to, no. No, you don't get to sit, look it in the middle of the night. Of course I do. Who doesn't? Oh my goodness. I'm exhausted. What's the last thing you do before you go to bed?

It's check your phone. Obviously. I mean, this was the easiest thing ever. What kind of dumb question was that? For you, it was a really dumb question. Really? I'm going to meditate? Michael Rubin doing a little, how many, I mean, try, have you tried it?

I tried once. Yeah, lasted 20 seconds. What are you currently aspiring for in your business life? It's a great question. I'm inspired. I want to build the greatest brand in sport that every sports fan in the world. It's like, I love this company. And we are so far from that.

We have so much to do. But that's my dream, right? How do I build something? Everyone's not like, not they, you know, it's just where you go to buy something or it's where you go to bed. It's like, we just make it so much better for the sports fan. Like that is like so exciting to do. And so that is the thing I'm obsessed with is like how do I build something?

It's like just sports fans, billions of sports fans love this. That's a great answer. What about in your personal life? What are you aspiring for there? You know, it's harder as you get. So I'm 52. Even though I act like a kid and look like a kid, you know, I think at my age, health. Like, yeah, it's, you know, I travel with a trainer. Right now I'm having, like, my neck is always, I have a PT person that's working on my neck every day because my neck is just pretty cranky. So I think it's, it's health. Like, if you can feel good, I think it's, like, I've had the last couple months, just like some, you know, like, just, you know, fighting just like you get older.

You got to work at that harder. It's the most important thing. What is a piece of advice that you've been given that changed your life? I remember being on a walk with Robert Kraft in like 2011 and 2012. I was on the phone with a commissioner, very unhappy about something they had done. And I was like, all I wanted to do was win that battle. And when I got off the phone, Robert said to me, Michael. give it to them because this is all about the long-term partnership.

And you know, you're too focused on the individual win, even though I was right. You're too focused on the individual win and not focused on just having that right long-term partnership. And that was a good moment because I chilled out. I took a deep breath. Even though I didn't agree with what they were saying, I did it the way they wanted. And it paid dividends. Yeah, I bet it did. what's something that you valued when you were starting out that you don't anymore

I think when I was starting maybe even until 10 years ago I was a work hard play hard person I really don't like people see my life they see like the five fun things I do a year and they think I'm super fun like I don't value like I just value building my company it sounds like obsessive and people are gonna be like he's a fucking weird or like all he cares about you know is building his company but like you know I'm less concerned like the time I used to have to go out you know like I think building a great company is fun.

Yes. So I don't, I think things that people would say are fun. You know, maybe I care less about now. That's really the answer to my next question is something that you value now, that you didn't then. What do you value now, most of all? Well, for sure, it's got to go back to health. Like, I want to do this in 50 years.

I want to do it in a healthy way in 50 years. So I think I really have a huge respect for health. Like, I'm spending time on that. I'm focusing on that. I value relationships. Like, I really care about my relationships. I think they're really important to me. I think, you know, I wouldn't be who I am without those relationships.

So I think I feel fortunate to have so many incredible relationships. So I want to respect them, give to those relationships. Those are probably two things I think about. They're great things. Great things to spend your time thinking about. Thank you so much for coming on the Aspire podcast, Michael Rubin. It's been a pleasure. Honored to be with you.

Thank you, darling. If you're loving this podcast, be sure to click follow on your favorite listening platform. While you're there, give us a review and a five-star rating and share an episode you loved with a friend who'll be so grateful. Aspire with Emagreed is presented by Odyssey. I'm your host, Emma Greed. Our executive producers are Corrine Gilliott Fisher, Derek Brown and me. Our executive producers from Odyssey are Maddie Sprung Kaiser,

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