How I Built This with Guy Raz - Away: Jen Rubio

Episode Date: March 18, 2019

In early 2015, Jen Rubio was racing through an airport to catch a flight when her suitcase broke, leaving a trail of clothing behind her. She tried to replace it with a stylish, durable, affordable suitcase — but she couldn't find one. So she decided to create her own. In less than a year, Jen and her co-founder Steph Korey raised $2.5 million to build their dream travel brand: a line of sleek, direct-to-consumer suitcases simply called Away. Jen's hunch that the brand would emotionally resonate with young, jet-setting customers paid off. Today, Away has become a cult luggage brand that has sold more than one million suitcases. PLUS in our postscript "How You Built That," how Jon Maroney made sledding easier for adults and more dynamic for kids with a pair of sleds that strap to your legs. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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walking distance from so much of the city, made it feel less like a visit and more like we were actually living there. Plus, taking a trip is the perfect time to host your space on Airbnb. Your place with all of its personal touches and its amazing location could make someone else's vacation even better. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca.com slash host. So the plan was launch before Christmas, get a lot of press, sell a lot of suitcases. But we found out when we placed our order that there was no way that our bag would be ready before Christmas, which I don't know why it was so surprising to us. We were like, what do you mean?

Like, we have this timeline in this spreadsheet. And it said that if we ordered the bags by August, we would have them for the holidays. Yeah. And it was as if, like, someone had said, like, we had to stop doing the company. From NPR, it's how I built this. A show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built. I'm Guy Raz. And on today's show, how a broken suitcase inspired Jen Rubio to design a better one.

And in the process, disrupt the multi-billion dollar luggage industry with her Instagramable suitcase away. So, you know when you're standing at the baggage carousel at the airport, waiting for your bag to come around, and there's like a never-ending parade of black suitcases going by? And every now and then, the person next to you rushes to grab one of those bags only to realize it's not actually hers. This is a pretty common scenario, because for a lot of people, a suitcase is just a little. the thing you shove all your stuff into when you go on a trip. You might have bought it for 50 bucks at T.J. Max or on Amazon. And most of the time, you shove it into a closet or under your bed between trips. And it probably only lasts a few years before the zipper breaks or the

handle falls off. And most of us have always accepted that. That's just the way it is, right? Well, Jen Rubio didn't think so. And back in 2015, she had a hunch that other people might agree. She hated how mid-range suitcases were designed. They seemed boring and uninspired. She wanted something that would last a long time, and she wanted to create a bag that would be eye-catching, something you'd want to show off at the airport. And so Jen approached a friend named Steph Corey, who worked with her at Warby Parker. And the result of that partnership is away. It's a line of sleek suitcases that come in tons of colors like rose gold or violet or sky blue, and with perks like a built-in phone charger, the kind of bag you'd want to

Instagram while you'd travel the world. And Jen's own story of traveling the world? It started when she was a kid in the Philippines. Her mom was a dentist and her dad was a business professor there until one day when Jen found out that their lives were about to change. I remember when I was seven years old, my parents told me that me and my brother and my mom were moving to the U.S. and we'd never been and we were so excited. And they told us stories about how in the U.S. it snows. And we went to this giant mall in Manila and bought snow suits. I had a pink one and my little brother had a blue one. And we wore them on the plane. So this was my first big, big flight with my mom. My dad stayed behind because he didn't have a visa yet. And we wore a snowsuits. I remember

just being very sweaty on the plane. And this was my first big, big flight with my mom. My dad stayed behind because he didn't have a visa yet. And we wore a snow suits. I remember. I remember. I And this was like, I don't know, late September. You were wearing your snowsuit on the plane to the U.S.? We insisted, I told my mom were like, it snows there, we read about it. And we land at Newark Airport in, like, September. It was sweltering. It was super hot. And I think that was the first time I'd ever really experienced true disappointment.

Why did you guys move? Do you know what the reason was? Was it just like new opportunities or what? Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, we had a great life in the Philippines as far as I remember. But it was presented to us as a very exciting opportunity that not a lot of people got. We had a couple of aunts and uncles who already lived on the East Coast and we were going to join them. And we'd never even met these aunts and uncles. So we were super excited about it. Obviously, looking back now, it was just for my parents to continue to grow and have more opportunities to develop their careers. and give a better life to us. Eventually, Jen's dad was able to join the family in New Jersey. Her mom opened up a dentist's office and her dad ran the business side. And Jen started to settle into her new life in America.

Did you, as a kid, were you immersed in Filipino culture? No, totally the opposite. The opposite. I think there was like two different experiences of immigrant kids. and they're the ones who embrace it. And they're the ones like me who are just immensely embarrassed of the experience. And I think it had a lot to do with, you know, the other kids at school or like wanting to fit in. But, you know, I only spoke English.

I would like get mad at my parents when they would cook Filipino food because it would make, like, my school jacket, like, smell like food. And I was just, I don't know. I was like, I was a kid and I was just so embarrassed of the whole thing. And you kind of don't come to terms of that until you're like in your early 20s. Yeah. When you start to kind of realize that it's this hugely rich part of who you are. Yeah, and it's so valuable and it's so important. And I just, I spent, you know, probably the first 10 years being in the U.S.

And just like being embarrassed of being Filipino. Jen was a pretty good student through high school to, despite, as she says, being more interested in being cool than doing well in our classes. And when it was time to go to college, she chose Penn State. And it was like TV college. It was a college in the movies. And there were football games. And there were tons of people.

And, you know, everyone's wearing, like, school colors. And there's, like, a quad. I know that's normal on every campus. But it was just, like, all of the college things you saw in movies. And I was like, this is amazing. And I picked a major called Supply Chain. It was like, like in the orientation, they had said, you know, they were one of a handful of schools in the U.S. offering supply chain as a major.

And I was like, cool, how exclusive. And I chose that to study. So you're doing, like, you're in college. And I guess you decided that you just, at a certain point, you had an opportunity and it meant that you didn't. go back to college? Like what, what happened? Yeah, so I was, I was taking a bunch of classes in the business school, and they had at Penn State what's called a co-op program, which is you take a semester off and you work for six months at a company. And I was hating school. And I was hating school. And I was hating going to classes and taking the tests and actually having to apply

myself. So I read about this program. And I was like, cool, you get credits and you don't have to go to school and I decided to do it and I was placed at Johnson and Johnson in Skillman, New Jersey. And I remember getting there on the first day. And it's, you know, Johnson Johnson's a huge company and this was their headquarters. And they told us something mind blowing on the first day. Like 140,000 people work here. And I just couldn't wrap my head around that number. I remember I kept trying to relate it back to to like the Penn State football stadium and how many people could fit in there. And I was, I was just enamored with the whole thing. I like, I got a cubicle and I got an ID badge and I had my own desk and my own phone number and my own email and an email signature. And just the idea of work and being like a business lady

was so exciting to me. And I just never wanted to go back to school. But I had to. So it ended. I had to go back for a semester, and I was just so miserable. I had felt like I knew what was out there. I knew what it was like to work. This whole like corporate world existed, and it was like, it was thrilling to me, and I wanted to be a part of it. So after a semester back at school, I got another co-op. And this time I got placed at Nutrugina, which is also owned by Johnson & Johnson in L.A.

And I asked them to extend it for a summer internship. and then I asked them to extend it into another thing. I just begged to stay. I couldn't fathom the thought of going back to school. And I don't know how I did it, but they let me stay. And they made me, like, I promised that I would take the rest of my credits online and that I would finish and get my degree. And I never did.

And they offered you a job. Yeah. And I basically was just like the intern who never left. and I was invited to walk at graduation, but I think I'm still three credits short. So you're technically a college dropout. Yeah, technically a college dropout. Yeah, I think people are like, oh, cool, you're a college dropout. I'm like, no, I like dropped out of college so I could work in a cubicle.

So this is like 2006, 2007. You're in your early 20s living in L.A. You're working for Neutrogena, and that was your plan at that point? Yeah, so I was working at Neutriena, and one woman that I really admired and that I had never spoken to her personally, but I just remember recalling, like, every time she sent an email, like, everyone would open it and everyone would read her analyst's reports all the time, and every time she spoke, like, people would listen. And she ran marketing. And I was talking to kind of my mentor about her, and I was like, okay, how do I get a job in marketing? So this woman's like, oh, well, to work in marketing here, you need to get an MBA. And me being me, I didn't think to myself, oh, I should finish and get my undergrad degree so I can go get an MBA.

I was like, there must be some way around that. And there wasn't. But now, like, this had opened up this whole new world to me of being able to work in marketing, which to me at the time meant that you could control how people found out about your products and how you could take everything that people were saying about it and maybe change the products. And I just thought it was so cool and I knew I really wanted to do it and that if I couldn't do it there, I would find somewhere else that would let me do it. So I quit. And did you have a job or did you think, okay, I'm going to figure this out. I'm going to try and do marketing for people and just,

just figure it out. Yeah. I was like, I'm going to do marketing. I quit. And I didn't have a job. And I don't have a degree. And I didn't have that much money. But I had, do you know that platform Tumblr?

Yeah, sure. So Tumblr had, I guess, maybe just started. And I was like one of the early people on it. And it's what, you know, I would do in my spare time. I would, like, write on my Tumblr blog. And I had met a few people in L.A. on Tumblr. One of the guys I met, you know, did social media. And I was like, what do you mean you do social media as a job?

Like I had MySpace, I had Tumblr, I had Twitter, and I didn't know that you could do that and also that it was part of marketing. But he would do, he would do social media for some of like the OG food trucks in L.A. He would like do like control their Twitter or whatever Facebook, whatever was around at that point. Yeah. And it's so, it's so wild. It was literally Twitter. And doing social media for a food truck meant like you would just tweet where the truck was going to be, which sounds so crazy now that that was someone's job. But I remember like following the Twitter account, finding out that the truck was going to be like on the corner of these streets in L.A.

Driving over there. And there would be hundreds of people there. And I don't know why, but it just blew my mind. I was like, you can just tweet where you are and like people will come. and that was their business. Otherwise, like, the truck would have just sat somewhere and you had to maybe drive by it. And it was like, this is marketing.

Like, this is how you get paid to do marketing and do social media. And these are all things I was interested in. And I was like, I got this. I'm figuring this out. So I started being, like, a freelance consultant for social media. You just put your, like, you just, like, hung a shingle out.

Like, how did you get people to hire you? How did you know where to go? Honestly, so much of it is luck. It was really a lot of the right place, right time. I was living in L.A. It was when food trucks were a big thing. And I kind of just spread the word. I would go to small businesses and to food trucks. And my first client was the cafe on my street. It's not around anymore. But it was this little cafe on Beverly Boulevard. And I would literally sit in the cafe all day and tweet things like, there's a lot. is a password of the day. And if you say the password at the register, you get like a free espresso shot. Oh, wow. It was such amateur hour, but there was also nobody doing it. So I found myself in the situation where I am getting paid to do something. I don't know that much about it, but also at the same time, everyone saw me as an expert. And it was one of the wildest years of my life, because my first client was Buzz Coffee.

And I don't even know if they paid me. Like, I think they paid me in coffee. And then all of a sudden, I was doing it for a food truck and a restaurant. And then all of a sudden, like, they introduced me to someone. And I was doing it for a new hotel that was opening. And then all of a sudden, I'd realized I'd just spent a year being immersed in digital and social media and realizing how people could use that in a really powerful way. I also wasn't making a ton of money, so I was also doing personal assistant stuff.

So I was a personal assistant to the wife of one of the heads of like one of the very big studios in L.A. And then she had asked me to help her with her blog and her social media and her website. And I started helping her with that. And then she told her husband, I was doing a great job. And all of a sudden I find myself like driving up to the lot every day, like checking in with my ID and meeting with these film executives

talking about how they could market their films like through social media. And this is like all, this is at the time when it's just starting to explode, right? And so primarily this was like Facebook and Twitter at that point, right? Yeah, it was just Facebook and Twitter. Like MySpace was tapering off.

Yeah. And I mean, you were just sort of doing this as you went along, right? Like you weren't, you didn't set up a business or a company or you didn't sort of show the companies how their social media impacted the world, right? You weren't like producing reports for them. You were just out there doing the social media stuff and we're hoping that they were happy with it. Yeah, exactly. And there were no metrics. There were no analytics of any sort at this time. And I would just be like, look what I tweeted.

Look at all these people that responded. Look at these people who showed up. And for me, it was, That was actually great because it wasn't reports. It was like real tangible stuff. It was like people showing up and saying something or doing something or spending money at the business. And that was really exciting for me. I just want to skip ahead for a first sec because I guess eventually you were able to get a job at like a legit ad agency in New York. And then you started to do this type of stuff like marketing for real. And then in 2011, you got recruited by Warby Parker.

How did that happen? So I have Tumblr to think for this one again. So my friend Rich, who worked at Tumblr, was like, you should meet with these guys. They're starting this glasses company online and they just want to talk to someone about social media. And I remember meeting this guy who worked at Warby Parker. And we met at Union Square Park. and I remember realizing kind of halfway through our conversation that it was a job interview. I thought that I was just like coming in there to like chat with them about the startup and they would like pick my brain and that was something I was like really open to.

And I left being like I think I just interviewed to be the social media manager at Warby Parker. And that's how like I got started in the startup world. They um, uh, two the co-founders have have been on this show before. And um, and you know, the, the, the, social media stuff never really came up. Did they have a social media strategy when you got there? I mean, it's still, this is still like the stone age of social media compared to today, but did they have like accounts for all the different social media stuff? Yeah, I mean, it was still the Wild West.

So there was a Twitter account that was basically for, you know, customer service. And the guy who interviewed me, Brian, you know, his whole job was like replying to everyone on Twitter. which then became my job, which just spent like 10 hours a day replying to people. Even if people would be like, I love Warby Parker. I would reply like, thanks, like hundreds of times a day. They're on Facebook, on Twitter.

They're on Tumblr. And Instagram launched right when I started. So I was like, guys, there's this cool platform. I think we should go on it. And they're like, okay, cool, whatever. And what did you do for them? I mean, like, what, how did you start to use, like, things like Instagram to expand their brand? Yeah, so I think I started thinking about, like, what a content strategy would look like.

How do we, how do we take this amazing thing that we're building that's kind of weird, which is selling glasses online? All of my friends thought I was crazy for doing this. And, like, how do we, how do we, like, translate that experience into, like, a social media community? And we would do things like, like, Warby Parker had that, like, home try-on program where you'd try on five pairs of glasses. And we would do it so that, like, people would post their five. And, like, we'd repost it to our Tumblr. Oh, they would, like, post photos of themselves? Mm-hmm.

And then, like, our community would, like, help them pick. And that was, like, a big thing on, um, on Tumblr and Facebook. Like, we would basically crowdsource what frames people should buy. And we just built this, like, really loyal, really engaged community. And it just kept growing and growing. And I think, like, it's all those embarrassing. to kind of like look back at your work, especially in those early days. But I really was just like, I really could feel how social media was having an impact on how much people loved the brand. And that was really special to me. When you, while you were at Orby Parker, did it ever cross your mind that like, I want to start my own business one day? Or was that not even on your radar at all?

No, I never wanted to start my own business. I never wanted to be an entrepreneur. I, um, I think I was just so grateful to have found work into something that I really enjoyed. And for me, that was like social media and marketing and eventually brand development, that because of those opportunities seem so limitless and that I never felt like I could learn everything there was to know about what I was doing, that it never occurred to me to start my own thing. So I guess you sort of lasted at Warby Parker for about two plus. years and you were recruited or you got a job with All Saints, which is the fashion brand based in the UK, to be their global head of innovation. You were like 26, 27 years old. How did that happen?

So, yeah, so when I joined Warby Parker, there were maybe 15 people there. By the time I left, there were a couple hundred. So it was still growing really quickly. I still left like pretty early days, but my father passed away while I was working at Warby Parker. And it kind of, like I kind of slowed down a little bit after that. And I started thinking a lot about what I wanted to be doing. And coincidentally, like this headhunter called me at the same time. I was kind of going through that. And moving to London seemed like one of the most exciting things I could do.

And I was so drawn to the opportunity. Yeah. The job was interesting, so it had really nothing to do with anything I'd ever done before. So I became the Global Director of Innovation at All Saints. And this is when they were, they were trying to turn the company around. They had new owners, a new CEO. I was 26 or 27. And I had a seat at the table with all these very seasoned executives from, you know, from selfridges and herds and Rehmont.

They knew your work from Warby Parker, and they wanted some of that magic for their brand, presumably. Basically, the new CEO at All Saints, I think, had just wanted someone from Warby Parker. But yeah, I mean, it was like, great job, great title. Like, I got to live in London. I didn't realize until after the fact that what was missing is that my entire career had revolved around the idea that there was a brand and that someone in the middle does something. and then there's a customer at the other end who falls in love with it. And I built my entire career around that middle part, like being the gap between the customer and the brand,

like building the relationship, making people fall in love with the company. And because all of my projects at All Saints turned out to be internal-facing and more of like internal innovation, I realized that was the part that I really missed. I wasn't wise enough to realize that at the time, time. But I think that's basically why it was so bored. So what happened? What did you, I mean, were you just kind of waiting to figure it out? Yeah, I was waiting to figure it out. I always

promised myself that I would only work on things that made me happy, especially after my dad passed away, it was like really important for me to, to spend my time doing things that I was really passionate about. And I knew that had kind of dried up for me in this opportunity. And so I left All Saints and I was still living in London, kind of for a finite amount of time, because my visa was going to expire. So I started interviewing for jobs. I interviewed for like VP of marketing, like CMO jobs at companies of all different sizes. And during this, I was completely just on a tear around the world, splitting my time. between interviewing and, like, going on vacation.

So I'm in Zurich Airport, and my bag breaks. And it was this old bag that I'd had, like, since college, I guess. Yeah. It's like no-name, like, black ballistic nylon bag. And it was super embarrassing. Like, I didn't realize it broke. I didn't realize a zipper broke. So I'm leaving a trail of, like, my underwear behind me.

As I'm running through the airport. And I get home and I go on Facebook and I tell everyone about this embarrassing story about my bag breaking. And I ask people if they have any recommendations for a new bag. New bag, yeah. This was just me really like just trying to shop. This is like, by the way, this is like 2015. This isn't that long ago. Yeah, this was 2015.

At that point, I've traveled hundreds of thousands. of miles in my life with this one bag. And I was super annoyed and I was just like, okay, I'm just going to buy a really nice bag that I love and this won't happen again for a long time. So I ask a bunch of people and every single person is like, I don't know or I have this, but don't get it, it's awful. Or I would specifically ask a friend that I knew traveled a lot. And he or she would be like, oh, I don't actually know what brand.

I travel with. And I think it was so crazy to me that all of these people, including myself, who love to travel, who did it all the time, who packed a suitcase every time they traveled, really had no connection to this thing that they brought with them on every single flight, on every single trip. Right. Like most people would go to like Target or T.J. Max or something or or, or marshals and just like go to the suitcase area and get a suitcase. Yeah, and I didn't want to do that, which is why I asked everyone. And then I found out that, like, no one really had luggage that they loved. There was one girl who really loved hers, and it was, like, $4,000.

Wow. I didn't even know they make $4,000 luggage. Yeah, I know. Me neither. So what I thought to myself was I have to find this brand. Like, there has to be a great luggage brand out there. Like, I didn't think, like, I'm going to start one. I was just like...

You were not looking for, like, just to be clear, you weren't... looking for like a category to start a business in? No, not at all. Not at all. No, I was like, I wanted to go shopping. I wanted to buy the right thing so that this wouldn't happen again. And I was I was crowdsourcing for answers and I didn't get an answer. And these are people who I have like amassed a network of friends over time who, whose taste I really trust, whose advice I take.

And no one had any advice for me. Everyone was like, good luck. So I started to think, why doesn't this luggage brand exist? Like, how come buying luggage is so awful? Like, how come you have to go into, like, the basement of a department store or in New York? There's all these, like, crazy luggage stores in Midtown that are massive. And you go in, and there's a $500 bag next to a $50 bag, and they look exactly the same. And, like, the luggage salesman is, like, whispering in your ear.

Like, I can give you 30% off if you buy it right now. I was like, why is this so horrible? So that's when I maybe thought that I could start something. Like at this point, like I was interviewing for jobs. And in my head, I was like, I can start a little luggage business on the side and like make it like some cool brand and maybe sell it at like at Liberty or Annette Porte or like these cool places that I like to shop. And that's when I caught up with Steph. When I was at Warby Parker, I met Steph Corey, and we had started on the same day, and we became fast friends, and we were friends all throughout my time at Warby Parker.

What did she do at Warby Parker? She ran supply chain there. So she was in charge of how the glasses were made, like the factories that we got him from, like how they got to the states to be shipped to customers, just like stuff that I actually technically, went to school for but really didn't know much about. But we kind of went through this like the crazy growth of where we Parker together. And we stayed friends and we'd like loosely kept in touch. We'd check in every few months. So just as this like this little baby idea of of making

luggage that my friends would love was brewing in my head, I reached out to stuff and like I sent her Facebook message. And I said, hey, there's something I've been thinking about would love to catch up with you. And she was in business school at the time. She had left Orby Parker. Yeah. She left Orby Parker to go to business school at Columbia. And she'd just always been my sounding board. So I called her to catch up. And I was mostly complaining. I was like, this luggage brand doesn't exist. Like, I have a bunch of ideas. Like, I think I could make like a cool one, but also how annoying I have to go interview for this other job. And we were just catching up. And this was supposed to be a 10-minute call. And like three hours later, we were still on the phone.

And basically, she was in business school and she had been looking to start something. And she was the one who was like, what we did at Warby Parker, we can do with luggage. And we basically got off the phone and she realized like all the same things that we saw with eyewear. And we were. we were seeing with luggage, like crazy markups in the industry, like no brands that people really loved, like a really awful shopping experience. So she was coming at it from this whole like supply chain disruption angle. And she's, I guess she was sitting there in business school,

like looking for her category. And I basically called her with my little baby idea to start a luggage brand. And she was like, this is it. Like this is what we have to do. when we come back in just a minute, how Jen and Steph turned this baby idea into a reality, and how a coffee table book saved their business. Stay with us, I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This from NPR. Hey, welcome back to How I Built This from NPR.

Okay, so it's 2015, and Jen Rubio and Steph Corey have this idea for a better luggage brand. But to start working on it would take a leap of faith, because at the time, both of the of them were interviewing for other jobs. So I was still living in London, and I was in pretty late stages to be VP of marketing at this fashion company. Steph was in business school and talking to a few startups about being like their VP of supply chain. And I was actually being flown into New York for like one of my final interviews.

And I realized as I was doing the interview that I was like, I don't. want to do this. I want to do the luggage thing. It's like I do the interview. I don't even remember how it went. But I got the job offer and I really didn't want to take it because I had been so excited about about this idea for a luggage brand that I actually wrote I wrote stuff in email about how I never wanted to be an entrepreneur before but like was really passionate about this idea and I thought that we were the two perfect people to do it and I made a whole list of everything I wanted a co-founder and then explained how she embodied all of those things. Like I wanted someone who had like a complimentary skill set and like had other lucrative opportunities that they were

turning down to do this, which was like a like a weird qualifier, but it was really important to me. And it wasn't until I wrote that email like asking her to be my co-founder and asking her to do this with me that that was the point I kind of realized I wanted to be an entrepreneur. Did you come up with the name already at that point? I feel like everyone's always looking for like some wild story about how I came up with it. But as I was doing my research, I was like trying to stay organized and I made like a folder on my computer and it was like TBD luggage brand. And one day I like opened my computer and I just took.

typed in Away as a placeholder, like it just came to me. And I always had it in my head, like, there's no way we can use, like, away as a brand name. It's, like, such a simple, like, four-letter word. It's, like, extremely common. And then Steph and I actually spent a lot of time, like, brainstorming new names, but we just never came up with anything as good. And she found, like, some trademark lawyers and asked them if we could trademark it. And they basically laughed in our face. And she was like, she like insisted that they looked into it. And then a week later, they called us and they said, you have been given a gift from the marketing gods because this trademark is available in your category in a lot of different countries. All right. So you have a name.

And what's the first step? Like how do you, how do you get luggage made? Like, where do you, where do you even start? Yeah. So kind of like our first steps made sense to us because we are who we are. I had this branding background. She had this supply chain background. And I was like, okay, we need to get a branding agency. Like, we need someone to do this. And it was still, like, we didn't even have a product. We didn't even know how to make it. But I was like, I'm going to start working on the branding. And you have to design it. Like, designed what the suitcases are going to look like? Oh, yeah. I didn't even think about that. I was like, I was like, I can sell anything. I was like, we have to brand it. She's like, what are you branding? I'm like, the company. Don't worry about it. But she kind of went with it. So that's where my head was at. And, and stuff. was like, okay, well, we have to, like, come up with a product to sell. So how did you find, like, I mean, how did you even begin? Because I have to assume that suitcase is probably mainly made in China, but, like, in terms of finding a place to make them and designers. And, like, what was the, what did you do?

How did you know what to do? Yeah, so we at Warby Parker, you know, Steph basically learned how to make things. And obviously, like, the industries are different. but she had a bunch of contacts in China who she asked for intros to, like in the luggage space. You know, we cast this wide net. We realized that there are lots of different factories, like a varying degrees of being good at what they do

and like varying degrees of working conditions and like in the end product and all of that, that we couldn't really make a decision until we had decided what to make. And I think the first few weeks were just like really intense, like our intense version of like market research, which basically meant we went shopping, like every single day. We went to every department store. We went to every luggage store and like compared all the experiences and all the prices and kept very meticulous notes

on what was out there, mainly because we couldn't afford to like pay for the industry reports. So we're like, we'll just figure this out ourselves. So we start shopping for luggage and we're like getting a better sense of like what was being offered. It still wasn't super clear to us. So we decided that to really create the perfect luggage, we need to actually figure out what people wanted. So over the course of a few months, we talked to like maybe 800 people and we would just talk to them about travel and we would ask them things like not even about luggage, but about their biggest pain points when they travel. And we discovered things like people would get to hotel rooms and they would like steal laundry bags from the hotels because

like they didn't have their own or that, you know, everybody like wanted a bag that they could fit a ton of stuff in, but also have it be flexible, but also really durable and like really lightweight. And then something we heard a ton was my biggest pain point, like one of my biggest pain points when I travel is like my phone always dies when I'm at the airport. So we were basically armed with, with not a list of features, but, but stories that kept coming up. And that's how we figured out all of the things we needed to make, like, our one perfect suitcase. So as the design process began, what, like, how did that work? Like, what did you, what did you want the bag to look like? Yeah. So basically, you know, Steph and I had this list and then I

knew what I wanted it to look like. And, you know, we were basically up like 20 hours a day because our industrial designers were in San Francisco. We had factories that we were talking to in China. Basically the second one of them wrote us an email, like we would make sure to write back or pass it on, so there would be no delays. Because also in all of this, and to this day I don't know where it came from,

but, you know, this was like January, this was like February of 2015, and we had it in our heads that we wanted to launch by Christmas. So in less than a year, we wanted to have, like, product out into the world. And luckily, like, we really didn't have anything else to do. So we just, like, immersed ourselves fully in this. And we're just obsessed with every single detail. So I guess, I mean, what's amazing is by, I mean, this idea really begins in 2015, like, January, February of 2015.

By November of that year, you guys managed to raise, I think, like, two and a half million. million dollars from from from VC companies yeah was it was that hard to get I mean was it hard to make the case because it sounds like it was pretty easy I mean pretty quickly after the you had the idea yeah so in March of 2015 like when this was barely an idea like we still didn't have a ton of direction what we were doing a friend of mine in San Francisco introduced me to Yuri Kim who's a partner at Forerunner and Forerunner is the VC firm that invested in Warby Parker and Everlane and Dollar Shave Club and Jet.com. And they just had like these amazing portfolio and these amazing wins.

And we had heard about them obviously when we worked at Warby but didn't really interact with them. And my friend was like, I'll introduce you to one of the partners. And me, like I just had like the audacity to schedule a meeting with her even though we literally had nothing. At this point, we still thought away was a placeholder name. It was just like an idea to create this thing. And we were basically just like in the throes of doing research. But I was in San Francisco and I met with Yuri and I kind of like, it was basically just like a meeting of me being excited about what we were doing.

In my head, it wasn't like me pitching her. But because of that, like because of that early meeting and because of like her wanting to stay in touch and being excited about the idea and seeing. how excited we were about the idea. Like we stayed in touch, which meant that when we actually went out to raise our seed round in the summer, we already had like a foot in the door with one of the firms that we wanted to partner with. And we pitched a lot of, we pitched a lot of VCs. It was like a crazy process. We were like super diligent. We had this crazy spreadsheet of every single venture capital firm who'd ever invested in a direct-to-consumer brand, who the partner was at each firm that did it. If we had any, like, mutual connections on LinkedIn, like, how we would get to them. We had this, like, crazy master plan for fundraising. So you really thought this through. I mean, you were really methodical about it.

You and Steph were really, I mean, you really did your homework. Yeah. I mean, I think part of it was that, like, that deadline to launch in 2015 came from nobody but us. But we just, we really wanted to do it. I don't even know where that timeline came from. And you wanted to do it in time for Christmas. Yeah, we wanted to do in time for Christmas. Yeah. We're like, this would be like a great way to launch, like get a ton of press. So we had this like self-imposed deadline looming above our heads. But like once we wrote the timeline down, we stuck to it. And that meant being super methodical in everything we were doing, whether it was designing the product or fundraising or just like literally anything that we were doing. But yeah, so we raised the seed round in the summer. And we talked to a lot of investors and Yuri Kim, a four runner, ended up. co-leading our seed round, and she actually brought in the other co-lead, which was Brian O'Malley

from Excel at the time. So you guys, I mean, by that summer, you get your, you get your, $2.5 million. Two and a half million. So what was the plan in the summer of 2015? So the plan was to launch before Christmas, and we had known from previous experience that this was like a very, very lucrative time to, to launch something. All the media does gift guides. There's also, like, a lot of demand for, like, human interest stories and things like that. So it had all these angles that we wanted to hit. But basically, the plan was to launch the suitcases and get a lot of press, because we knew from Warby Parker that the press was a big part of driving sales. Right. They had this, like, article in GQ or Vogue or something that just, like,

like blew up for them. But this is already July, August of 2015. Like the big magazines are already, they're already making decisions about their Christmas issues at this point. Their gift giving guides at this point. Yeah, so we didn't know that at the time. We were like, got months. But yeah, our whole thing was launch before Christmas,

get a lot of press, sell a lot of suitcases. But we found out when we placed our order in August, that because of the way we designed the bags and we used all these top-of-the-line components and we had looked at every single supplier and wanted all the best things from all the suppliers that there was no way that our bag would be ready before Christmas. Wow.

Which I don't know why it was so surprising to us. We were like, what do you mean? Like we have this timeline in this spreadsheet and it says like the spreadsheet that we made up and it said that if we ordered the bags by August, we would have them for Christmas. Yeah, right. And it's so weird that this whole world did not adhere to our timeline.

And it was as if, like, someone had said, like, we had to stop doing the company, even though it was a self-imposed deadline. At this point, we'd actually started, like, we didn't even have a suitcase yet, and we'd already started talking to editors and to, like, potential PR agencies about what we were doing. And we had gotten some really good feedback. But didn't they want to see the suitcase, or did you, were you sending them, like, photos of it? We were sending them, like, three-de-year-old. renderings and we're mostly just like selling them on on this idea that that like before us

amazing affordable luggage did not exist and beyond that there was like this whole brand that was obsessed with travel the way that they were and that we were creating it so people were just excited about that and when we found out the bags weren't going to be ready we were like okay what are we going to launch like we can't launch suitcases so so basically our options were like don't launch or push it back, which it wasn't on the table for us for whatever reason. Or we could launch with a pre-order, which I think is just like the most boring thing you can do when you're launching a brand. Like no one wants to put their credit card down for something that they like may or may not get. So we came up with this idea and the idea was that we would come up with something before Christmas

that people would want to buy that would show them that we were like this amazing new travel brand that they've never heard of. Right. So the idea was to write a book. A book? A book? Yeah. A book. And this is before a single suitcases come off the factory lot, right?

Actually, I'm just like, I was just like this freak with all these crazy ideas and stuff would be like, okay, okay, we can make this work. Like, we were just total enablers. Was it going to be a book of your, like, photos of your luggage? No. So basically, I was like, we're sitting in this weekwork. We're like, okay, we have to show people that we're an exciting new travel brand. and that they're going to love us. So the book was we were going to find 40 taste makers,

like not celebrities, but people who had really strong communities, like people who we wanted to vouch for us, essentially. And my friend who was like a freelancer for T-Magazer for T-Magazze and Vogue and Into the Gloss, she was going to interview these people about, like, their favorite place to travel to. And she would write the little blurbs. And then we realized that, like, we would need photos in the book, would be really boring, so she would also ask them for their vacation photos. And we came up with this list of people that she would interview.

And the whole plan was to write this book and to, you know, we had two, it was just us and two designers at the time. And we got them to agree to design the book. So we're like, we're going to make a coffee table book. And then inside the coffee table book, we're going to put a gift card that people can redeem for the luggage. Wait, let me just pause for say. You had raised $2.5 million from VCs who wanted you to make luggage, and you were now using that money to come up with a coffee table book of people's vacations? I didn't even think about that.

I'm just, I'm just one, like, did anybody say, hey, what are you guys doing? Or did they not really know? Well, it's actually funny because when we were trying to choose our investors, a lot of the feedback that we got were like, oh, you're creating the Warby Parker for luggage. great, we'll invest. And those are super easy conversations. The other feedback was like, you know, we would show them a picture of the luggage, like a rendering of the luggage and they'd be like, I don't get it. It's just luggage. Like what's different about it? We're like, well, here's all the great things about the product. But also, and then I would go on and on about this brand that we were building. And I would like ramble about the brand. And I was like, like, we make luggage, but we're a travel brand. It's really going to connect with people. And that's the whole idea for a way is that. people didn't emotionally connect with Samsonite or Toomey or any of these other brands. And basically, the VCs that we ended up going with were the ones who got that brand was this tangible thing that we could make uniquely ours. And that's what would set us apart. So every time, and even now, like every time we come up with like some crazy idea like this, they're like, okay, it must be for the brand.

So no one questioned what we did. Yeah. Where were you going to sell the book? So we were going to, that was like the book was the thing that we were going to sell. So we had set up this whole website to sell luggage that wasn't going to be ready. So then we changed the website to sell the book. Wait, so if you went on the away website in November of 2015, you could only buy the away coffee table book? You could not buy a suitcase?

Yeah, I mean, I guess, I guess like a different way of looking at it would be like you would, it was basically a pre-order for the suitcase, but you would get the book. And the reason we did that was because we would. wanted people to be able to give people things for the holidays, like something tangible. So, yeah, so if you went on the away website in November of 2015, you would buy the coffee table book and the book would come with a gift card for the suitcase, but you would have to go back on the website in February to redeem the gift card. And it was like the craziest, like, least efficient idea on paper and even now, as I'm telling you. But stuff was like, you know what? I think this could really work.

And we made 2,000 of these books. And I remember, like, the books got delivered and they came these huge boxes. And I think Steph and I looked at each other and we were like, this is either a great idea or we're going to have these books in this office, like, fraternity. Yeah. Which is like these thousands of books showed up. So November rolls around. We had lined up a bunch of press.

We invested a ton of time in meeting with editors, like, getting them to fall in. love with us and the idea and the product that would eventually launch. And on November 9, 2015, we woke up and there's a big feature on vogue.com all about this new travel brand, and that was our launch. And we had the book on the website, and we basically spent the whole day, like, refreshing Google Analytics, refreshing our, like our little dashboard for the platform that we were selling on. And people just started buying the book.

Wow. And how much did it cost? Well, so basically you had to buy the book for $225, which was the price of the first suitcase, and we sold hundreds on the first day. On the first day? On the first day. So Vogue wrote about it. A bunch of other outlets picked it up. All of the people in the book were really excited about it. We had like a big dinner. Everyone was posting about it. And then the next day, like hundreds more sold.

And then more the next day. And by the end of a couple of weeks, we had sold out of all of the books and each book represented one suitcase that we ordered. So we had sold out of our first order. And at this point, you still did not have a single suitcase like in stock in the U.S. No, so basically every suitcase that would come in February was accounted for. So February of 2016, the suitcases were going to arrive from China. Exactly. And how, and where, like, do they come in like a giant shipping container to, like, a warehouse in New York?

Yeah. So, so it's actually great because, so this, like, the holidays happened. We sold the books. Like, our minds were blown. And we were like, look at the appetite for this brand. Like, all the stuff we told VCs is real. And we actually weren't sure if it would be. So that felt great.

But then we were like, okay, we actually have to get the luggage over here. So right after Christmas, we flew to our factory, and we actually spent days in the factory on the production line doing like quality control, checking every suitcase. Like Steph and I were like, we're standing there with all the factory workers. Like we inspected every bag off of the line. They got packaged in their boxes. Were you happy with them? Did they look the way you wanted them to look? Yeah, it was a dream come true because we'd basically spent.

an entire year just imagining it and designing it and like and putting in the work and I had never been a part of that process before of like coming up with and designing something from scratch and then seeing the end result. So there were a lot of tears. It was like a very emotional time. But we were like, I was like on the factory floor like crying like hugging the suitcase. But yeah, so that was January. They put them on a boat and they made their way over and we sold our first physical suitcase in February of 2016. Wow. That year, I think in your first, the first year where you actually had the suitcases, you ended up selling 55,000 suitcases, which is amazing. How did people find out about them? I mean, I think what we saw pretty quickly is that our timing was perfect.

Like we were in this time in social media where travel is a status symbol. Everyone wanted to post about not just their trips and not just about the beach that they're on or like the mountain that they're skiing on. But how they got there and people were taking photos at airports or even when they were packing. And Steph and I realized that like we had to be a part of this. And we had to be the bag in all of those photos that people were posting as they were packing or as they were. at the airport. So we basically found, I mean, in the beginning, in the beginning was a lot of press. And then it was a lot of basically anyone we knew on social media that had a lot of followers,

like asking them to post about the bag during that kind of like pre-trip process. And we made it so that anytime you would open Instagram and someone was like getting ready for a trip, they would be posting a photo with their away suitcase. How did you, I mean, pretty, I guess, Pretty soon you were, I mean, celebrities were starting to use the bags like Rashida Jones and Carly Klaus. I mean, did you deliberately seek them out and say, hey, check out our bags or how did that happen? I think what happened was we'd gifted to a couple of celebrities and I can't remember who, but, you know, celebrities get their photo taken by paparazzi when they leave the airport. So the bag would start showing up like in all of these magazines.

as celebrities were leaving airports. So I think that did a lot for growing our customer base and also other celebrities seeing it. But I think what's been amazing is that, like, celebrities were so drawn to the brand that every celebrity collaboration we've ever done has been because that celeb has been a customer. And it was crazy.

Like, I don't know how it happened. Like, when we first launched the book and we were, like, looking at the orders come in, you know, we would see the names of every single person who order. Oh, who'd order, yeah. Yeah, and I remember, be like, oh, I know that person from college,

like they must have seen on Facebook, or like, I used to work with that person. And it'd be, like, names of people we knew, and then maybe, like, names of people we didn't know. But then once in a while, like, you know, we were watching orders come in one day and Laura Jean Witherspoon ordered a bag. And stuff said it out loud.

And I was like, that's Reese Witherspoon. That's her real name. She's like, that's so weird that you know that. But yeah, like, Like, she had heard about it from, like, one of these articles or one of these influencers, and she ordered a book. So she actually has one of our, like, original books and the bag. You started this company, just the two of you, in 2015. How many employees do you have now?

We've close to 250 employees. Wow. I mean, it is pretty unbelievable. Like, you, I mean, on the one hand, it is unbelievable, right? You start this company in 2015. Today, three and a plus years later, you know, you're doing, I don't know, the last I've seen is 50 million in revenue, probably higher today. So we've sold over 1 million suitcases. Wow.

I mean, it's pretty amazing how quickly that's happened. But at the same time, like you really, both you and staff came to this with a lot of experience, an experience that really kind of set you up. to succeed in in this venture. Like this was, like you, you sort of took the time to kind of learn the ropes. And, I mean, in some ways, it's not surprising that it succeeded so quickly. I don't know. I mean, does it surprise you?

I think that just things have been moving so quickly that, like, I don't think we stop enough to, like, to think about what happened and what we've done. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that, we're so different and basically like any strength that Steph has is like my weakness and vice versa. So that meant like from the beginning we had all bases covered. So I feel like even if this wasn't a runaway success, we would have done things like twice as quickly or twice as good as anyone else. Because we really like from the beginning operated as like one brain.

But I mean, I don't know. I think it's like I never set out to do this. I never set out to run a company with hundreds of people. And I think what's asked of you when you have a couple dozen employees and maybe like a couple million in revenue is so different than what is being asked for us now. So for us, like, while externally it definitely has been successful and really exciting and something we're really proud of, we're just like we're constantly like behind the scenes, like trying to fix things or trying to,

trying to keep up with things. Yeah. You know, like those first investor meetings, they'll sit there and look at you to see if you have what it takes or if you have the idea that can turn into a $1 billion company. And to us, that was so daunting. Like, how do you create a billion dollar company? And now the kinds of investors that we meet with or that we're getting to know for this next phase of the business will say things like, yeah, we really, you know, we're really

just evaluating to see if this can be like a five or ten billion dollar company, which which is mind blowing. Yeah. I mean, you are like at the time of this recording, you're only 32. You've got, oh my God, like your entire career ahead of you. Where do you see this company going? I mean, do you, what do you imagine a way becoming beyond a company that sells suitcases? I'm only 31. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm just kidding. I was like, am I 32? I mean, so I think for us, it's funny because the future of away really goes back to what we were saying in those first investor meetings that we're building this travel brand. And I think we talked about it a lot, but we didn't really know what it meant. We knew we were going to be a travel brand and we were going to start by selling luggage.

But we became so obsessed with just every part of the travel experience. So I think, you know, in the short term, like our goal right now is, The way you would go to Nike, if you're playing sports and you can get everything from like one sportswear brand and they make all the different things. Like we want to do that with travel. Like when someone's going on a trip, we want to make everything they need to go on that trip seamlessly. But I think in the long term, like what we've done or what we're trying to do is really set this foundation for how do we create a brand that people love and trust in it? so that we can solve every single part of the travel experience. Do you, how much do you think of, how much do you think luck played a part in your success

and how much do you think it was hard work and skill and talent? I think it's, it's probably 50-50. I mean, I think for me personally, luck and timing had so much to do with, with everything I've done at every single step, just in terms of like the way we timed things or the people that we met. even just the fact that, like, it was really lucky that I called Steph when I did and that we didn't take the jobs that we were supposed to. But I think we worked our tails off, especially in that first year just obsessing over everything. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I think it's like every time

I saw something that excited me, I would find a way to do it. Like, I never thought, oh, I need to get a degree to do that or I need to have certain work experience to do that. I would just find a way to do it. And I think, I'm just a very curious person. That's something I learned from my dad, actually. And I just followed all of my curiosities. That's Jen Rubio of a way. The company has expanded its product line a bit since those first few bags came off the factory floor. In addition to their signature hard shell suitcases, they now sell duffel bags, backpacks, even packing cubes. And the brand continues to gain more and more celebrity fans, including most recently, Gutsch's Megan Markle, who reportedly gifted away suitcases as party favors at her baby shower.

And please do stick around because in just a moment, we're going to hear from you about the things you're building. But first, a quick message from one of our sponsors, Smartwater. Inspired by fresh thinkers whose stories you're listening to, smart water has more ways to hydrate. Smartwater alkaline with 9 plus pH and smart water antioxidant with added saline. Smart water? That's pretty smart. Hey, thanks so much for sticking around because it's time now for how you built that. And today's story comes to us from John Maroni, who lives just outside Grand Rapids in Michigan.

Anyway, back in November of 2015, the snows came early to the east side of Lake Michigan. And one afternoon, John decided to take the kids sledding. Sledding is something fun. You can grab a few sleds and go find a hill and spend hours. And as John watched his kids slide down the hill, he thought, hey, I want to get in on the action because sledding is awesome. But John is also a fully grown, middle-aged man. And as he sat on that sled waiting to glide down the hill, he realized that sleds don't always agree with grown-ups. Many pounds and years later on our bodies, sledding isn't quite as exciting as it used to be when you're 8, 10, 12 years old.

Which to John didn't seem fair or right. Sledding should be fun for everyone. And besides, this seemed like a problem waiting to be solved, which worked out great because John happens to be a professor of product design. So that afternoon, he decided to take out his notepad and take some notes. We noticed that a lot of kids like to run and jump onto their sleds, trying to get a little bit more speed. And a lot of them would do it running and then kneeling on their sled as they

go down and hitting jumps and things like that. Well, that was terribly uncomfortable for us as adults. That kind of got the wheels turning a little bit. The wheels started turning, and John got in touch with a group of friends who also loved to solve design problems. He shared his notes with the team, and he asked, hey, could we figure out a way to make sledding more comfortable and more fun, not just for kids, but for grownups too. One of the team members said to us, hey, I think we could really make this a little bit

more exciting if we created two independent sleds and strapped into our legs. Two sleds strapped to your legs. Kind of like the pads a hockey goalie might wear, but instead of pads, they'd be sleds. So John and his buddies decided to pursue this idea. They pool together about $20,000 each and got to work. The first prototype was actually kind of like a foam-filled sled that was cut in half and duct tape to somebody's legs, just to see if it were possible to have two independent legs with something underneath them track and stay straight down a hill.

It was possible, but not that simple. So for the next model, John made a hard plastic shell to fit over the lower legs. Screwed some straps to it and then cut up some yoga mats and stuck those on the inside just to get a little bit of cushion. Yeah, you laugh, but when you're my age, that matters. This version did move better on the snow, but now John needed to make the sleds more comfortable without losing that agility. The foam was kind of the key ingredient to all of this. There's an impact energy absorbing foam that goes into it that sort of raises your feet up in the back

and really makes it possible to go down the hill and pick up some speed without totally dragging your feet the whole way. At this point, John needed feedback on his design, so he got his friends, his kids, and his neighbor's kids to try them out. You know, we heard really straightforward things like, I really like how I can run and slide on them. It helps me go faster. I like how I can walk up the hill and not have to carry my sled up. By the next winter, 2016, the team was ready to sell their product.

They used some of their money for advertising, and they ended up selling 800 units. It was time to celebrate. But... About two days after that big shipment, We hit this local ski hill. All the founders put on a pair, jumped, went down the hill, and half of them broke on the very first run. Thank God for the beer, because that probably made it a little bit more tolerable when we discovered what the problem was.

But, man, it sure didn't feel good at all. The problem was the straps. They weren't properly attached. So the team grabbed the beer and left the hill and spent an entire night troubleshooting. And after a few days, they sent customers a follow-up shipment. It had better fasteners and instructions on how to attach them. And they also started gearing up for the next winter. They tweaked the sled design and they added a smaller size for little kids.

So when the 2017 season rolled around... We sold 8,000 units. We actually sold out. John Moroni and his team are the founders of sled legs. Next year, they're planning to sell sled legs in stores. If you want to find out more about John or hear previous episodes, head to our podcast page, How I Built This.NPR.org. And of course, if you want to tell us your story, go to build.npr.org.

And thanks so much for listening to the show this week. You can subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. And while you're there, please do give us a review. You can also write to us at hibt at npr.org. And if you want to send a tweet, it's at How I Built This. Our show is produced this week by Rachel Faulkner with music composed by Rumtin Arablui. Thanks also to Julia Carney, J.C. Howard, Nora Kudzi, Neva Grant, Melissa Gray, Sanaz Meshkampur, and Jeff Rogers. Our intern is Candice Lim.

I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to How I Built This. This is NPR.