The Modern Retail Podcast

Making Marketing is making some changes. Starting with our very next episode, we'll be the Modern Retail Podcast, bringing you conversations with people innovating in retail, including the oh-so-buzzy world of DTC. But before that, this episode rounds up a few highlights from Making Marketing's interviews in the past year: Kevin Lavelle, the founder of menswear brand Mizzen and Main "I’ve spoken with a couple VC firms. We had positive feedback, but one VC said she couldn’t see how we could [make] 10 times our revenue over the next 12-18 months, so they’re not interested. And it stuck with me. She was absolutely right." Rachel Drori, founder of the subscription frozen food company Daily Harvest "I have such issues with what I call the cycle of torching cash. What’s happening is that there’s so much VC money out there — anybody can raise — and then they can throw money at their problems." Joe Kudla, founder of athleisure brand Vuori "If you go straight to the VC community pre-revenue, they’re going to dictate terms often terms. You don’t want a VC running your business." Jed Berger, CMO at Foot Locker "I think that it’s an interesting time, and in many companies, there needs to be a redefinition of the role of the CMO, or marketing within the organization, or how it reports, or what its accountabilities are. The marketing industry is in for an evolution."

Equinox took the gym and turned it into a premium product. Now the company is looking to do the same with the fitness instruction videos you watch online -- think high-end camera work instead of vertical video shot on an iPhone, featuring some of their 6,000 instructors and full-fledged classes. Equinox Group is serious enough about it that they've put a new division of the company, Equinox Media, to the task. "We're really running a half fitness club, half production studio every single day," Equinox Media CEO Jason LaRose said on this week's episode of Making Marketing. In this, LaRose said, they're responding to trends among existing customers -- who in surveys say they want to spend more time with the brand -- and Americans as a whole. "When you see a $4 trillion wellness economy, when you see gym or club memberships at an all-time high in this country while you also see digital content going through the roof, I think you're on to something where you really need to follow the consumer." In this week’s episode of Making Marketing, LaRose talked about starting a content-making company from scratch, how stores today are more about marketing than bringing in revenue and why media will be a customer acquisition tool.

Working at the NFL gave Rhone CEO Nate Checketts a pretty good lay of the land as far as men's activewear went. And what he saw was a big hole in the supply-side of the market. "Lululemon was really leading the charge" in marketing premium workout clothes to women, he said. "And then you had all of these brands that were there going after the same customer." But no one seemed to be doing that for men. "If you were to look at the men's side -- at, call it a 40% price premium to the Nike, Under Armour, Reebok, Adidas of the world -- it was crickets. It was nobody." So Checketts co-founded Rhone, a clothing company meant to give guys threads that they can wear at the gym, in social settings or often both. In this week’s episode of Making Marketing, Checketts talked about just how far back the DTC model goes, why it's easier than ever to go small (but harder than ever to go big) and the tough standards venture capitalists often judge brands by.

Amazon doesn't just dominate the market for paperbacks and e-books. Through its subsidiary Audible, they've got the audiobook market (worth $2.1 billion, according to Bloomberg) cornered, too. They're also not limiting themselves to putting existing books on tape. "We want to give our customers experience beyond traditional audiobooks," said Audible CMO John Harrobin. The company's range of audio products -- like Audible-exclusive books and listenable stories from The New York Times -- means that "competition is anything that you can do when your eyes are occupied but when your mind is free." Many of Audible's subscribed listeners consume 80% of their content in just one format, whether e-book, print or audio. "But several people are choosing to listen to certain types of content via audio," said Harrobin. "For example, many people that are e-book readers listen to non-fiction on audio, because they do it in their commutes. It's not that escape moment for them where they're relaxing and reading." On this week’s episode of Making Marketing, Harrobin talked about how the company serves as both a platform and a creator of original content, the reason brands are so bent on selling "purpose" and a serendipitously-named Kentucky Derby contender.

Even in states that have legalized marijuana, opening a business that sells it can be hard. Some of it, according to Kristi Knoblich Palmer, the co-founder of Kiva Confections, which makes edible THC products, is just down to people not wanting cannabis retail in their backyards. For a time, even Instagram was skeptical of letting Kiva's products -- mints, gummies, and chocolates -- show up on their platform. "Our account kept getting shut down," said Knoblich Palmer, even though they were "keeping it informative, all about education -- and then you'd look at other pages that weren't getting shut down and weren't getting flagged, and they were racy and inappropriate." Still, her company's answer was to keep graduating marijuana's image. "We really have to act professionally and go above and beyond to make ourselves look professional, to act professionally, and to help overturn that stigma," said Knoblich Palmer, who launched Kiva in 2010. That starts with the packaging, where 95% of Kiva's brand image happens. "Having a beautiful package was the front door for the consumer," said Knoblich Palmer. "It had to step up the edibles category as a whole and really let edibles finally sit in a different part of the mind for consumers." Beyond that, down-to-the-milligram precision in THC dosage ("everybody had those college experiences" of having a bit too much) goes a long way in building trust with consumers. On this week’s episode of Making Marketing, Knoblich Palmer talked about the responsibility she feels when marketing a product that some people still oppose, how the company started in her kitchen, and what her vision for the company in five years is.

Reddit bills itself as "the front page of the internet" with more than 300 million average monthly active users. But from a marketer's perspective, much of it represents an untapped audience "We're very lucky in that we have seen our top-line awareness continue to grow year over year, largely organically," said Roxy Young, vp of marketing at Reddit. Next comes bridging what she calls "the relevance gap" -- convincing people who know about Reddit to browse and join the website. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Young talked about how the company aims to bring some gender balance to its user base, the technical features it's still catching up on after last year's website redesign, and her own favorite subreddits.

Gin Lane was the ad agency behind some of the most well-known digitally native brands that have sprung up in the past few years. And co-founder Emmett Shine helped create the look, feel, and digital interfaces of modern brands like Harry's, Recess, and Sweetgreen. But then he wanted more. This summer, Gin Lane shut up shop. In its next iteration -- under the new name of Pattern -- Shine wants to now create what he calls the next generation of brands: It's not just about transactions, but building a relationship with customers. And -- though he doesn't want to "sound too New Age, wellness-y" -- helping them cope with the alienation common to modern life. "We all live in cities, we don't as much go to church, we don't have as many organized, civic things that we do." Shine said on this week's episode of the Making Marketing podcast, adding that in this age, brands are poised, and have a responsibility, to have a purpose in their customers' lives. The company's first product is a line of high-quality cookware called Equal Parts, which customers can get extra use out of through content via the company's coaching program to help people cook. "It's something that is just inherently positive," he said. "It makes you feel good to cook for yourself or for someone else."

MetLife is as opposite to a start-up as any company you can imagine. But that doesn't mean it shouldn't think like one, says the company's U.S. CMO, Hugh Dineen. "How does a 150 year old company stay in the game? It's the same thing in terms of how you think about marketing. Our customer is dynamic, and so must we be." Hugh Dineen joined Shareen Pathak on this week’s episode of Making Marketing to discuss the digital side of best in class marketers, why advertising is overblown, and how enlisting mid-sized influencers ("not the Kardashians") is the way to go.

When's the last time a shoe company made you feel all warm inside? Atoms is looking to do that. Its two founders moved from Pakistan to the United States to craft shoes with a personal touch, not solely in their customization -- they come in quarter sizes, and you can get slightly different measurements for each foot since "most people have shoe size difference between their left and right foot," co-founder Waqas Ali says -- but in the hand-written notes and other inviting customer engagement methods. Sidra Qasim and Waqas Ali joined Shareen Pathak on this week’s episode of Making Marketing to discuss how the couple plans to keep that personal touch as their company grows (it scored $8.1 million in Series A funding earlier this year).

At any given moment, millions of articles of clothing are coursing through ThredUp's logistics behemoth. Founded 10 years ago, the company will send you an empty bag for you to fill with clothes that you want to cash in on. Then they'll take them off of your hands to photograph, price, and ultimately sell online -- after which, of course, you pocket some consignment money. “The source of all of that amazing product are the closets across America. It turns out that people buy a lot of stuff, and even when they don't need to buy more, they buy more," said Anthony Marino, ThredUp's president (and formerly its CMO). "If you look at some recent statistics, in the United States, people buy on average 65 to 70 new items every year, and they wear them maybe 6 or 7 times and then never again.” Selling stuff through ThredUp, Anthony says, users can both experience the "life-changing magic of tidying up" so astutely promoted by Marie Kondo -- and feel like they're doing their part to reduce waste.

You'd be hard pressed to find a more beautifully packaged product than The Laundress's detergents. The company, which was acquired by Unilever in January for a reported $100 million, started off as a special-care laundry brand, and now makes a line of detergents and cleaning products. “We've had, since early on, women and men contact us about how we've saved their christening gown that's been in their family, or we saved a quilt of their grandmother's,” said Lindsey Boyd, co-founder of The Laundress, on this week’s episode of Making Marketing. Lindsey joined Shareen Pathak on this week’s episode of Making Marketing to discuss how to balance a brand's growth ambitions with reality, why retention is more important than acquisition, and what it means to be direct to consumer.

Direct-to-consumer is coming to furniture. The Inside, a one-year-old startup, is going down the path of companies like Burrow, by selling furniture online. The twist: It's also customized.

When Kara Goldin founded Hint in 2005, she was searching for a way to get herself to drink more water. Her solution: adding chopped fruit to pitchers of water, to offer flavor without the sweeteners of traditional flavored beverages. Thus, Hint was born. Now, almost 15 years later, Hint has become one of the largest independent, non-alcoholic drink companies in the U.S., boasting over $100 million in sales each year. The brand sells on Amazon and inside grocery stores, as well as through its own site. It's even launched new lines of products, such as kids' drinks and sunscreen. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Shareen Pathak sits down with Goldin, to discuss turning a product into a company, avoiding too much reliance on a single platform and expanding the brand into new categories.

Amy Fuller, CMO of Accenture, is overseeing an expansive list of functions throughout the company, and she likes it that way. For a company that seems to offer an endless list of services to its clients, this isn’t much of a surprise. Accenture hosts an expansive offering of services, which include everything from strategy, technology, consulting, operations, and with its recent acquisition of ad agency, Droga5, it now boasts a strong creative services offering as well. On this week’s episode of Making Marketing, Shareen Pathak sits down with Fuller to dig deep into why B2B marketing is converging with consumer, and how the company thinks of in-housing and the role agencies play in the industry.

Rachel Drori started a company because she was hungry. But once the seeds of Daily Harvest were planted in her head, she dove in, and started trying to build a brand. Now, with a cushion of VC funding, Drori is looking towards the next evolution of her company. According to Drori, some of the funding will be used to build out the brand's content strategy and help them share their story. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Shareen Pathak sits down with Drori, the brand's founder and CEO, to discuss how she built her business, why she worked with investors before taking funding and how she's pushing back against rising customer acquisition costs.

In the past few years, Foot Locker has been making headlines for its aggressive push to modernize, and according to the company's CMO, Jed Berger, that innovation has pushed their marketing department to start thinking about their customers in a new way. From investing in a handful of consumer startups, to rethinking their retail spaces, to launching their own incubator, the company has been working towards what it will be the next evolution of the retail industry. For Berger, this forward-thinking push means that how the company is marketing itself has to evolve as well. Now, Berger is getting involved in the products from the design stage to ensure that the consumer draw is built-in, and sees himself as more of a business partner, than a marketer. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Shareen Pathak sits down with Berger to discuss the changing role of marketing at Foot Locker, why the company chose to incubate and invest in new brands and the shift of the overall marketing industry.

Electric toothbrush DTC brand Quip wants to grow up, and it is doing so by going beyond DTC. As is common with many direct-to-consumer brands looking to scale, Quip participated in a pop-up, took to the New York City subways, and recently began selling its products in Target stores (although refills can only be bought directly from their website). Now, following the acquisition of dental insurance brand Afora, Quip is looking to expand its offering into services. Quipcare, which will be rolling out this summer in New York City, has two options that will let customers partake in either a pay-as-you-go model which offers services at a discount or a $25-a-month model that resembles traditional dental insurance. When asked about how the company plans to balance two very different businesses -- products and healthcare -- Shane Pittson, Quip's vp of growth, said it's all part of the same ecosystem. Customers can pick-and-choose which parts they would like to subscribe to, or they can subscribe to the full Quip "universe." On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Shareen Pathak sits down with Pittson to discuss how Quip learned from its DTC peers in its early days, why its move into Target is part of an accessibility-focused mission and how it's working to control the brand experience in places where it doesn't have total control.

When sustainable bedding brand Buffy, launched in late 2017, it looked like the archetypical direct-to-consumer company: online presence, purpose-driven marketing and no middlemen. However, that didn't last very long. In one of their earliest rejections of the direct-to-consumer tropes, Buffy did not take any VC capital. Instead, the founders opted for a few angel investments, and bootstrapped the rest of its funding strategy. According to Paul Shaked, Buffy's co-founder and vp of growth, growing has been at the core of Buffy's mission since day one, so shortly after launch they moved into selling third-party on Amazon, and then into physical retail. Now that the company has reached a point of scale it is happy with, it is starting to explore non-Instagram and more non-digital forms of marketing as a way to continue growing. In this week's episode of Making Marketing, Shaked sits down with Shareen Pathak to discuss the many tropes of a DTC brand, Buffy's approach to marketing and why it's investing in its own editorial platform.

When David Wolfe co-founded premium mattress brand, Leesa in 2014, he already had almost two decades of experience in the DTC world. Throughout that time, he says, he's learned to keep an eye firmly planted on technology. In the years since its launch, Leesa has expanded beyond DTC -- it now sells in West Elm, on Amazon and on its own site. Now, Wolfe is focused on finding new, more efficient ways to market the company, going beyond what he calls "traditional" digital marketing channels. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Shareen Pathak sits down with Wolfe to discuss how a brand purpose can be built authentically, why he's a big believer in video advertising and how he defines the word "omnichannel."

Vuori clothing, an athleisure brand launched in 2015, is a rarity: The company, which does do most of its business direct-to-consumer, has a healthy wholesale operation, a few physical stores of its own and has raised only a small angel funding round to date. The company's founder, Joe Kudla, joined Digiday on the Making Marketing podcast to talk about why it was important for his business to not go down the VC-funding route when it launched.

Burrow is a digital-born luxury furniture company, that, like most DTC brands, put most of its marketing eggs in the Facebook basket. But it soon realized that it can't simply rely on social media to drive sales. Burrow's head of intelligence, Alex Kubo joins us on this episode.

As the traditional lines of luxury blur, luxury marketers are competing for attention and consumer spend across categories. Lee Applbaum, CMO of the high-end spirits brands Patron Tequila and Grey Goose Vodka, part of Bacardi Global Brands Limited, is making a play for more of the luxury customer’s wallet. Applbaum discussed how platform partnerships can help the brand reach customers differently, how he thinks of marketing channels and more.

In the past year, the agency world has been rife with news of consolidation. Most executives have explained this as part of a longer-term plan to create less siloed organizational structures and pitching more efficient, integrated solutions to clients. Peter Sherman, executive vice president of Omnicom Group, doesn’t buy it. Sherman discusses the best path to consolidation, how consumer centricity has changed over the years and more.

Brand purpose has become the go-to phrase for chief marketing officers. Stephanie Buscemi, CMO at Salesforce, claims brand purpose is imperative for every brand and it’s even expected by the employees.

Shopify has emerged anew in the direct-to-consumer era. The 15-year-old e-commerce platform that powered the small business segment is worth $25 billion. Now, it's setting its sights on the larger brands. Hana Abaza, director of marketing at Shopify Plus, the division in Shopify that works with larger merchants, says the pitch is about distinguishing between control and ownership. Abaza discusses evolving as a platform to retain bigger brands as they grow, why the DTC companies are here to stay and more.

The direct-to-consumer era is changing consumer behavior and expectations across categories, be it retail or insurance. Liberty Mutual has felt this shift, and in its new products as well as marketing is attempting to change in line with those expectations. Emily Fink, CMO at Liberty Mutual, joins us on this episode.

The direct-to-consumer playbook at this point is well known: Launch online with one product, expand to physical stores, and stretch into new products and even categories. For Brooklinen, the online-born bedding brand, it's no different. The company, which made about $48 million in revenue last year and says it's on track to be a $100 million company, just experimented with a pop-up store in SoHo last year. It has also expanded to bath wear, with more to come soon. Founder and CEO Rich Fulop said it comes with taking a broader view of the category. He talks about the best marketing channels, building a creative team in-house and more.

In the last year, Athleta, the women's workout wear brand owned by Gap Inc., has taken its creative in-house for its content creation efforts. Athleta CMO Sheila Shekar Pollak discusses the marketing mix for the brand that is on its way to becoming a $1 billion business, the importance of in-store events, omnichannel marketing and more.

There is no lack of success stories in the direct-to-consumer markets. But there are also questions being asked of how long the industry can sustain itself. With a plethora of new brands launched every day, built on VC money with tall growth targets, it's fair to ask if a shakeout is coming. Kevin Lavelle, founder and CEO of Mizzen and Main, a brand that sells men’s performance wear dress shirts, thinks a carnage is it's on the cards. Lavelle talks about building a brand, advertising on platforms versus TV and what’s in the future of the DTC space.

A few months ago, Verizon launched Visible, a new brand that sits within the multi-billion dollar company. Launched invite-only, Visible is a digital-only phone carrier with no stores and e-commerce only service. And the telco brand is taking cues from direct-to-consumer brands. Minjae Ormes, CMO at Visible, discusses Visible’s strategy, the cues the company’s taken from Glossier and its own direct to consumer playbook.

As DTC brands grow up, they begin to look a lot like traditional brands. The challenge then, is differentiation. The solution: better data management. MM. LaFleur, the “bento box” pioneer of women’s workwear is one of those brands that uses data to differentiate itself. LaFleur discusses fighting the downward price push in the e-commerce space, how the bento box came about, diversifying customer acquisition channels and more.

Consultancies are turning into agencies as agencies grapple for a seat at the table. Alicia Hatch, CMO of Deloitte Digital, the $1 billion ad agency that sits within Deloitte, has insight into why consultancies are built for the modern CMO. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Hatch discussed the pressures on today’s CMO, why Deloitte believes in having skin in the game, and why in-house doesn’t scare her.

Born online direct-to-consumer brands are increasingly turning to traditional physical retail models to find new places for growth. Mike Grillo, CEO at Gravity Products, thinks DTC is just a launch model and not a sustainable business model for the longer term. Grillo discussed the impending DTC shakeout, why it’s important not to depend on Facebook and why TV remains important.

Thirty Madison, the parent company behind men’s hair loss treatment Keeps and migraine treatment company Cove, which just raised a little over $15 million in funding, is using the wellness and health momentum in the DTC industry as it looks to disrupt a giant, $17 billion industry. Steven Gutentag, co-founder of Thirty Madison discussed how the launch and growth model works at the company.

At a time when brands everywhere are turning to digital marketing to connect with customers, American Express is taking a much more human approach. For Rutledge, her motto has always been, 'Customer first,' so it felt natural to try and find a way to incorporate them into their marketing strategy. From customer referral programs to taxi top ads that change based on your neighborhood, she believes that showing your customer that you really understand and want to take care of them is the best way to turn them into authentic brand ambassadors. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Rutledge joins Digiday's Shareen Pathak to discuss turning your customers into your best marketers, why complicated messaging doesn't work and how fighting fraud strengthens C2B relationships.

For Shiv Singh, most of the industry's current problems come down to trust. That's the focus of the former PepsiCo and Visa marketing executive's new book, co-written with psychologist Rohini Luthra. The book, called "Savvy: Navigating Fake Companies, Fake Leaders and Fake News in the Post-Trust Era," is a deep dive into the business of marketing with a decidedly psychological bent. It focuses on disinformation campaigns in the Facebook era, the rise of fake news and what happens when people lose faith in institutions around them. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Shareen Pathak sits down with Singh to discuss why brands today lack trust, the difference between brand purpose and brand equity and why he still likes Facebook.

One year old men's healthcare DTC brand is attempting to disrupt healthcare. The company, which is centered around removing the friction from treating common health issues such as erectile disfunction and hair loss, uses a combination of affordable product lines and education in an attempt to get men talking more freely about their health. They're also trying to branch out beyond men: Hims has also launched a female-focused counterpart, appropriately titled Hers, hopes to solve this issue of access to birth control and time spent waiting in line at the pharmacy. The products, paired with the opportunity to have 24-hour access to physicians, have helped Hims to raise about $100 million in funding, and, if the rumors are true, of a new round of funding may just raise the valuation to a whopping $1 billion. On this week's episode of Making Marketing, Shareen Pathak sits down with Hims founder and CEO, Andrew Dudum, to discuss using humor as a marketing strategy for touchy topics, the impending DTC bubble burst and making the move into female wellness.

Orange Theory, a fitness company founded in 2010, is now making $1 billion in revenue and is on track to open 2,500 studios by 2024. The brand is riding the wellness wave, which means more than just fitness. Kevin Keith, chief brand officer at Orange Theory, is focused on creating a strong brand message and differentiating. Keith revealed why being a lifestyle brand is not the goal, how wellness has permeated culture and whether a robot is going to take Kevin’s job.

Ro, a healthcare direct-to-consumer company that began with a product to treat erectile dysfunction, has a different set of marketing challenges to worry about compared to other DTC brands. Regulation in marketing pharmaceutical products differs from state to state. And because health remains a sensitive topic, establishing legitimacy remains a priority with prospective customers. Rob Schutz, CRO and co-founder at Ro, discussed using platforms for acquisition, TV advertising and more on this episode.

Late last year, Gap Inc. launched Hill City, an activewear line that is its version of Athleta, but for men. It's also the retail giant's new opportunity to keep growing in activewear. Eric Toda, head of marketing at Hill City, says the advantages of launching Hill City are to be seen for Gap but in the meantime, there’s a lot Hill City is learning from the retailer.

Born online, so-called DTC brands are growing up. Retailers that were once solely e-commerce are now turning to a more traditional playbook for growth. Rolling our physical retail stores is the first step in the way. Parachute, a digitally-born bed and bath brand, is on its way to launch 20 stores by 2020 and already has six stores in the U.S. On this episode, we chat with Parachute CMO Luke Droulez.

The road to in-house certainly isn’t smooth. As the industry gets more and more excited about brands building their internal agencies, a bit of a rude awakening came in December last year when Intel announced it would be shuttering its internal agency, Agency Inside. Teresa Herd, who led Agency Inside and is now the vp and global creative director at Intel, talks about building an in-house agency, how external agencies fit in and more on this week's episode of Making Marketing.

B-to-B marketing is not a bubble. The rise of influencers and direct-to-consumer businesses have presented marketers with new challenges with whom to market to and which tools and channels to use. Inside SAP, chief marketing officer Alicia Tillman is focused on extending the brand’s relevance from decision-maker to the everyday user.

Consolidation is the name of the game and one of the big players in the M&A space are consultancies. Karmarama CEO Ben Bilboul discusses the merits of being acquired by Accenture, why he is wary of holding companies and more.

On this episode of the Making Marketing by Digiday, we recap the big themes that emerged for marketers this year, from agency consolidation to marketing evolving as a driver of business.

For GoPro, it never considered itself as solely a camera maker. Rather, it was a media brand, according to founder Nick Woodman. He discusses reshaping the brand over the years, how GoPro’s media team operates differently and more.

Big mergers resulting in new entities like Wunderman Thompson and VMLY&R have set the tone for 2019: It’s going to be the year of consolidation. Anne Bologna, chief strategy officer at Hearst-owned agency iCrossing, says there is too much continued pressure on agencies — a talent war with the duopoly and continuing competition has made agencies lose their confidence, and forget their craft. Bologna discusses why consolidation is necessary, how agencies are trying to be everything for clients and more on this episode.

The big shift in this year has been in the marketers’ demands from an agency. It’s not just about the advertising anymore. Agencies are increasingly being called on to solve business problems -- and it's showing. Mike Sheldon, Chairman and CEO of Deutsch North America has witnessed exactly that in pitch meetings. Sheldon discusses learning new skills, the allure of consultancies and in-house agencies and more consolidation in 2019 on this episode.

Blockchain and AI are IBM's big bets to take the company back on the top as a leader in innovation and technology. Michelle Peluso, chief marketing officer at IBM, discusses how the technologies will change the craft of marketing.

There's a lot of talk around "nimbleness" inside big companies. But the legacy internal red tape stands in the way of operations and the lessons of traditional marketing behavior are difficult to unlearn. That's been the responsibility of Pete Blackshaw, Nestlé’s Global Head of Digital Innovation Service & Service Models, who has spent the last few years working on changing up the company's internal makeup so it can move faster. Blackshaw discusses the ease and difficulty of being a direct-to-consumer brand, his upcoming new job at Cintrifuse and more.