Another start up gone awry due to the founder’s lack of business acumen and maturity. Add to this the ego and command and control style of Drexler, other investors charmed by her and the brand, despite formidable activewear brands such as LuLu and Athleta as competition and you’ve got a recipe for failure. The ones who lose are the former OV employees without jobs and consumers who likely overpaid for mediocre products.
42
'revolving door of hires'. Hmmm, well, if trump can do it I don't see why she can't. /s
13
I'm a millenial female and business school student. This is a brand my friends and I have supported for years. Among my cohort, this is a well-known company that is distinctive and popular. Trying to revolutionize a business model is why I love this company, and I'm sure that's why many young people my age have continued to support it.
I'm appalled by the comments from people who have never heard of this brand being 'underwhelmed' by the products at first glance. As someone who has followed this brand for years (along with many others), it's uniqueness and adherence to distinct values is what drove my interest.
I'm sad and sorry to see this company corrupted by an older generation focused on the status quo of "retail" and "business". The reasons I followed and supported this brand in the first place is tragically misunderstood by older generations, to their own detriment.
Looking forward to seeing what Ty Haney does next, and to the next generation of idealistic companies who will capture the interest and revenue from people like me.
I think that in the next 50 years we will see a new generation of companies scale-up with management that can integrate traditional metrics with an open-minded culture and an itch for creativity/ social responsibility. This is what will turn profits.
Outdoor Voices was ahead of its time.
51
@Sarah they were losing 2mm a month and had no idea what things cost and where they were spending money. Thats the issue, its not that they were ahead of its time. The concept was amazing, the branding was spot on but the execution and business side of things which you need to succeed were flawed. To blame the "older generation" for the demise of this company is absurd
115
@Sarah I'm currently reading an article of interviews of 20 former employees and they are talking about a toxic working environment with Ty Haney being the toxic individual. They claim she hired inexperienced friends and basically recreated the "mean" girls experiences of high schools.
No matter your vision, if you have a toxic workplace, if you belittle employees, if you don't value your employees, if you don't know how to give constructive criticism - you're going to fail.
I hope she did learn something.
80
@Sarah Blame the older guy who said 'maybe we should look at the prospect of making a buck so we can continue to pay these nice folks who work here'?
Was it the older generation's fault that they attempted (unsuccessfully) to teach some Business 101's to the founder?
Glad you're looking fwd to what Ms. Haney does next. Just don't invest.
56
Having never heard of it, I went to the website. T shirts. Hoodies. Sweat pants. This is a new fashion exercise? It’s almost funny in some regards. It does reveal the vacuity and general desperation of VC and equity mopes for something, anything, to throw money at. With all the ideas out there that can change the world, these folks go for T shirts.
27
31-year-olds and 75-year-olds rarely make a good mix. But from the looks of it Ms. Haney was a bit too arrogant and didn't have enough business sense in terms of how to turn a profit.
23
Sounds like the WeWork of clothing. Sorry if the men they hired to find a path to sustainability and profitability were .. men?
17
Ms Haney is the penultimate self absorbed and self impressed founder. She was always the smartest person in the room who surrounded herself with cool women who didn’t have the first clue about what they were doing. As a result everyone in the company had to cowtow to her whims and wishes. Thus, decisions were either delayed or shelved, progress was impeded, blame spread to anyone over 35 who just might have a tad of experience in the business. She oversaw the corporate version of the circus clown car. And the car crashed. Lesson learned? Probably not. It’s just everyone else’s fault.
49
The brand image was/is very childlike, which works. Get outside and play and look cool and be comfortable while doing it, pretty awesome message for anyone of any age. The problems come when the founders take this "authenticity" and "realness" too far. It's a brand image, not business reality.
16
Direct to Customer is borderline nonsense. There is a reason most manufacturers sell to, either, direct to retailers or to distribution who then sell to retailers. Why? Because it involves more work. And more work means more costs and that's money. Great ideas are cheap. I've got millions of them and I bet many of you do too. They real work is manufacturing (usually easier then the next ones), then marketing and distribution. And then you want to do retailing too? If ya think you're gonna make something and make all this extra money by skipping the dreaded middleman(men), it's a delusion. You are running at least three very different business, under the false idea you are running one.
Ya got a product? Find someone to manufacture it that already has distribution in place. If it sells millions, take your few pennies from each item and run to your next idea.
If you look into all these 'direct to customer' businesses, they require large amounts of money. As the article describes, getting that money has a price.
Disclaimer: I am not a Fashionista, but I looked at Outdoor Voices and the stuff looks like ........ clothes.
Whelp, I gotta go. Someone is knocking on my door. I believe it's Amazon delivering my new car that I bought direct from the plant.
22
T-shirt company fails to find right size for growth is a more appropriate title.
19
I've never heard about this company before so I visited their website. I was somewhat underwhelmed by product selection and construction of the website. But I did love beautiful models representing all shapes and sizes.
8
Ms. Haney had little to no experience in running a large profitable company. That she needed an adult in the room was no surprise. Zuckerberg found Sanders and that turned out well. Yet calling in Mr. Drexler was probably not the wisest idea. Mr. Drexler played violin while J Crew burned to the ground. That a bunch of finance guys are left running this business is the funniest joke of all. Let’s see how well they can sell high priced yoga wear to young women with some disposable income.
30
Compare the rise and fall of a company like OV to Glossier, an incredibly successful and beloved company. Perhaps the difference comes down to how savvy and fiscally-adept its founder is.
26
@Left Coast Perhaps it comes down to how much the company and founder stress expansion and profit vs. marketing to a particular group and realistic expectations of the buying power of that group.
12
I'm gobsmacked too! Who wouldn't be, frankly.
5
As an ATX local with a seat close to the stage, I watched Ms. Haney, much like our President, fail to recognize her shortcomings and miss multiple opportunities to compensate by listening to smart counsel. The team was right about turnover, btw. OV leadership role opportunities looked like vacancies at the Hotel California upside down. Come in any time you like, but don't expect to stay. Mickey didn't help, his helicopter parenting from a bully pulpit dissuaded more than one super-talented would-be star. More than anything, this is a story of fawning SV investors, IG followers, and mainstream media, smitten with a bright, shiny, likable, well-intentioned penny, albeit one lacking the experience and professionalism to produce profitable results. Too bad... the product and position had legs.
60
Initially I loved the message and concept of OV, but when I went to the website to actually buy something, everything seemed way overpriced and did not look at all well made or in any way special. At the end of the day, if the product doesn’t meet the expectations of the message the brand wants to send, no one is going to buy it. Maybe plain and simple, lots of people felt the way I did.
40
I like Outdoor Voices and own several pairs of their leggings. That aside - why would a clothing company receive $50 million in funding? Were they expected to make some sort of technological advancement? That seems like a lot of funding for a retail brand.
50
It’s like a repeat of the Democratic primaries.
2
@God Hilarious. Sounds more like the ongoing drama at the White House. Revolving door of hires? Indeed.
11
@God I think you meant to say, it's like trump's revolving door of swamp monsters.
Hardly the example of efficiency, competence, honesty, and integrity.
It's really hard to defend the republicans without trying to smear everyone else, isn't it?
I believe they're currently "gathering elements of medical" to address the corona virus issue. I feel safe!
6
So every time a business started by a woman fails, it's misogyny? I thought equality was the aim. Men don't have excuses when they fail and they certainly don't have a chorus of people ready to comfort them and point the finger at the big bad world. It's getting pathetic. Truly.
Mr. Wexler has a pattern of picking on women and getting involved with start ups so he can push women around and out? It's become outright paranoid with progressives. Or could it be there are some people who have been coddled and when they must face the real world they fail and can't take criticism and the convenient excuse of misogyny comes in handy.
43
@MCS Big banks in 2008? Maybe when businesses driven into the ground by old white men fail, the old white men are rescued by we the taxpayer (hello, Jamie Dimon)...and those executives are never blamed or punished because if those companies fail, it has nothing to do with their leaders, right?
16
Theranos. WeWork.
I'd very much like to see how much Ms. Haney walked away with after failing, and burning all that VC money. $20-million? $50-million?
70
Exactly. Failed at business - still a millionaire.
31
Maybe also 35k worth of Topo Chico?
12
Details like profit margins and overhead are boring and also impede creativity and vision. Those old men just don't get it.
82
@Harry VC's demand high returns given low equity in firms; therefore, revenue must exceed much more than the funding seed, and as a function of profits, costs can be saved to increase profits. If you are a good retail company you identify and define the next customer your company caters to and voraciously spend money to acquire and retain them. Financial statements are a partial reflection of the creativity and vision your firm does to acquire customers and increase purchases and purchase amounts.
11
This must be 2020; letter upon letter upon letter making hollow excuses - most against men. There is such a mass of people deliberately living in Ding Dong world that Trump as president (who seems to own the rights to Ding Dong world) seems appropriate. Too little attention is paid to start-ups (like Uber & the mattress cos) which fail to make actual profits but just ruin established businesses & real people
21
@Kelleher
To be fair, many of those excuses are not hollow. There are multitudes of women who are just as qualified as men for executive and board positions.
29
the American Apparel of the 2010s
20
Sorry - confused. You mean that when you take investor money you need to show them a return on their investment?? The nerve! And when you can't run your business with profitability, you have to be held accountable? Wait. What???? Even if your a WOMAN?!? Hmmm. Definitely must be a gender thing.
116
I'd rather be the one with the broken heart than with the broken wallet.
23
“Doing Things” with petrochemicals to manufacture buttery soft athletic wear? Who is getting rich and famous while exploiting the environment? What is the carbon footprint of your workout clothing? Are you wearing fossil fuels?
53
@PMD What alternatives to synthetic fabric would you suggest? Cotton is no good - using way too much precious water in this warming climate. Wool is no good - mistreating animals, not vegan.
3
@Ed
But digging up fossil fuels that destroys the entire globe including its ecosystems is "vegan" by your definition?
Talk about short-sighted...
1
Amen. Too few care about environmental, health, labor concerns. Would live yo see yoga go eco.
And don’t forget: OV was made overseas with, probably, lax labor and environmental laws, and shipped in container ships that contribute heavily to climate change. Wearing plastic is, as Portlandia put it, OVER. Or should be. Organic natural fibers—that’s progressive, sustainable, feminist from seed to customer to landfill.
That said, woman-owner, simple, elegant—OV, thanks to the founder and her team had what my fave biz book, Small Giants, calls Mojo. Once you let in VCs nothing that matters is safe—they care nothing for a founder’s mission or integrity.
8
Not every business makes it. Welcome to the real world.
38
Babe: You don't have to quiz people on the spot, especially with math problems. I would be so angry. And I'm a financial analyst. It's disrespectful. No wonder. And I looked for something to buy on the site. Did not see one item I was interested in and I have bought a lot of shorts, shoes and other clothing items this year already. Not one interesting item on your site.
9
@patrick
I’m wondering if he asked them to “calculate” profit margin or if he was just asking for the profit margin. They should know that. I never worked in this industry but when I worked for a company that made high tech hardware, all the senior staff knew the approximate profit margin of all the products. Those calculations aren’t all that difficult. (And it was the old expert Drexler who was doing the quizzing, not Haney.)
46
Babe? That anecdote was about Drexler quizzing people, not her. Read the article, honey bunny.
49
@patrick
Why are you calling Drexler “babe.”
32
They were doomed from the start when they based their whole marketing effort on Instagram.
37
and it's all propped up on credit.
13
@Dave h And who moves retail from NYC to Austin?
21
Here’s a simple rule for all the budding entrepreneurs and visionaries that read this article - if you want to retain control of your enterprise, think very carefully about whether you want to bring in outside capital. It’s an time-tested example of the business golden rule “them that’s got the gold make the rules”.
Investors put their money into companies like this in order to make money. That’s all.
120
@David DiRoma Absolutely!
1
One of the things that strikes me as I see what little is shown of the clothing, is that this would be so simple to knock off. I’m sure Target already did this.
35
If you think spending 100 grand on water and candles for a store is a good idea you shouldn't be in charge. Why would anyone invest with a person who has those priorities?
71
Read the New Yorker article on OV when it first came out and thought it was anything but glowing. Insightfully biting is how I would describe it. Also one of the more entertaining reads that year and I shared it with friends. We all agreed that Jia Tolentino was a talented writer with a bright future and OV was a smoke and mirror company with none.
60
@nana
Yes, haven’t read this but I like everything Jia Tolentino does. I’ll have to find it. Sounds a little like the profile on Theranos, which the author totally called well before it’s downfall.
14
What?! Tolentino's book in particular was aw-ful. That nonsensical chapter about female literary heroes.. or how she just had ~so many weddings to attend.. aka she was very popular in college. IMO she is a flash-in-the-pan writer of the digital age that isnt nearly as insightful as she thinks she js
21
VC ruined this business model as it has several others, with too much money too fast.
Money needs leadership from within the original investment plan.
The leadership can overcome growing pains if the model of growth is understood and the product or service is good beyond trendy.
Too much money , too fast, created too many cooks with different recipes in the kitchen.
Money does not need to feel good but it does need to work with a goal and it needs leadership.
The old business model of having cash seems to have fallen by the wayside these days.
Trendy is not always an equity for a loan.
22
“Ms. Haney was a compelling spokeswoman for the brand, which resonated among millennials and college-age customers with money to spend.”
— Ah, I see the problem. Millennials and college-age customers don’t have money to spend.
39
@Mike I’m a millennial and I’m almost 40, mike.
15
also missing from this article is the fact that OV co-opted work from a freelancing woman of color and used it in an ad campaign without giving her any credit or compensation for it at all. if she wants Ty wants to use being a female-run company as one of her company's unique value propositions then maybe she should actually support the women in her ranks.
41
Can you elaborate maybe include names and the ad campaign in question? I'm curious. Also sadly if she was freelancing, OV retains the right to that work in most cases, not the designer.
15
@JB the 'women's community values' vibe at this finest. just a matter of time before they insert the (bejeweled) knives into each others backs.
3
Is this only an outrage because it happened to a woman of “color”? Or is “woman of color”, now just a marker for outrage?
8
The general consensus seems to be that Outdoor Voices produces high-quality products. Unfortunately, with the few products I've owned from the brand, they've all been mediocre at best. One example was a ~$300 jacket produced in collaboration with APC. Within a week or two, two of the zippers had broken. Something similar happened with a pair of shorts.
28
@MEF Completely agree. The seams also tear too easily on the leggings and that's not just me. Most friends have experienced the same. Shotty products that carry too hefty a price tag.
9
Shoddy. It’s “shoddy”!
24
My wife bought a piece of OV from Marshall’s or similar retailer. She likes it but we’re older than the target market. What amazes me is that boards and fellow investors still look up to Mickey Drexler. He helped rescue a struggling purveyor of West Coast basics - Gap - turn it into a juggernaut only to fail after chasing “fashion” and alienating the customer base. Gap still hasn’t recovered almost 20 years after he left. Then he went to J. Crew, struggling purveyor of East Coast basics and the same exact thing. I understand he joined OV just as J. Crew was starting its downturn, but it still looks bad.
71
@David Mickey Drexler rescued Gap from almost certain death when Don Fisher brought him in the early 1990s. He then created Old Navy, which perhaps cannibalized sales at The Gap but remains a juggernaut even today.
He also saved J. Crew's bacon and created Madewell, another strong brand. He tripled revenue at J. Crew while there. Losing Jenna Lyons, who was the creative spirit of that business, set the J. Crew business into decline.
Drexler is a legendary merchant. I have no idea what happened at OV, but it's clear he wasn't the only one at the company acting imperiously.
46
@Stephanie S., correction: Jenna Lyons' awful, impractical so-called "visionary" clothes are what sank J. Crew. Credit where credit is due...:)
7
I didn’t know about Outdoor Voices until they started massive giveaways on my college campus. They must have given away hundreds of shirts and tote bags with the brand name featured prominently, but I’ve never seen anyone wearing apparel that they had actually purchased. It always seemed like a weird business model.
33
@Anon It's a weird business model that, in fact, is not a business model. Small brands like this should grow slowly, proving their value and funding growth with internally generated cash flow. The problem is a lack of patience. Founders and VCs alike want explosive growth and outrageous returns. They only got the explosion and outrage it seems.
35
@G, but when your product is trendy (and one easily-copied), going slow is the one thing you can’t afford, no? :)
3
@Anon, not many college students can afford $90 leggings.
2
If she managed to grow the business to only 10 retail stores as well as the online business, for example, self funded, she would have been a lot happier. Scaling consumer brands is more about venture capitalists setting unrealistic expectations than the quality of the initial underlying business.
48
It seems easy to portray this situation as a idealistic founder dealing with the realities of business. I'm sure there is much more to it and the article did allude to a few. I think there is probably more to the story in regards to how women have to secure funding for their companies and yes, there is no doubt a gender/generational issue here. We can do "business" differently and I think that's maybe what she wanted to do and there was a complete conflict of values and some naivety. I hope she succeeds in something else and is able to stick to her vision of a business. Scarred but smarter.
16
Why do people promote this notion that women will do “business” in some sort of kinder, gentler, all inclusive maternal way?
Business is about profit or it ceases to be business, sex doesn’t enter it.
Unless you are saying women are less likely to pursue business in a successful(profitable) way. Which I’d need data to believe.
Business is not something nice.
A businessman, is now running our country like a business- how cared for, do you feel, in the sweet grasp of a country ruled by business?
Probably depends on your net worth.
29
You can, indeed, be a woman, work for profit and not have male grey suit style.
When the business model doesn’t take in consideration the human factor and only care about profit companies grow at expenses of an overworked, poorly paid human force. That is not a business model that is pure exploration. We can do better.
8
@Andrea I believe both men and women in business can and do care about employee well being.
16
I’ve been active and fit my whole life and OV’s products are the best I’ve ever found. I own dozens of things they’ve made. I’m so disappointed to hear the company is struggling. I also worked with venture backed companies for years and have seen the pitfalls of growing too quickly. Hope they can turn it around.
26
Having spent my career in retail, and putting misogyny aside, this sounds like the all-too-common modern delusion that getting lots of likes on Instagram equals a successful business.
Being a "visionary" and being cool is all well and good, but if you can't make a profit, you're running a hobby, not a business. Lots of likes and great visuals will not make up for losing money.
220
Creativity doesn’t matter, bottom line profits only matter. Great writes up don’t matter. Wall Street buys companies only to spite them out when they have destroyed the culture
The founder and for others going forward surround your self with people you can trust. Otherwise the beauty of your product will be destroyed by Wall Street greed
8
Well, that strategy worked out for billionaire Kylie Jenner.
3
@JRH There is a difference. Kyle has MILLIONS of followers before she had a brand. She also has a genius business manager (mother) who didn't take outside funding. Many VCs tried investing, didn't succeed, even Sequoia..they took no outside money until very recently and they made 600M majority-selling to Coty.
Not remotely near Outdoor Voices.
15
I don't know if it's that there are too many startups, like online mattress companies and clothing manufacturers, but they seem to blossom and die on the vine before the vast majority of the public has heard of them. I keep up with news and technology, but reading about Outdoor Voices failing is the first time I've heard of them.
45
Yep. Never heard of this. Did they sell khaki pants with cuffs and t shirts? Cool.
3
@Linda, ain’t it the truth. Too many of these start-ups think that generating trendy online buzz is the same as sparking mass market interest. It isn’t—and blowing insane amounts of venture capital instead of generating real profit always nails these guys in the end.
4
When men start companies like Uber, they look at aggressive growth, not profitability as a way to get funding capital. This young woman did the same thing and she was expected to know better & be nice and not take any time off to give birth. The standards for women are different.
Women run companies receive less funding and when they do, the investors demand that the company hand over leadership to a man and change the way they are doing things, which changes the entire business so they lose their original customers.
I’m of the philosophy that all businesses should be able to break even on their own before investment capital pours in or they are not viable in the first place but greed takes over when someone senses a good idea.
Outdoor Voices had an opportunity for organic growth but investors change the trajectory and thus the time limit starts and there is no time to make mistakes and learn and improve and grow the business as the consumer demand increases.
VCs & equity capital firms implode more businesses than than they create because they can’t support their the debt and demand faster turnaround. And what made the company unique in the first place no longer exists and the new men in charge blame the women for the losses.
89
@Dog Walker There is a ton of evidence of sexism in the outcomes for female founders vs. male founders in general, but it's not obvious from this article that that is the case here.
Your first point, about male founders going after aggressive growth, seems incomplete. The environment for funding startups goes through cycles. A few years ago, pursuing growth at all costs was fashionable and a good way for late-stage companies to get large checks at high valuations. Since then, because of the struggles of Uber and Wework in the tech space and Casper in the eCommerce space, investors have a renewed focus on profitability. Let's remember that Ms. Haney successfully raised more than $50m in funding at a high valuation in the past--its just harder now. The broader funding environment has become more challenging.
Also, comparing Outdoor Voices--a pretty traditional ecommerce business--to Uber is not a good comparison. Uber is a technology company and Outdoor Voices is not. While Outdoor Voices sells things online, it is much less innovative on the technology side. Solving hard software and hardware engineering challenges is not core to its business. To really suss out the comparison and see whether Outdoor Voices and its founder were treated unfairly, you have to compare against other eCommerce brands.
26
@Dog Walker
Well it’s in the dna of men. Uber, Lyft and do many other male companies have yet to turn a profit but still they are founded by Wall Street
So why the disparities ? The same reason why Warren just wasn’t good enough
So please NYT do investigative journalism on why minorities can’t get hedge fund funding why companies built by women are systematically destroyed by white men and there cronies.
2
Fashion is time sensitive. This was fashion
2
"employees responded with an "OK Boomer" derogatory text message when they could not calculate profit margin"
I mean, this guy put a bunch of money into the company, and he expects us to return a profit? Who does he think he is?
163
@Johnny G
Apparently, he thought he was their boss.
I mean seriously, how hard is it to subtract one number from another? And for expecting people to be able to do that, he was ridiculed?
16
I'm not defending the founder, but what almost any other old board member would see as normal behavior for a male CEO helped get her fired from her own company.
36
@aging not so gracefully
I'm pretty sure that as soon as experienced board members and executives get brought into an over-leveraged company they expect it to get on board with the mission of becoming profitable.
Your sexism insinuation seems pretty off the mark.
13
@Jeff, doubt it. Men like Uber’s founder are cut way more slack/time to mess up because their “vision” is regarded as more precious, for some odd, totally unexplainable reason.
4
I wouldn't describe the profile in The New Yorker as "glowing"! There's a lot of skepticism and interesting questions raised in it - especially about the out-of-proportion attention we give young, attractive, female founders.
113
@Alice I had the same thought regarding The New Yorker article. It appeared to me as being a bit skeptical of some of the founder's espoused views and of the company's support of female empowerment by way of more figure-flattering workout clothes.
24
@Alice I'm pretty sure that the comment said the New Yorker article was "anything BUT glowing"
3
@Alice
What about that darling blonde who hoodwinked every rich white man yo be on her board and received millions for a product that didn’t exist . She hoodwinked her investors just like a ponzu scheme
So in short sound business plans written by qualified women and minorities get nowhere on Wall Street but a schemer gets over and makes other businesses suffer.
7
As a very active female, I never got the attraction to Outdoor Voices clothing. There was nothing particularly special about it, and it was overpriced for what it was. There is only so long that you can sell based on the "aura" of the founder, and then reality sets in.
105
Other than pointing out the fact that there were demographic changes in leadership over the past few years, this article fails to articulate the root cause of the friction that supports their thesis. Age and gender differences can certainly be a challenge within a leadership team, but correlation is not causation. This article doesn't flesh out what the main pain-points were.
47
The founder lamenting the loss of the "totally possible mindset" while running a business that was rapidly losing money is just plain ironic.
81
Andy Warhol's (pre-iPhone) fifteen minutes of fame for individuals has become fifteen minutes of fame for highly leveraged, media-driven, direct-to-consumer concepts.
Live by Instagram, die by Instagram.
90
@Taz and leggings.
4
Outdoor voices made a really great merino wool t-shirt that I wore for a year. When I went to re-order, it was gone, never to return.
I never considered shopping there again. I don't have time for a retailer who is changing their fundamental offerings on me.
26
@RDA Their wool offerings were by far the best products. Sadly, they discontinued the 100% wool sweatsuits (wish I’d stocked up) and now the tees. In a saturated market, those were the truly exceptional pieces but they never focused their marketing on them (outside of the just okay wool blend megafleece)
5
That merino was the best!
4
Similar to We Work, with the difference being the founder somehow walked away with over a $billion. I think VCs aren’t particularly good at finding great business opportunities, but good at selling other investors to salvage their investment. None are good at running a business.
47
Why does this have to be a tale of sexism? Could it be that the founder was naive, thinking that the investors' money would always be there? This would not be unique to her; many founders of "start-ups" have this issue, forgetting that a company that can't generate profits can't survive.
163
@Christopher Loonam this didn't strike me as a tale of sexism at all...? the writers of the article mention the almost all-male board.... which is worth acknowledging considering it's in stark contrast to the target consumer and the all-women team just entirely laid off ..... but it seems that Tyler Haney is depicted fairly, that is, as a first-time start-up founder who maybe took the wrong managerial approach and suffered the consequences (not at all like a "victim" of sexism...)
7
@Christopher Loonam- to me, her treatment by her board was sexist, so it is a tale of sexism mixed up with the pain of what happens when someone with a good idea meets a rapidly and unforgiving market.
2
@rss Read the Jia Tolentino profile on OV in the New Yorker and you might see why the all-women team were laid off. Dysfunctional is one way to describe the culture fostered there. There were serious leadership issues there and relying on a manic charismatic leader was not going to cut it long term.
18
This sounds similar to the story of the ouster of Away's founder Jen Rubio.
Old-school business methods that run on the rails of patriarchy (demanding profit margins without advanced notice -- come on) clashing with new-school business founders who want to do things their way.
And the women always have to be smeared for being too-emotional.
21
@Mari woah, away was totally in the wrong. You must see that?
14
@Mari - calculating profit margins is basic retail 101.
I'm a woman and I've worked for a number of regional and national retailers. Everyone KNOWS the current profit margin of their assortments. And everyone knows the costs of their items and can recalculate profit margins on the fly when discussing possible cost (to the retailer) and price (to the consumer) changes. There might be a little rounding (like 0.1%) in ad hoc calculations, but the basic math is in fact basic math, if one knows the fundamentals of the business.
This particular example has nothing to do with gender expectations and lots to do with being expected to run a profitable business.
247
@Mari
If you don't have profit margins memorized in and out, you aren't a businessperson. You are running a hobby outfit where profits don't matter.
Part of the blame has to go on Mickey Drexler. He should have done his homework. Tyler Haney could have taken a couple of executive MBA classes and learned all she really needed to know about cost plus accounting and basic marketing analysis. Instead, it sounds like she got upset when investors reminded her she wasn't running a charity.
77
Always maintain at least 51% ownership of anything you create. If you want to grow faster than that allows, be prepared to lose what you created.
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this is happening a lot: get the idea, get the cash, expand, spend a lot of money recklessly, then wilt or shutter . Whats truly up with the Wing and the other hypes ? Is this the new ponzi era ? This economy is moving too fast or slow for most start ups, especially the fashion and lifestyle related .
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@tell the truth
Agreed and I’d add that it’s all fun and games when the money is handed over. Not so much when execution fails and folks are held accountable. Leadership needs to deliver to meet expectations of their investors. That’s that.
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@Mickey
Very true words however leadership doesn’t exist in companies anymore. It’s all about profits . Everything is short term not long term
Look at Boeing , a brand name that list focus on quality and focuses on profits
Wall Street runs the country and ruins decent corporations that attempt to do the right thing by their employees
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@tell the truth
Well said . The new legal ponzi .
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