July 11, 2022 • 31 mins
Olivia sits down with founder of Set Active, Lindsey Carter. She started her business from the ground up and is giving you all the tip and tricks you need to be an entrepreneur!
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is Conversationous with Olivia Jade and I Heart Radio podcast.
Hey everyone, it's Olivia Jade. Welcome back to another episode
of Conversations. Today's episode I have a very very wonderful, smart,
special guest and she is the founder of Set Active,
(00:24):
which if you guys follow me, you know I wear
their workout gear all the time. I'm in it right now,
I worked out in it this morning. It's my life.
I'm obsessed. So I'm so excited to have her on.
And with that being said, please welcome Lindsay Carter. Hello, Hello, welcome.
(00:44):
Thank you. You like my jacket? Yes, honestly I was
going to wear Set two and I was like I
probably like I'm in full set just so you know
right now. Also in short, the bra, the whole. Oh
my god, I'm we're sending you some new stuff, right
I think I'm so excited that's coming on the way. Yeah,
thank you so much, because I'm not exaggerating when I
(01:06):
say I've probably bought over twenty pairs of your workout here, Like, um,
we'll stop buying it, We'll stud me. I'm happy to support,
but I'm like a die hard fan. When they told
me they were like, do you want Lindsay on the podcast?
I was like, please, I really want to know everything.
My god. So I'm just really excited you're here. Thank
you so much for coming on. Um, of course, I'm
(01:28):
so excited. Should we just dive right in? Yeah, It's
it's weird for me to be on the opposite end
because I also host a podcast. So I'm like kind
of excited to be in the hot seat rather than
hosting because I get awkward sometimes I do. So if
you want to take over at any point, feel free.
I don't mind. Um, but will you give a little
background as to who you are for the listeners that
don't know. Yeah, Um, so I'm Lindsay Carter. I am
(01:54):
soon to be a mom of two. Um, I own
that active I started it like four and a half
years ago. Um. I started it with no experience in
the active industry or fashion world. Um. I went to
school to be a kindergarten teacher and now I have
an office in Beverly Hills with over thirty employees. Wow.
(02:16):
So when you say you had no experience in active
where what made you want to start this? Then? Um
it's kind of a loaded question, but I so After college,
I got a job at NBC Universal and then I
dabbled in social media. Back then, I say back then
as if like I'm, you know, a dinosaur. But back then,
(02:40):
in my world, social media was just kind of like
popping off, like no one really was using it, No
one really used it for marketing or anything like that.
And I had told my bosses at NBC Universals, like,
I really think that we should be marketing these shows
on social media, Like no one's doing that, but there's
these personalities on social and that's where I found my
(03:03):
love for branding and social media. And I say this
story because I think it's such an important part of
how I started set um. And then from there I
went to a trending forecasting agency UM where I did
social media and branding and marketing and I basically wrote
reports on how to create a cult like brand UM.
(03:25):
And then from there I was like, you know what,
I want to take what I know and apply it
to like myself. And I had my own social media
marketing branding agency called Elie Social, where I did like
I blew brands up for people UM. And then I
was like, why am I giving everyone my idea? I
(03:45):
should do my own thing. So I was sitting at
Alfred on Melrose Place and everyone was wearing activewear in
and out of the coffee shop, but no one looked
like they were cute cute people, but like no one
looked put together, like no one looked street style active
where you know, no one was doing it at the time.
Um Ala was really focused on like yoga, and Lulu
(04:09):
was focused on exercise, and Jim Shark was focused on
like full on yeah, and so it's like there's no
one who's like focusing on the in between of being
active while staying active essentially. So I was like, I'm
gonna do it. So I did it so smart. You
found the missing thing in the market and created it yourself.
(04:31):
And I have to say it's it honestly is so
comfortable too. And I I feel like any time I
don't know what to wear, I'm constantly reaching just for
one of my set sets because it looks so chic
and put together, like you're saying. Um So, I have
a question that I've been wondering, and I love to
ask this to people that have started their own businesses
(04:53):
or entrepreneurs in any sense of the word. If you're
a young girl or a young boy, and you're sitting
at home and you don't have the connections or maybe
necessarily some of the resources that some people may have,
and you really want to start a line. What would
your advice be and where did you kind of start
and say, Okay, this is what I want to do.
(05:13):
This is the first step I'm taking. And obviously you
can share as much as you want without giving too
much of your secrets and whatever. But I am curious.
It's honestly really not a secret. I there's so many
different ways to start a brand. UM. First of all,
talk about it, Tell your friends, tell your family friends,
talk to your parents, ask if they know anyone, because
(05:37):
you would be so surprised who has connections where? And
everyone has this like taboo thought like they don't want
to ask for help or you know, whatever it might be.
But you'd be so surprised who's willing to just connect
you to someone to start a conversation. UM. And then also,
Google is your best friend. I literally googled seamless Active
(05:58):
where Los Angeles. I already had my business plan in
my head and I had it written up, and it
was like this whole social media pitch um of how
I was going to market it and like why they
should partner with me, Because a lot of factories and
manufacturers require minimums, and so unless you're willing to hit
their minimum, they're probably not going to work with you.
(06:19):
But when I was willing to like prove and show
the growth to them and say like this is what
this is the reach I have, and this is how
I'm going to do it, they're more willing to listen
and sort of negotiate with you. Um, everyone's willing to negotiate. Um.
And then also there's services. UM. I I'm not like
(06:42):
a master in sourcing, but I did post on my
TikTok with our head of production resources that if you
did want to start your own clothing brand or anything
like that, there are resources or websites that lead you
to the right contacts depending on what it is that
you want to start. UM. But I would really say
the first steps that you should take our first understand
(07:05):
what it is that you're building. Be passionate about it,
because if you're not passionate about it, it's not going
to take off. It's not going to go anywhere. And
don't fake your passionate about it, really be passionate about
and ask yourself, can you do this every single day
for the rest of your life, even the hard days,
And if the answer is still yes, then go to
the next step and keep going to that next step
(07:27):
as long as you're answering yourself. Yes. Okay, great advice.
I love that. Can we backcheck a little bit about
kind of maybe some like marketing hacks that you've discovered
or what's worked really well for you and why you
think it's worked really well. Yeah, Um, marketing is so broad,
so it really depends on what the product is that
(07:48):
you're marketing. The first thing you need to understand in
any marketing position, whether you're working at an agency, marketing
for your own brand, marketing for someone else's brand, is
no your audience. You have to understand who you're selling to,
what their interests are, what they like, what they don't like,
(08:09):
and then you have to trial and airing your marketing plans.
So first set specifically, they need to be educated on
new styles, new products, different things like that, because then
they feel they get like anxiety if they're not understanding
the function of the new the new style that we're doing. UM,
(08:30):
I would definitely say. The first step any marketing hack
one on one is know your audience. Know who you're
marketing to. You know, it's if you don't understand your audience,
then you're not going to be able to tell the story,
which is hack number two. Tell a story. You need
to be able to talk to your audience and let
(08:52):
them understand, like why are you doing this, Why did
you decide to come out with this style dress, How
does this dress make a difference in your day? One's
different about it? Um. And then I think and a
lot of people might either agree or disagree with this,
but tip number three is transparency. I think that's like
what set No Pun intended, What set Set apart from
(09:15):
other brands is our transparency. You know, if we've poked
up and there was a production mistake, we say it.
If something's delayed in our warehouse, we announce it. Um.
I think that would definitely be hack number three. I
love that. I feel like, yeah, that it's a huge thing.
And I also think like there's something to be said
for the fact that I knew who you were before
(09:38):
meeting you, or I like had a face to put
to the brand head sort of and like I think
that's really helpful as well, because you feel like a
like there's a personal connection there just another like young
woman or something of that regard. I think is helpful
to not only sales, but just to make the consumer
feel like, oh, this is like a legitimate, trustworthy, like
(10:00):
wholesome brand also, um, which I think is amazing. And
I also just feel like it can be probably i'd
imagine I've never started a company, but really difficult when
something comes back fucked up like you said, or there
was a mistake, and have you had I mean, I'm
sure you guys have been around for a few years now,
(10:21):
like any major no pun intended, but like setbacks. Um,
right now we're currently going through something. So I think
the biggest lesson that I've learned in business in general
is that not only are there going to be like
problems externally you know with production and manufacturing, but internally
managing your employees, understanding their personalities, um, creating a like
(10:44):
company culture where people want to wake up and come
to work every day, and then dealing with people who
aren't in the right you know, positions. It affects the
company externally, having the wrong talent in the wrong positions
could really up your company and something that we're dealing
with now. So we're going through our second restructure. We're
trying to find the right talent. We're poaching people were
(11:07):
doing really hardcore interviews. By talent, do you mean people
that work on the Set Active team or you mean
like social media presence that you like, I want to
work with influencers talent meaning like employees, like people who
work on this on like the Set Active team. Um.
(11:28):
You know, so many people can like talk the talk,
but they cannot walk the walk, they cannot execute, and
it can really really really like up a company. Um.
And then also like obviously there's production issues our whole thing,
or colors and like wearing matching colors, um with your
(11:49):
sweats or your basics or you're active and we had
a color for Montana that's it was really hard to
get it to match and so it it's delayed and
we had to be like, Okay, we got to get
the DPS ready, which is the product description pages that
you see on websites. We have to say, like this
item is not shipping till this date. You have to
alert the whole team. You have to like let social
(12:10):
media know, because they want to know when they're getting
their stuff. Um, so like problems like that happen all
the time, and that I would say, like the other
hardest part of like being a business owner is that
so many people think they know how to run your business.
Um there's people who hide behind social media accounts or
you know, someone commented on our TikTok saying like this
(12:32):
color is just the same as Macha. I'm like, really,
because you and opened our Pantone book and pack the
Pantone color yourself, and you know for a fact that
we just took that color. And I'm just like sitting
there and I had this conversation with a friend last
night at dinner, and I was like, would they say
that to someone's face, No, they sit behind don't even
(12:57):
saying I've It's it's mind blowing to me what some
of these people do behind a phone screen. I'm just
like audacity, because they know how to run a multimillion
dollar company. Maybe I should bring them in and let
them do it for a week. I have a question.
(13:27):
This is so random, but I feel like one of
the trickiest things to do with anything like legging material
or just like tight and a mixture of a light
color creates a camel toe or like something that's unflattering.
And I feel like with all the workout gear I've
purchased from you guys that doesn't happen. Is that because
(13:50):
of the material, Is there like a double layer situation happening?
How do you avoid that? Um? Get yourself a good
tech packer? Um? No, but really there's some thing called, well,
all of our all of our leggings now don't have
a front seam. They have the back seam that you
know flatters your butt, but there's no front seam that
(14:11):
gives you that camel toe. I think it just depends. Obviously,
everyone's like bottom half is created differently. Um, understanding and
in seems so like the line that would go in
the front, and like how that measures is also really
important for camel toe, and so getting that in seam
like perfect will make a huge difference in any active where. Um. However,
(14:37):
we took out our front seam to alleviate the camel
toe situation. Um, it also depends, like what underwear you're
wearing under your leggings. Um. Some I mean consult with
your doctor when I say this, But some gynecologists say, like,
you're not supposed to wear underwear with your leggings because
it's like a double added like bacteria layer. So that
(14:57):
might help or not help with camel too. Try out,
let us know, Yeah, try it out, let us know.
And we also came out with seamless underwear to like
mitigate what camel toe does. Um, And it's like we're
finally bringing it back. We had a production issue with
them and it was our best like one of our
best selling products. So I'm excited that indoors coming back
(15:20):
because that helps the camel too. That's huge. When you
first started, like backtrack a little bit more, were you
immediately using a factory or like a shipping warehouse or
were you when you first began like shipping things yourself.
How how much help did you have? Like what was
the really early stage looking like? Um, the really early
(15:42):
stage is probably exactly what you imagine a young entrepreneurs
life to look like. Um, it was me and Nicky Shay,
who was my first employee, and we looked like Santa
Claus every day with like plastic bags full of orders
over my shoulder, my whole apartment, my poor husband who
(16:03):
is now my husband at the time, but was my
boyfriend and fiance. Basically had to live in this box
line department with me of like you know, container store
boxes labeled with sizes and colors, and then production boxes
I'm talking lined from the floor to the ceiling every
crevice of my apartment. UM. And so me and Nicky
(16:24):
were shipping out orders every single day. UM. I remember
like burying Nikki in the orders, Like one day when
we got a time and it was like find Nikki
and she like pops up from the orders. Um. And
then we graduated to my family friend's house, her guesthouse.
She like had it as an office um, and we
(16:48):
shipped orders from there because we needed more space. And
then we worked for my dining room up until two
and a half years ago. I would say, um, we
crowded my dining room table. Once I hired on more employees.
I think at one point I had ten employees at
my dining room table. And then we were like, okay,
it's time for an office. And that was year three
(17:10):
that we got an office. So for three years I
worked from my dining room table at my house. That's
some serious hustle. I respect that on so many levels.
That's amazing. What was like the trickiest thing within that, UM,
I would say, keeping up with the growth, UM, teaching
myself things that I am not good at, like Shopify
(17:31):
and inventory and customer service. Oh my god. I learned
so quickly that I could never work on a customer
service team, Like ever did you have to deal with that?
Like when if things weren't going or if like an
order didn't ship or somebody didn't receive something, where you
personally in the beginning messaging these people back, being like
I'm so sorry, what was your order number? Dada da da?
(17:52):
Oh yeah, I mean even on launch day, I don't
even think we had a customer service email set up
like it was it was my hand Like it was crazy. UM.
And I learned quickly that I have little patients for
rude people, and people tend to get very rude over
customer service. I understand the frustration of like spending money
(18:14):
on something and not receiving it and you know the
long list of reasons, but you don't need to be rude.
And I was like finding that I didn't have tolerance
for that. But Nikki is so patient and so kind,
and she was really good at it, so I kind
of like put that on her weight. UM. And then
you know that goes into just like knowing your employees
and always hiring for your weaknesses because UM, that's what's
(18:39):
going to move a company forward in the end. But yeah,
I mean we did all of the customer service. That
was definitely one of the hardest things. UM. And then
just like things that I didn't know, like you had
to put package weights and I'm like, well, I don't
know how much this package ways? Like what am I
supposed to put shop? Um, There's things that you learn
(19:00):
a long way. And so I think that's like my
biggest piece of advice that I try to tell people
is like take it step by step. Things are going
to pop up. You can google, you can ask a friend, like,
you'll figure it out as long as you take it
step by step. Just don't get ahead of yourself totally.
How many sets did you guys release when you first started? UM,
(19:23):
So it was only one active fabric, which was our
skull flex fabric. It's that buttery seamless fabric that UM
we came out with, and then we came out with
four colors UM, and then I think it was two
style tops, and then biker shorts. Actually biker shorts didn't
come until a little bit later, and then the legging
(19:44):
and then um, it was we've kind of dominated like
the limited edition aspect for the first year. UM at
the time, like no one was really doing drop model
businesses like they were, but it was like supreme like
really you know coveted brands that either were like known
(20:04):
for like the lines on Fairfax and things like that,
and there wasn't really a dt C brand, or at
least maybe I just was. I'm naive and I have
no idea, but I didn't know the DTC brand that
we was doing drop model um. And so that's sort
of how we went about doing things. And we don't
do any wholesale UM, I won't do it. This might
be a really dumb question, but what is a drop model?
(20:26):
What does that mean? Drop model means that it doesn't
stay in stock, So you like have a limited edition collection,
you drop it, and then you do a new drop
a couple of weeks later, a month later, whatever your
cadence that you want is. And that's not a dumb
question question. So it just like makes it a little
bit more enticing maybe for the consumer like, I have
to have that before it is out of there. Obviously,
(21:04):
we talked a little bit in the beginning about marketing
and how important that was. But before you guys launched
your product, did you have a marketing plan in place
that you guys were posting like this is a new
brand set active drops this day, And did you build
like a little bit of a social media following for
the brand before launching it or when you launched it then,
did you guys really go like balls to the wall
(21:26):
with promotion. Yeah, so, actually we never ran ads um
first set, I started like an Instagram page and had
a mood board going. But on my personal Instagram, which
is something I still do on my personal Instagram, was
I was posting samples. I was posting teasers. I had
(21:47):
all of my friends come over and shy on samples,
and then they were posting about it, and then their
friends were like, where is that from? So I call
it my digital word of mouth like marketing strategy. Because
I had everyone anyone come over. I wouldn't have a
pizza party when it was sample night and all of
the sample boxes would arrive and all of my friends
would take me yourselfies and like just be like this,
(22:08):
these leggings are insane or you know. I I posted
reviews on my Instagram and this was all through my
personal Instagram, and then I started selling the samples on
my Instagram very transparently. I was like, this is a sample,
it might not fit perfectly. This is my venmo. Whoever
secures it gets it. And I sold out of all
(22:28):
my samples. UM. So yeah, I like did a Set
Active mood board because I knew I needed a home
base for these people to follow once my friends started
posting about it UM, and I needed to keep the
momentum going of the chatter about the brand. UM. But
I will say that what I intended for to start
(22:49):
Set Active and what it is today has changed, has pivoted. UM.
That's always going to happen in business. If it's not
pivoting and it's not you know, like staying the same
like or changing and something's wrong like you're it's never
going to succeed. So that's amazing. And would you say
(23:11):
that you intended to expand into UM like different types
of product, not just work out because obviously I'm in
like a hoodie and I know you guys have like
the comfy shorts and the cute like quarter zips. And
was that always a part of the plan or are
you saying like kind of similar to what you just
had said, Like No, that wasn't initially what you had
(23:33):
in mind, but you just kind of like grow and
evolve and see what the people want. Um. I mean
I always knew that the sky was a limit and
tow in terms of you know, expanding into new categories.
That's why the one mistake I did make was not
doing just Set on Instagram and just and doing that
(23:55):
active because I did know that I was going to
expand eventually. I didn't know how hard it was going
to be to get an Instagram handle later on. Um.
But it's okay. I mean, as long as it's still
staying true to the idea of why Set was created,
it's fine. Um. But I actually started Set, I wanted
it to be like a subscription box. Um. I don't
(24:21):
know how to explain it. Do you know? Do you
know who Nicole Rogers is. She's friends with like Devon
and Stuffs. So Nicole actually in the early days like
helped me get Set started. Um, And she her and
Devon have this like tattoo right here. It's like three hearts.
(24:43):
That was going to be the set logo. So I
don't even I can't explain why. I don't ask why. Um,
I have like a denim custom jacket with that logo
on it because I was like, look, how cool to
set logo. It's just just like heart hears um. It
was I don't listen. I don't know what I was,
but I was very stoked about it. Um. And then
(25:07):
it was gonna be a subscription box of like everything
you need to like jump start your workout, even if
you didn't want to go to the gym. So it
was going to be like a subscription box of like
a water bottle, a jump rope, a set, and like
something else. And then it just can't. Like every creative
meeting we had leading up to production and the launch,
it just evolved and changed and it completely changed the
(25:31):
business model. And I called my dad and I was like,
I need an investor, like I need to I need
I need this much. And he was like, how do
you know you need this much money? And I was
like I don't know. So he's like, okay, let me
let me connect you with my friend chat. He like
does investments and stuff, and he knew exactly what he
was doing when he connected me to this guy. And
(25:52):
I called chet and chats asking me all these hard questions.
I start crying because I have no idea what the
hell he's asking me. And I was like, I can't
start this company. I don't have an investment, and I
didn't start Set with an investment. I started Set with
my own investment of credit card debt um So, yeah, stop,
(26:14):
I'm no longer in debt. But wow, that's wild. Did
you ever run into like any problems when you like,
did you ever have too many sets that wouldn't sell
and then what do you do with those? Or it
was that never an issue? Because I know that's a
thing for some companies. Listen, we can only predict what
(26:35):
colors are going to do well and what aren't. Like
we had a drop maybe it was last year where
pinks just weren't selling. Pink was not a good color.
And then when we decided we were picking our Montana colors,
that's how to be. Like eight months ago, when we
were picking our Montana colors that drops tomorrow, Ali was like,
I really want to do a baby pink, Like we
should do one and I was like, the pinks don't sell,
(26:57):
and now pink is is like people are so excited
about paink that we think it's going to be the
number one seller tomorrow. But um, sometimes we get our
prediction song like what we think is going to be
a fire color ends up being the least seller, like
the least selling color that we do. So you have
(27:17):
to get creative. We put it on whether it's a
sale or UM, we market it differently. You just you
just got to get creative. I know, for like, for example,
our shorty suit, it's a unitard that's like in short version,
UM wasn't selling. We almost discontinued it, like it just
was not selling. And then one day this girl I
(27:40):
think she bought it or we we must. I don't
know if we gifted it to her or she bought it.
I'm almost positive she bought it because the whole office
was like, what's going on, Like the shorty suits selling
out on the website, and she posted a TikTok video
I think, just like talking about the shorty suit and
it went viral and shorty suits and are number one
of our number one selling products. And we were this
(28:01):
close to discontinuing it. It's crazy the power of social
media and if it just has a little buzz or
something that looks like appealing, it's it's really so insane,
which I think comes back down to marketing. But I
think now more than ever, especially with TikTok and Instagram,
but especially TikTok, because the amount of times I see
a girl or even sometimes a boy like post a
(28:23):
fashion video and say where their stuff is from? You
bet my first thing I'm doing is like quitting out
buying the same thing. It's it's really wild the impact
it has. Um. I don't want to keep you for
too long. I know you're very busy. Do you have
anything upcoming besides I know you have a collection dropping tomorrow,
as you've said, that's really exciting. But anything else that
(28:44):
you want to share that is in the brand's future. Um,
it depends what gets the people excited. For me, what
it gets me and I'm going to sound like such
a moment when I say this word, but what gets
me super jazzed is creative and campaigns and how we
market things um our Black Friday campaign and what we're
(29:05):
doing next year creatively. I haven't seen a brand do before.
So I'm excited to like tell that story. We locked
ourselves in the in the conference room on Friday, me
our creative director, and um my best friend Nicholas, who
used to work out set, and for hours we just
creatively planned out um next year. And I'm I like
(29:28):
pitched it to the team yesterday and then after on Friday,
and they were like jaws were on the floor. They're like, holy,
this is going to be epic. Um. So I'm really
excited about that we have coming, and I'm really excited
about some new styles we have, like long sleeve robbers coming,
we have new style dresses coming. Um, we have a
(29:51):
flare onesie coming with spaghetti straps. Like, we're just getting
really creative with where we're putting out there. In terms
of product. We have swimt coming next year, Men's coming
next year, a bunch of collaborations and new categories. So yeah,
oh my god, it's so exciting. Well, congratulations on all
(30:12):
your success. I can only see it going up from here.
I am truly a die hard fan. I'm obsessed with
your brand and um, yeah, thank you so much for
sharing some wisdom. I know this will help so many
people listening that are feeling either uninspired or don't know
where to start when creating their own company helped me
so much. You know that if you ever need anything,
(30:35):
or have any questions or want to start your own thing,
you know I'm here to help. So uh, thanks for
having me. Thank you, I appreciate it. Thank you so
much for coming on good Luck with two Bye, Thank
you
This is Conversationous with Olivia Jade and I Heart Radio podcast.
Hey everyone, it's Olivia Jade. Welcome back to another episode
of Conversations. Today's episode I have a very very wonderful, smart,
special guest and she is the founder of Set Active,
(00:24):
which if you guys follow me, you know I wear
their workout gear all the time. I'm in it right now,
I worked out in it this morning. It's my life.
I'm obsessed. So I'm so excited to have her on.
And with that being said, please welcome Lindsay Carter. Hello, Hello, welcome.
(00:44):
Thank you. You like my jacket? Yes, honestly I was
going to wear Set two and I was like I
probably like I'm in full set just so you know
right now. Also in short, the bra, the whole. Oh
my god, I'm we're sending you some new stuff, right
I think I'm so excited that's coming on the way. Yeah,
thank you so much, because I'm not exaggerating when I
(01:06):
say I've probably bought over twenty pairs of your workout here, Like, um,
we'll stop buying it, We'll stud me. I'm happy to support,
but I'm like a die hard fan. When they told
me they were like, do you want Lindsay on the podcast?
I was like, please, I really want to know everything.
My god. So I'm just really excited you're here. Thank
you so much for coming on. Um, of course, I'm
(01:28):
so excited. Should we just dive right in? Yeah, It's
it's weird for me to be on the opposite end
because I also host a podcast. So I'm like kind
of excited to be in the hot seat rather than
hosting because I get awkward sometimes I do. So if
you want to take over at any point, feel free.
I don't mind. Um, but will you give a little
background as to who you are for the listeners that
don't know. Yeah, Um, so I'm Lindsay Carter. I am
(01:54):
soon to be a mom of two. Um, I own
that active I started it like four and a half
years ago. Um. I started it with no experience in
the active industry or fashion world. Um. I went to
school to be a kindergarten teacher and now I have
an office in Beverly Hills with over thirty employees. Wow.
(02:16):
So when you say you had no experience in active
where what made you want to start this? Then? Um
it's kind of a loaded question, but I so After college,
I got a job at NBC Universal and then I
dabbled in social media. Back then, I say back then
as if like I'm, you know, a dinosaur. But back then,
(02:40):
in my world, social media was just kind of like
popping off, like no one really was using it, No
one really used it for marketing or anything like that.
And I had told my bosses at NBC Universals, like,
I really think that we should be marketing these shows
on social media, Like no one's doing that, but there's
these personalities on social and that's where I found my
(03:03):
love for branding and social media. And I say this
story because I think it's such an important part of
how I started set um. And then from there I
went to a trending forecasting agency UM where I did
social media and branding and marketing and I basically wrote
reports on how to create a cult like brand UM.
(03:25):
And then from there I was like, you know what,
I want to take what I know and apply it
to like myself. And I had my own social media
marketing branding agency called Elie Social, where I did like
I blew brands up for people UM. And then I
was like, why am I giving everyone my idea? I
(03:45):
should do my own thing. So I was sitting at
Alfred on Melrose Place and everyone was wearing activewear in
and out of the coffee shop, but no one looked
like they were cute cute people, but like no one
looked put together, like no one looked street style active
where you know, no one was doing it at the time.
Um Ala was really focused on like yoga, and Lulu
(04:09):
was focused on exercise, and Jim Shark was focused on
like full on yeah, and so it's like there's no
one who's like focusing on the in between of being
active while staying active essentially. So I was like, I'm
gonna do it. So I did it so smart. You
found the missing thing in the market and created it yourself.
(04:31):
And I have to say it's it honestly is so
comfortable too. And I I feel like any time I
don't know what to wear, I'm constantly reaching just for
one of my set sets because it looks so chic
and put together, like you're saying. Um So, I have
a question that I've been wondering, and I love to
ask this to people that have started their own businesses
(04:53):
or entrepreneurs in any sense of the word. If you're
a young girl or a young boy, and you're sitting
at home and you don't have the connections or maybe
necessarily some of the resources that some people may have,
and you really want to start a line. What would
your advice be and where did you kind of start
and say, Okay, this is what I want to do.
(05:13):
This is the first step I'm taking. And obviously you
can share as much as you want without giving too
much of your secrets and whatever. But I am curious.
It's honestly really not a secret. I there's so many
different ways to start a brand. UM. First of all,
talk about it, Tell your friends, tell your family friends,
talk to your parents, ask if they know anyone, because
(05:37):
you would be so surprised who has connections where? And
everyone has this like taboo thought like they don't want
to ask for help or you know, whatever it might be.
But you'd be so surprised who's willing to just connect
you to someone to start a conversation. UM. And then also,
Google is your best friend. I literally googled seamless Active
(05:58):
where Los Angeles. I already had my business plan in
my head and I had it written up, and it
was like this whole social media pitch um of how
I was going to market it and like why they
should partner with me, Because a lot of factories and
manufacturers require minimums, and so unless you're willing to hit
their minimum, they're probably not going to work with you.
(06:19):
But when I was willing to like prove and show
the growth to them and say like this is what
this is the reach I have, and this is how
I'm going to do it, they're more willing to listen
and sort of negotiate with you. Um, everyone's willing to negotiate. Um.
And then also there's services. UM. I I'm not like
(06:42):
a master in sourcing, but I did post on my
TikTok with our head of production resources that if you
did want to start your own clothing brand or anything
like that, there are resources or websites that lead you
to the right contacts depending on what it is that
you want to start. UM. But I would really say
the first steps that you should take our first understand
(07:05):
what it is that you're building. Be passionate about it,
because if you're not passionate about it, it's not going
to take off. It's not going to go anywhere. And
don't fake your passionate about it, really be passionate about
and ask yourself, can you do this every single day
for the rest of your life, even the hard days,
And if the answer is still yes, then go to
the next step and keep going to that next step
(07:27):
as long as you're answering yourself. Yes. Okay, great advice.
I love that. Can we backcheck a little bit about
kind of maybe some like marketing hacks that you've discovered
or what's worked really well for you and why you
think it's worked really well. Yeah, Um, marketing is so broad,
so it really depends on what the product is that
(07:48):
you're marketing. The first thing you need to understand in
any marketing position, whether you're working at an agency, marketing
for your own brand, marketing for someone else's brand, is
no your audience. You have to understand who you're selling to,
what their interests are, what they like, what they don't like,
(08:09):
and then you have to trial and airing your marketing plans.
So first set specifically, they need to be educated on
new styles, new products, different things like that, because then
they feel they get like anxiety if they're not understanding
the function of the new the new style that we're doing. UM,
(08:30):
I would definitely say. The first step any marketing hack
one on one is know your audience. Know who you're
marketing to. You know, it's if you don't understand your audience,
then you're not going to be able to tell the story,
which is hack number two. Tell a story. You need
to be able to talk to your audience and let
(08:52):
them understand, like why are you doing this, Why did
you decide to come out with this style dress, How
does this dress make a difference in your day? One's
different about it? Um. And then I think and a
lot of people might either agree or disagree with this,
but tip number three is transparency. I think that's like
what set No Pun intended, What set Set apart from
(09:15):
other brands is our transparency. You know, if we've poked
up and there was a production mistake, we say it.
If something's delayed in our warehouse, we announce it. Um.
I think that would definitely be hack number three. I
love that. I feel like, yeah, that it's a huge thing.
And I also think like there's something to be said
for the fact that I knew who you were before
(09:38):
meeting you, or I like had a face to put
to the brand head sort of and like I think
that's really helpful as well, because you feel like a
like there's a personal connection there just another like young
woman or something of that regard. I think is helpful
to not only sales, but just to make the consumer
feel like, oh, this is like a legitimate, trustworthy, like
(10:00):
wholesome brand also, um, which I think is amazing. And
I also just feel like it can be probably i'd
imagine I've never started a company, but really difficult when
something comes back fucked up like you said, or there
was a mistake, and have you had I mean, I'm
sure you guys have been around for a few years now,
(10:21):
like any major no pun intended, but like setbacks. Um,
right now we're currently going through something. So I think
the biggest lesson that I've learned in business in general
is that not only are there going to be like
problems externally you know with production and manufacturing, but internally
managing your employees, understanding their personalities, um, creating a like
(10:44):
company culture where people want to wake up and come
to work every day, and then dealing with people who
aren't in the right you know, positions. It affects the
company externally, having the wrong talent in the wrong positions
could really up your company and something that we're dealing
with now. So we're going through our second restructure. We're
trying to find the right talent. We're poaching people were
(11:07):
doing really hardcore interviews. By talent, do you mean people
that work on the Set Active team or you mean
like social media presence that you like, I want to
work with influencers talent meaning like employees, like people who
work on this on like the Set Active team. Um.
(11:28):
You know, so many people can like talk the talk,
but they cannot walk the walk, they cannot execute, and
it can really really really like up a company. Um.
And then also like obviously there's production issues our whole thing,
or colors and like wearing matching colors, um with your
(11:49):
sweats or your basics or you're active and we had
a color for Montana that's it was really hard to
get it to match and so it it's delayed and
we had to be like, Okay, we got to get
the DPS ready, which is the product description pages that
you see on websites. We have to say, like this
item is not shipping till this date. You have to
alert the whole team. You have to like let social
(12:10):
media know, because they want to know when they're getting
their stuff. Um, so like problems like that happen all
the time, and that I would say, like the other
hardest part of like being a business owner is that
so many people think they know how to run your business.
Um there's people who hide behind social media accounts or
you know, someone commented on our TikTok saying like this
(12:32):
color is just the same as Macha. I'm like, really,
because you and opened our Pantone book and pack the
Pantone color yourself, and you know for a fact that
we just took that color. And I'm just like sitting
there and I had this conversation with a friend last
night at dinner, and I was like, would they say
that to someone's face, No, they sit behind don't even
(12:57):
saying I've It's it's mind blowing to me what some
of these people do behind a phone screen. I'm just
like audacity, because they know how to run a multimillion
dollar company. Maybe I should bring them in and let
them do it for a week. I have a question.
(13:27):
This is so random, but I feel like one of
the trickiest things to do with anything like legging material
or just like tight and a mixture of a light
color creates a camel toe or like something that's unflattering.
And I feel like with all the workout gear I've
purchased from you guys that doesn't happen. Is that because
(13:50):
of the material, Is there like a double layer situation happening?
How do you avoid that? Um? Get yourself a good
tech packer? Um? No, but really there's some thing called, well,
all of our all of our leggings now don't have
a front seam. They have the back seam that you
know flatters your butt, but there's no front seam that
(14:11):
gives you that camel toe. I think it just depends. Obviously,
everyone's like bottom half is created differently. Um, understanding and
in seems so like the line that would go in
the front, and like how that measures is also really
important for camel toe, and so getting that in seam
like perfect will make a huge difference in any active where. Um. However,
(14:37):
we took out our front seam to alleviate the camel
toe situation. Um, it also depends, like what underwear you're
wearing under your leggings. Um. Some I mean consult with
your doctor when I say this, But some gynecologists say, like,
you're not supposed to wear underwear with your leggings because
it's like a double added like bacteria layer. So that
(14:57):
might help or not help with camel too. Try out,
let us know, Yeah, try it out, let us know.
And we also came out with seamless underwear to like
mitigate what camel toe does. Um, And it's like we're
finally bringing it back. We had a production issue with
them and it was our best like one of our
best selling products. So I'm excited that indoors coming back
(15:20):
because that helps the camel too. That's huge. When you
first started, like backtrack a little bit more, were you
immediately using a factory or like a shipping warehouse or
were you when you first began like shipping things yourself.
How how much help did you have? Like what was
the really early stage looking like? Um, the really early
(15:42):
stage is probably exactly what you imagine a young entrepreneurs
life to look like. Um, it was me and Nicky Shay,
who was my first employee, and we looked like Santa
Claus every day with like plastic bags full of orders
over my shoulder, my whole apartment, my poor husband who
(16:03):
is now my husband at the time, but was my
boyfriend and fiance. Basically had to live in this box
line department with me of like you know, container store
boxes labeled with sizes and colors, and then production boxes
I'm talking lined from the floor to the ceiling every
crevice of my apartment. UM. And so me and Nicky
(16:24):
were shipping out orders every single day. UM. I remember
like burying Nikki in the orders, Like one day when
we got a time and it was like find Nikki
and she like pops up from the orders. Um. And
then we graduated to my family friend's house, her guesthouse.
She like had it as an office um, and we
(16:48):
shipped orders from there because we needed more space. And
then we worked for my dining room up until two
and a half years ago. I would say, um, we
crowded my dining room table. Once I hired on more employees.
I think at one point I had ten employees at
my dining room table. And then we were like, okay,
it's time for an office. And that was year three
(17:10):
that we got an office. So for three years I
worked from my dining room table at my house. That's
some serious hustle. I respect that on so many levels.
That's amazing. What was like the trickiest thing within that, UM,
I would say, keeping up with the growth, UM, teaching
myself things that I am not good at, like Shopify
(17:31):
and inventory and customer service. Oh my god. I learned
so quickly that I could never work on a customer
service team, Like ever did you have to deal with that?
Like when if things weren't going or if like an
order didn't ship or somebody didn't receive something, where you
personally in the beginning messaging these people back, being like
I'm so sorry, what was your order number? Dada da da?
(17:52):
Oh yeah, I mean even on launch day, I don't
even think we had a customer service email set up
like it was it was my hand Like it was crazy. UM.
And I learned quickly that I have little patients for
rude people, and people tend to get very rude over
customer service. I understand the frustration of like spending money
(18:14):
on something and not receiving it and you know the
long list of reasons, but you don't need to be rude.
And I was like finding that I didn't have tolerance
for that. But Nikki is so patient and so kind,
and she was really good at it, so I kind
of like put that on her weight. UM. And then
you know that goes into just like knowing your employees
and always hiring for your weaknesses because UM, that's what's
(18:39):
going to move a company forward in the end. But yeah,
I mean we did all of the customer service. That
was definitely one of the hardest things. UM. And then
just like things that I didn't know, like you had
to put package weights and I'm like, well, I don't
know how much this package ways? Like what am I
supposed to put shop? Um, There's things that you learn
(19:00):
a long way. And so I think that's like my
biggest piece of advice that I try to tell people
is like take it step by step. Things are going
to pop up. You can google, you can ask a friend, like,
you'll figure it out as long as you take it
step by step. Just don't get ahead of yourself totally.
How many sets did you guys release when you first started? UM,
(19:23):
So it was only one active fabric, which was our
skull flex fabric. It's that buttery seamless fabric that UM
we came out with, and then we came out with
four colors UM, and then I think it was two
style tops, and then biker shorts. Actually biker shorts didn't
come until a little bit later, and then the legging
(19:44):
and then um, it was we've kind of dominated like
the limited edition aspect for the first year. UM at
the time, like no one was really doing drop model
businesses like they were, but it was like supreme like
really you know coveted brands that either were like known
(20:04):
for like the lines on Fairfax and things like that,
and there wasn't really a dt C brand, or at
least maybe I just was. I'm naive and I have
no idea, but I didn't know the DTC brand that
we was doing drop model um. And so that's sort
of how we went about doing things. And we don't
do any wholesale UM, I won't do it. This might
be a really dumb question, but what is a drop model?
(20:26):
What does that mean? Drop model means that it doesn't
stay in stock, So you like have a limited edition collection,
you drop it, and then you do a new drop
a couple of weeks later, a month later, whatever your
cadence that you want is. And that's not a dumb
question question. So it just like makes it a little
bit more enticing maybe for the consumer like, I have
to have that before it is out of there. Obviously,
(21:04):
we talked a little bit in the beginning about marketing
and how important that was. But before you guys launched
your product, did you have a marketing plan in place
that you guys were posting like this is a new
brand set active drops this day, And did you build
like a little bit of a social media following for
the brand before launching it or when you launched it then,
did you guys really go like balls to the wall
(21:26):
with promotion. Yeah, so, actually we never ran ads um
first set, I started like an Instagram page and had
a mood board going. But on my personal Instagram, which
is something I still do on my personal Instagram, was
I was posting samples. I was posting teasers. I had
(21:47):
all of my friends come over and shy on samples,
and then they were posting about it, and then their
friends were like, where is that from? So I call
it my digital word of mouth like marketing strategy. Because
I had everyone anyone come over. I wouldn't have a
pizza party when it was sample night and all of
the sample boxes would arrive and all of my friends
would take me yourselfies and like just be like this,
(22:08):
these leggings are insane or you know. I I posted
reviews on my Instagram and this was all through my
personal Instagram, and then I started selling the samples on
my Instagram very transparently. I was like, this is a sample,
it might not fit perfectly. This is my venmo. Whoever
secures it gets it. And I sold out of all
(22:28):
my samples. UM. So yeah, I like did a Set
Active mood board because I knew I needed a home
base for these people to follow once my friends started
posting about it UM, and I needed to keep the
momentum going of the chatter about the brand. UM. But
I will say that what I intended for to start
(22:49):
Set Active and what it is today has changed, has pivoted. UM.
That's always going to happen in business. If it's not
pivoting and it's not you know, like staying the same
like or changing and something's wrong like you're it's never
going to succeed. So that's amazing. And would you say
(23:11):
that you intended to expand into UM like different types
of product, not just work out because obviously I'm in
like a hoodie and I know you guys have like
the comfy shorts and the cute like quarter zips. And
was that always a part of the plan or are
you saying like kind of similar to what you just
had said, Like No, that wasn't initially what you had
(23:33):
in mind, but you just kind of like grow and
evolve and see what the people want. Um. I mean
I always knew that the sky was a limit and
tow in terms of you know, expanding into new categories.
That's why the one mistake I did make was not
doing just Set on Instagram and just and doing that
(23:55):
active because I did know that I was going to
expand eventually. I didn't know how hard it was going
to be to get an Instagram handle later on. Um.
But it's okay. I mean, as long as it's still
staying true to the idea of why Set was created,
it's fine. Um. But I actually started Set, I wanted
it to be like a subscription box. Um. I don't
(24:21):
know how to explain it. Do you know? Do you
know who Nicole Rogers is. She's friends with like Devon
and Stuffs. So Nicole actually in the early days like
helped me get Set started. Um, And she her and
Devon have this like tattoo right here. It's like three hearts.
(24:43):
That was going to be the set logo. So I
don't even I can't explain why. I don't ask why. Um,
I have like a denim custom jacket with that logo
on it because I was like, look, how cool to
set logo. It's just just like heart hears um. It
was I don't listen. I don't know what I was,
but I was very stoked about it. Um. And then
(25:07):
it was gonna be a subscription box of like everything
you need to like jump start your workout, even if
you didn't want to go to the gym. So it
was going to be like a subscription box of like
a water bottle, a jump rope, a set, and like
something else. And then it just can't. Like every creative
meeting we had leading up to production and the launch,
it just evolved and changed and it completely changed the
(25:31):
business model. And I called my dad and I was like,
I need an investor, like I need to I need
I need this much. And he was like, how do
you know you need this much money? And I was
like I don't know. So he's like, okay, let me
let me connect you with my friend chat. He like
does investments and stuff, and he knew exactly what he
was doing when he connected me to this guy. And
(25:52):
I called chet and chats asking me all these hard questions.
I start crying because I have no idea what the
hell he's asking me. And I was like, I can't
start this company. I don't have an investment, and I
didn't start Set with an investment. I started Set with
my own investment of credit card debt um So, yeah, stop,
(26:14):
I'm no longer in debt. But wow, that's wild. Did
you ever run into like any problems when you like,
did you ever have too many sets that wouldn't sell
and then what do you do with those? Or it
was that never an issue? Because I know that's a
thing for some companies. Listen, we can only predict what
(26:35):
colors are going to do well and what aren't. Like
we had a drop maybe it was last year where
pinks just weren't selling. Pink was not a good color.
And then when we decided we were picking our Montana colors,
that's how to be. Like eight months ago, when we
were picking our Montana colors that drops tomorrow, Ali was like,
I really want to do a baby pink, Like we
should do one and I was like, the pinks don't sell,
(26:57):
and now pink is is like people are so excited
about paink that we think it's going to be the
number one seller tomorrow. But um, sometimes we get our
prediction song like what we think is going to be
a fire color ends up being the least seller, like
the least selling color that we do. So you have
(27:17):
to get creative. We put it on whether it's a
sale or UM, we market it differently. You just you
just got to get creative. I know, for like, for example,
our shorty suit, it's a unitard that's like in short version,
UM wasn't selling. We almost discontinued it, like it just
was not selling. And then one day this girl I
(27:40):
think she bought it or we we must. I don't
know if we gifted it to her or she bought it.
I'm almost positive she bought it because the whole office
was like, what's going on, Like the shorty suits selling
out on the website, and she posted a TikTok video
I think, just like talking about the shorty suit and
it went viral and shorty suits and are number one
of our number one selling products. And we were this
(28:01):
close to discontinuing it. It's crazy the power of social
media and if it just has a little buzz or
something that looks like appealing, it's it's really so insane,
which I think comes back down to marketing. But I
think now more than ever, especially with TikTok and Instagram,
but especially TikTok, because the amount of times I see
a girl or even sometimes a boy like post a
(28:23):
fashion video and say where their stuff is from? You
bet my first thing I'm doing is like quitting out
buying the same thing. It's it's really wild the impact
it has. Um. I don't want to keep you for
too long. I know you're very busy. Do you have
anything upcoming besides I know you have a collection dropping tomorrow,
as you've said, that's really exciting. But anything else that
(28:44):
you want to share that is in the brand's future. Um,
it depends what gets the people excited. For me, what
it gets me and I'm going to sound like such
a moment when I say this word, but what gets
me super jazzed is creative and campaigns and how we
market things um our Black Friday campaign and what we're
(29:05):
doing next year creatively. I haven't seen a brand do before.
So I'm excited to like tell that story. We locked
ourselves in the in the conference room on Friday, me
our creative director, and um my best friend Nicholas, who
used to work out set, and for hours we just
creatively planned out um next year. And I'm I like
(29:28):
pitched it to the team yesterday and then after on Friday,
and they were like jaws were on the floor. They're like, holy,
this is going to be epic. Um. So I'm really
excited about that we have coming, and I'm really excited
about some new styles we have, like long sleeve robbers coming,
we have new style dresses coming. Um, we have a
(29:51):
flare onesie coming with spaghetti straps. Like, we're just getting
really creative with where we're putting out there. In terms
of product. We have swimt coming next year, Men's coming
next year, a bunch of collaborations and new categories. So yeah,
oh my god, it's so exciting. Well, congratulations on all
(30:12):
your success. I can only see it going up from here.
I am truly a die hard fan. I'm obsessed with
your brand and um, yeah, thank you so much for
sharing some wisdom. I know this will help so many
people listening that are feeling either uninspired or don't know
where to start when creating their own company helped me
so much. You know that if you ever need anything,
(30:35):
or have any questions or want to start your own thing,
you know I'm here to help. So uh, thanks for
having me. Thank you, I appreciate it. Thank you so
much for coming on good Luck with two Bye, Thank
you
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