August 10, 2023 • 41 mins
In 2017, Dae Lim founded Sundae School, a Korean "smoke wear" brand born at the intersection of cannabis and streetwear.
With the help of his sister, Cindy Lim, Sundae School started releasing collections of shirts and jackets filled with weed references and plays on religion.
In the years that followed, Sundae School would grow from a rack of t-shirts to a full fledged global brand, offering cannabis products, accessories, and apparel worn by celebrities like Pete Davidson and Jacob Elordi.
On this week's episode of All Angles, we talk to co-founders Dae Lim and Cindy Lim, head of business development Jennifer Tran, and head of Fashion Gia Kim, to hear the full story of Sundae School, and learn how a small team of high achieving degenerates created one of the most interesting and exciting new brands in fashion and cannabis.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So I was like, you know, I'm gonna quit my job,
go to Korea, whip this out in two months, and
then showcase it in your fashion week, which is what
we did.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
And then we.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Got an order from Barney's and I was like, wow,
like this is like by making it in America moment.
And then a year and a half later, Barney's went bankrupt.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Welcome to Idea Generations All Angles, a podcast about culture's
most influential brands and the teams that built them. If
you're an entrepreneur, creative, or anyone interested in harnessing the
power of collaboration, join me Noah Callahan Bever each week
as we dissect the most dynamic companies in culture, because
(00:52):
the only way to truly understand success is to look
at it from all angles. Idea Generations All Angles is
a will Typomedia podcast. In twenty seventeen, Day Limb founded
(01:14):
Sunday School, a Korean smokewear brand born at the intersection
of cannabis and streetwear. With the help of his sister,
Cindy Limb, Sunday School started releasing collections of shirts and
jackets filled with weed references and plays on religion. In
the years that followed, Sunday School would grow from a
rack of T shirts to a full fledged global brand
(01:36):
offering cannabis products, accessories, and apparel worn by celebrities like
Pete Davidson and Jacob Alordi. On this week's episode of
All Angles, we talked to co founders day Limb and
Cindy Limb, head of business development Jennifer Tran, and head
of Fashion Gia Kim to hear the full story of
Sunday School and learn how a small team of high
(01:59):
achieving degenera It's created one of the most interesting and
exciting new brands and fashion in cannabis. But before any
of that happened, years before hosting pop ups in New
York City or developing their own weed gummies, daylim was
just sitting around his living room with his grandma, preparing
for his life as President of Korea.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I am born and raised in Korea. This is like
a very distinct memory of mine. But when I was
in second grade, I was watching TV with my grandma,
who was like my best dad. She pointed to this
like white guy like speaking and she was like, you
gotta be like him.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
And I was like, who is he? And She's like,
that's George W.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Bush and I was like, oh, okay, interesting, I'm not
white and I don't speak English. And she was like,
that's why you need to go to Yale and then
you can be the president of Korea.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
So honestly, I thought I was going to.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Be the president of Korea when I was in second grade.
So I started studying English super hard, started studying math,
and then I come from a family of doctors, typical
Korean parents.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
So when I went to college, I thought I was
going to be a doctor. So I was pre med.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
Day didn't end up at Yale like his grandma wanted,
and his presidential aspirations fell by the wayside. But he
did end up going to Harvard pre Med not a
bad backup plan. So Day left Korea to study in
the US. His interests been beyond the classroom.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
I have always had an interest for fashion, especially like
women's fashion. I was that kid making like dresses out
of toilet paper, you know. I would like sketch so
many things. I love anime too. My favorite anime was
like Card Capture Cherry, where there's amazing volume and amazing dresses,
(03:45):
and I was like, okay, this is what I've always
wanted to do, but I felt like, you know, I
gotta be a doctor.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
Despite a growing interest in fashion, Day stayed in school
and graduated from Harvard in twenty fourteen with a BA
in applied mathematics. He then moved to New York City
in search of his first real job.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
So I was like, Okay, I'll probably go into business.
So I started at a consulting company. I started at
McKinsey in New York, and that was very interesting because
you know, I am very much and very unorganized, Like
my MBTI type is e NTP. I'm the orator, you know,
I'm always like the one being like, let's do this
(04:28):
and then little to no follow through. So it really
helped me figure out like how to like structure my thoughts,
how to figure out what the steps are required for execution.
So it was a really great experience. Fast forward two years,
you know, I was like, Okay, this is not too bad.
And then I was on a project that puts me
(04:50):
on like the roadmap or promotion, and that was the
Perdue Pharma case.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
And more specifically, my workstream.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Was like working to extend the patent on oxycotton. And
then I quit five days later, I was like, you know,
if this is what it takes, this is not why,
this is not what I was meant to do.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
So that was twenty sixteen.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
Just like that, they quit his former job and decided
to return to his parents' home in Korea to contemplate
his next move.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
Thankfully, I was in a place where I had saved
up money, and you know, I don't have any student loans,
so I have like my parents to make for that.
And so I think, I you know, it comes from
a place of privilege for sure, because I didn't have
to worry too much, especially for two months. I was
like getting paid after the two months, and then I
had like a two month gap and I just came home,
(05:50):
you know. I came to Korea and where like my
mom made me food every day, you know, so I
could kind of be economical. Came home in the wintertime
and actually in this exact bed, which is my childhood bed,
I had smuggled in a faight pen.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I was like puffing it in my bed.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
I was wrapped underneath the blankets, underneath the sheets, and
I was just like, fuck, like what is life? What
am I supposed to do? I was just like thinking
about different things. And then I hear a super loud
banging in my door and I was just like.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Oh my gosh, you don't know, there goes my mom again.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
And then she barged in and started just ripping me
a new one. And then at that moment, I was
just like, Wow, the world is so beautiful and so chaotic.
I don't know what led to that moment, but I
was like, what if God was Korean and smoked weed
every day and created this world and that's why it's
so beautiful, but it's also such a mess. And what
(06:48):
if that God was my mom? And I think it
all started from like me thinking my mom needs to chill,
so she should probably smoke. And then that kind of thought,
you know, kept lingering, and for me, like I'm the
type of guy who when I'm on something, I'm just
like I need to like write this down. So I
just started like writing out a lot of ideas, started
(07:08):
like sketching as I do, like I love to sketch.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
And then I was like, you know, fashion is my passion,
so let's make some T shirts and hoodies, which is
my love language.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
And that was twenty seventeen, and that's how Sunday School
was born.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
Sunday School was alive, or at least the idea was,
but to actually create some shirts and jackets and to
bring the brand to life, they would need more than
just his creativity and high ideas. So he reached out
to the most reliable person he knew, his sister.
Speaker 4 (07:40):
When I was in college and my parents lived in Korea,
I would go back to Korea in the winter, and
Day also happened to be in Korea.
Speaker 5 (07:48):
He's not usually there all the time, but he was.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
This is Cindy Lynn, co founder of Sunday School Day.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
He always has been so interested in fashion since I
was growing up. I remember when I was in middle
school and he was in high school. He had a
fashion show in Korea and he was designing all these
clothes and going to fashion studios and sewing his own
designs and clothes. I think it was sophomore winter. My
(08:16):
brother was like, Oh, do you want to start a
clothing company with me? So I knew that this wasn't
out of the blue for him. I just love trying
new things. If it sounds like I won't regret it.
Speaker 5 (08:29):
So I was just like, Okay, why not. Where do
I start.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
With Cindy on board and both siblings together in Korea.
Day and Cindy went to work on building the first
Sunday School products.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
Yeah, so I didn't know anything and I just knew
one thing. I was like, I need to launch on
four to twenty, right obviously, and this was Christmas Eve,
so I had four months five months. I talked to
my sister, who was taking a gap year at the time,
and I was like, yo, do you want to do
this with me?
Speaker 2 (08:59):
Do you want to help me out out? And she
was like you know why not?
Speaker 1 (09:02):
So yeah, two of us we started Google starching, you
know Korea's version of Google's called Neighbors, started like screenprinting,
like T shirt links, you.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
Know, all of that. Started going around in the garment district.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
Buying people coffee, making friends, and then started sketching out ideas.
Speaker 5 (09:21):
He basically was like, I want to create a smokewear brand.
Speaker 4 (09:26):
You know, skate people have skatewear, surf people have surfware,
there's yoga wear. Smoking can be a sport, so we
should make smokewear. And I was just like, okay, you
can do all the design part for me. I'm focused
on Okay, if we're gonna make clothes.
Speaker 5 (09:43):
Where do we even start? Me and my brother had
zero experience.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
Maybe my brother a little bit with him in fashion
show and sewing, but for me, I was like, I
don't even know where you get the fabric, what kind
of fabric you need to get for a T shirt,
how you print on T shirts a different way, and
just like the whole factory line of how to do
the operations. So my first step was figure that out.
Number one. There's a neighborhood in Korea called kunde Mun.
(10:16):
It's like called d o mg dong dae day moonmo
n dong daemon in like more English pronunciation, and basically
that's where all the fabrics are sourced.
Speaker 5 (10:30):
That's where a lot of the clothes.
Speaker 4 (10:32):
Get manufactured in Asia, especially in Korea. I just went
there and I started knocking on every little fabric shop
showing them a design.
Speaker 5 (10:44):
That day had sketched out. It was just a T
shirt design. One of our first collections was a T.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
Shirt with a play on the old Korean king and
he's smoking a j I was just carrying that print around,
being like, I want to print this on a T shirt.
Speaker 5 (11:00):
I want to start a company.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
And everyone was like kind of laughing, but they thought
I was They thought it was cute because it's just
this twenty.
Speaker 5 (11:07):
Year old young girl carrying like.
Speaker 4 (11:10):
Something they didn't know, marijuana, so something like a cigarette,
like a king smoking a cigarette, asking them like how
to do anything.
Speaker 5 (11:18):
And then I actually found this girl who.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
Sat me down at a coffee shop and told me
all about how you need to choose the fabric and
you need to make the pattern, and then the pattern
is what the factories take and that's how the assembly
line or manufacturing starts. So then I hired her to
be kind of like my operations manager while I can
focus on other things.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
I Sidy built out the operation side of the company.
Day returned to New York to prepare the launch at
the first official Sunday School collection. With a rack of
sample clothes in hand, they hit his favorite spots to
find a place to pop up his brain.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
I started doing events outside of mister soft Ease. I
did events outside of my neighborhood, Boatdega, and then I
started doing events at like, you know, all the Korean
owned coffee shops.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
You know, just bring a.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
Rack, put some clothes on, and then did an event
at like, you know, different places wherever I could, you know,
try it off inness.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
As Day networked in the city and started to build
brand recognition in the streets of New York. Cindy was
busy trying to build a buzz around Sunday School online.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
It was during winter break, so I had a bit
of quality time dedicated to figuring out the operations and
how things should be structured. But I had to leave
actually to Milan. I was studying abroad in Milan the
next semester.
Speaker 5 (12:38):
So after that was set.
Speaker 4 (12:40):
Number one checked. I found someone who can at least
communicate with me if there's problems, and I can pay
her to go visit the factories or.
Speaker 5 (12:49):
Go source fabrics.
Speaker 4 (12:51):
And then number two was the other big part of
my job one being operations too, was marketing and the
growth part of it. Now that we know how to
make clothes and we made some samples and did some
quality control.
Speaker 5 (13:05):
And they're not too horrible, how do we market our brand?
Speaker 6 (13:08):
How do we grow our.
Speaker 4 (13:10):
Brand to beyond just our small group of friends who
will be there for us supporting this small clothing brand.
I would be asking a lot of different consumer startups in.
Speaker 5 (13:22):
The US, like how do you do? Facebook Ads?
Speaker 2 (13:25):
How do you bid?
Speaker 4 (13:26):
I would be learning everything from tactical and more technical
bidding strategies and digital advertising and marketing.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
One way to market the brand was by cold emailing
anyone and everyone. Just as Day was in the city
making connections, Cindy was knocking on doors online.
Speaker 4 (13:44):
So most of my job also during my semester in
Milan was to reach out to reporters in like Typeeast,
High Sobiety, Vogue Paper, every reporter outlet.
Speaker 6 (13:57):
We had a Excel sheet.
Speaker 4 (13:59):
Where I kind of tracked down what kind of articles
they wrote, basically just tracking down each reporter in each
of the major PR or like. Honestly, a lot of
the Times dms them and they were very responsive, so
we got a lot of the press from the cold outreach.
Speaker 5 (14:18):
We had our first launch.
Speaker 4 (14:20):
Party with PR close friends and like Instagram influencers that
we also calld outreach to and just DJs of the
creative voices of New York and we invited them to
join us in our launch where we will be selling
the samples that we've created.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
After building some buzz with press and public, Sunday School's
first four to twenty pop up was a success. People
bought the clothes and the event was a vibe amongst friends, supporters, press,
and any curious passer bys. And one of those guests
was to become a pivotal Sunday School player.
Speaker 7 (14:56):
We first met in Boston.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
He was a college student at Harvard.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
This is Gakim, head of fashion at Sunday School.
Speaker 7 (15:05):
We have these things called like long weekends, where like
they give you like a five day weekend, but because
like international students like me, there's like nowhere to go,
Like you can't go back home because our homes of
sixteen flight away Korean students would just go get a
hotel in Boston. And one of my friends from high
(15:26):
school was friends with Day. She introduced me to Day,
and that's when I first met him. I saw their
journey from the very beginning, and so I actually was
one of the first customers. I bought the first hoodie
ever since the beginning of their journey, I was there
as a customer though.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
Gia was an early Sunday School supporter, but after college
she moved to La keeping tabs on the brand from Afar.
After the four to twenty pop up, Day left feeling
optimistic about the event and what he was building, but
it still wasn't paying the bills, so we searched for
a full time job while working on Sunday School.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
On the side, I joined a company called v Files,
which is like fashion music and creator.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Program for a lot of young creative talent.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
I was kind of doing the same old business development
partnership sales, and that was amazing because it.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Really opened my eyes to so many young.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Creative talent across the world, got to connect with them.
And not only it, you know, it gave me like network,
but it really gave me hope and it really gave
me inspiration that I was like, oh, shoot, I too
can be a designer and I too.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
You know, before I would always be so.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Wary of calling myself a creative director, but now I
truly believe that I am a creative director because you know,
the main job of creative direction is telling a story visually,
telling a story emotionally.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
And that's what I focused most of my days on.
Speaker 3 (17:03):
As they kept building his idea for Sunday School, it
became more than a job, It became his purpose. But
Cindy found a hard time matching his intensity.
Speaker 4 (17:13):
The first five or six months of the brand. I
was a full time student who is studying abroad in
the lawn and day was a full time employee leading.
Speaker 5 (17:23):
Like a media company.
Speaker 4 (17:24):
So it was definitely challenging in terms of time allocation.
It's a safer way to do a very risky thing,
kind of juggling both testing it out until there's a
minimum reached where you know that at this point, there's
always going to be a point where you.
Speaker 5 (17:40):
Know that you're either going to have to go all
in or leave.
Speaker 4 (17:43):
So for my brother, it was at that point when
he quit his job and just decided to do Sunday
School full time because he believed in it and it
is his brain child. And for me, it was when
we started getting fiduciary responsibilities that I didn't want to
I just I just didn't want to be guilty about
(18:04):
not being not being as passionate as I could as.
Speaker 5 (18:07):
Other people could be. So that's why I left.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
She was like, yo, I got a like one.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Working with you is not fun because you are a
mean older brother and like you know, it gets so
personal with family because like you just treat them like
how you would treat them, But you can't do that
when you're working with someone and then two she went
back to school, so that was a big up. And
then yeah, I think every everything went wrong, you know,
(18:33):
production delays, and I like had to balance like my
full time job while doing this on the side.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
Cindy's departure was a major blow to Sunday School, but
the brand still had a good amount of recognition and
people willing to help build the brand, including Jia who
just finished school and was entering the workforce after graduating.
Speaker 7 (18:55):
I was like looking for jobs getting out of college,
and then that's when like Day hit me up and
he was like, we're hiring someone for the position for
a chief of staff, and he was like, do you
want to try it out? And I was like, I mean,
like why not try it out for like a month
as like a like a trial period, But that one
month became three years. My early responsibilities were when I
(19:18):
first started, it was we were doing our first ever
pop up in LA so they were like.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
Figure it out.
Speaker 7 (19:26):
So my task was to make this pop up come
to life. That was just like the big test, and
I guess I passed. That was like my big thing.
Everything went well, So as a chief of staff, I
really like did everything everything from like event planning production
to sampling clothes, following up with production on the clothing side,
(19:51):
setting up our websdite pages on Shopify, setting up social posts,
sourcing production people, sending shipping out orders. I just did
anything and everything I could do.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Sunday School continued to release products and to build a
name for itself within the fashion industry. Eventually, their hard
working consistency paid off and they landed a major opportunity.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
We got an opportunity to showcase New York Fashion Week
for free. We had to make a collection and I
was like ooh, and we had two months. So I
was like, you know, I'm gonna quit my job, go
to Korea, whip this out, and then showcase it in
New York Fashion Week, which is what we did. And
(20:39):
then we got an order from Barney's and I was
like wow, like this is like my making it in
America moment.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
And then a year and a half later, Barneys went bankrupt,
so they.
Speaker 6 (20:56):
Returned all their inventory to us.
Speaker 7 (20:58):
So like, our wholesale weren't going that great, so we
were like, okay, like let's stop doing this wholesale thing
and let's just do DTOC.
Speaker 5 (21:06):
At first, as like such a.
Speaker 7 (21:08):
Small brand being carried in Barney's. That was like such
a huge win for us. That was like a huge milestone.
So even the fact that we had that on our
like record, we were super proud of it. But ever
since Barney's went bankrupt, it was like, not too long
COVID hit and then ultimately like basically a lot of
(21:31):
our remaining wholesalers also went out of business. So I
think like Barney's was a good start in where we
had to prepare ourselves that, like wholesales cannot be like.
Speaker 6 (21:42):
Our main revenue, we have to shift gears.
Speaker 7 (21:45):
It was like a double edged sword. It hurt us
and we had to figure out a way to deal
with all that leftover inventory that they like sent back
to us. But at the same time, like it was
an opportunity where like it gave us meant to think
about what we need to do in order to be
alive on the e comm side.
Speaker 3 (22:15):
Looking for ways to increase their direct to consumer sales,
Day went for something that was right in front of
their faces.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Literally, we started selling masks.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
One of my favorite pants you know that I've been
wearing since college is a semaki pleated pants, and I
was like oh, let's make pleated masks.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
Met up with a bunch of factories.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
They had like patented materials that was encoated with silver
and that you know is super breathable.
Speaker 7 (22:41):
Even before March, people in Korea were like wearing masks,
Like everyone, like the whole country was wearing masks. No
one was wearing a mask in the state, but back
home everyone was wearing a mask. So we're like, oh
my god, maybe this is an opportunity for us to
like start early. Even like the in March of like
the beginning of COVID, like no one was wearing a mask.
(23:03):
We were already selling masks by then, so we were
almost like the first brand. I actually think one of
the very first brands in America to be selling like
fashion mask, like fashion brand selling masks, and that did
really well.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
The masks were successful, but they wanted to design actual garments.
So we would returned to Korea in search of new inspiration.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
I need to go back to Korea where I can
really be next to product development and really figure out
the future of our business.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
I you know, worked with GS.
Speaker 1 (23:39):
We were like, you know what else, like can kind
of showcase our brand message like high quality goods for
high achieving degenerates. And it's like, we got to make
clothes that are comfortable but you look fly af so
that it gives you, you know, that utmost confidence that
it gives you that like utmost high, which is how
(24:00):
we started making our fleeces.
Speaker 3 (24:02):
While the fleeces were in development, they also looked to
expand Sunday School into another lane near and dear to
his heart weed, so we went back to la to
build the cannabis division of Sunday School.
Speaker 8 (24:13):
I knew from a very young age that I wanted
to do something with the community.
Speaker 6 (24:19):
Whatever I was going to end up doing, I was like,
I'm going to have to come back to the community.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
This is Jennifer Tran, head of business development for Sunday School,
and I thought.
Speaker 8 (24:27):
My way of getting there would be get my political
science degree, go to law school.
Speaker 6 (24:33):
That was where I thought my trajectory to to take me.
Speaker 8 (24:36):
I like went really close by. I went to sax Day.
I was in political science and it was fun. Right
after that, I was like, Okay, I'm going to jump
into the most community thing, which is marketing.
Speaker 6 (24:48):
And I did that for a couple of years. I
went into.
Speaker 8 (24:52):
Multiple things fashion marketing, finance marketing, and then where I
really found my stride was consulting for different new and
emergingmpanies in Silicon Valley in LA and I really was like, Oh,
this is what I'm good at. I'm good at growing
small companies, launching small companies, and I loved meeting new people.
A couple years into consulting and doing all this, a
(25:15):
company came onto my lap and.
Speaker 6 (25:18):
It was checked all the boxes.
Speaker 8 (25:20):
It was community base, it was a new industry. It
was also located in Oakland, which is my hometown, and
it was a cannabis.
Speaker 6 (25:29):
Company, which got me really really excited.
Speaker 8 (25:32):
It was a small company, but what I worked on
was just understanding how we can have a company give
back to the community like Camvus is happening so so quickly.
This company was really focused on giving back to a
community that like really started all this. So it was
a one for one company where every.
Speaker 6 (25:51):
Product they sold they would give back to.
Speaker 8 (25:53):
Food and secure families. And that started my journey in cannabis.
Speaker 3 (25:57):
As Jennifer learned the ins and outs of the cannabis industry,
so connected with Day on social media. Eventually, while in LA,
the two linked planted the seeds for Sunday School's first
crop day and.
Speaker 8 (26:07):
I were friends and then we ended up at a
dinner together and that's.
Speaker 6 (26:12):
Where my journey with Studay School started.
Speaker 8 (26:14):
I think, like most people, we slid into each other's dms.
It was one of those things where I kind of
knew that Sunday School was something that was happening.
Speaker 6 (26:23):
I was really excited about.
Speaker 8 (26:24):
He kind of knew me as like another Asian person
in cannabis doing something.
Speaker 6 (26:30):
I was just really excited.
Speaker 8 (26:31):
After everything I was doing in cannabis, I felt very
much like there needs to be something more here. So
when Day I was in California, this was like years ago,
we ended up at dinner together and it was just
this really special moment where we're like, we want to
make Asian products, we want to do this, we want
to see this in cannabis, and like, I think there's
so much more.
Speaker 6 (26:52):
We can do with the space and really make it
more authentic and fun. And I was all down. I
was like, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 8 (27:00):
So when it came time for Sunday School to finally
pivot and finally start the canvas, I guess arm I
was like, yeah, let's do this.
Speaker 3 (27:12):
Having the idea for cannabis products is one thing, but
actually getting it manufactured and approved for legal sale is
a whole different ballgame.
Speaker 6 (27:20):
There is a whole system involved.
Speaker 8 (27:22):
Cannabis is heavily regulated, like more regularly than most. I
mean obviously more regulated than most because we were goods
out there, which is really shocking. Actually, the production manufacturing
coming from sourcing the flower, they have to pass certain
things that's tested before then it's tested and assured. Once
it's in the facility becoming pre roles, it's tested another
(27:43):
time for quality, all these other materials and stuff before
it reaches our distributor.
Speaker 6 (27:49):
So there is a lot of different checkpoints.
Speaker 8 (27:52):
One of the things that I said earlier was just
like you have to make sure you're working with the
right partners to make sure that your product is passing
all the test and stuff, because if you don't, your
product gets basically gets killed.
Speaker 6 (28:04):
You have to destroy everything.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
The regulations were tough, very very tough, and unfortunately Sunday
School had to learn this the hard way.
Speaker 8 (28:13):
There was a mislabeling of one of our products that
put the wrong year on it and it was supposed
to expire in two years or it was sust expire
a certain time, but we put it on an earlier
date accidentally, and because of that, we're like, oh, no, worries,
We'll just change the date. They're like, nope, you can't
change the date on it, and they made us take
(28:34):
all the product out and we had to basically.
Speaker 6 (28:37):
Destroy all the products.
Speaker 8 (28:38):
I mean a less of us. But there's lots of
moments that happened like that in cannabis. So that took
a little while to understand market and from there just
making all the connections, making sure we took meetings with everybody,
making sure we learned who to work with, who not
to work with. And yeah, that was step one. Finding
(28:58):
the right partner to launch with. We found that in
a couple local vendors and manufacturers, and then after that
it was on us to get the product out there.
With very little money, we were just knocking on doors.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Eventually, Sunday School was able to get their cannabis line
off the ground and launched their first official item, pre rolls.
But soon they would find another lane that would change
the company forever.
Speaker 8 (29:28):
We came out with the pre rolls first, it was
the right fit. We were one of the first companies
could have come out with like the many pre rolls.
They were like a pack. They fit in our little pockets.
It was different. We called them tiny bit.
Speaker 6 (29:40):
Mighty because that was kind of how we felt about it.
Speaker 8 (29:43):
The cannabis side really like launched probably a couple months
before lockdown. Yeah, we had like the pre rolls come
out and we were kind of excited about it, but
it was still kind.
Speaker 6 (29:54):
Of like beta testing.
Speaker 8 (29:55):
And then two months before the lockdown happened, we came
out with our Mochi dummies, which forever changed our business.
We have always wanted to make something that was authentic
to our roots.
Speaker 6 (30:07):
The motion gummies are based.
Speaker 8 (30:08):
Off of our childhood growing up like Asian in America,
and it was just something that changed the company forever.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
The gummies were a hit, And yes, developing weed gummies
sounds as fun as you'd imagine.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
It's a lot of work.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
It starts, it's gonna sound such like such degeneracy, but
it really starts with our teammates getting high and we're
just like, what are our favorite memories?
Speaker 2 (30:38):
Right?
Speaker 1 (30:38):
So, like how we came up with the milk Ti
Boba flavor is like you know, we have like a
five person cannabs team, and four of us all used
to go to Sunday School, like actual Sunday school, you know,
to pray and whatnot. But the highlight for all of
us was getting boba after you know, at Guncha, and
we were like, oh my gosh, that's iconic and like
(31:01):
a lot of gummies out there are super kind of
like fruity juicy, so we were like, you know, we
want to make some sort of like that savory sweet
savory gummy and then we're like, okay, like milk tea.
So basically we work with a food scientists and we
work with like a cannabis scientist that we like freelance with,
and then we you know, it took a year and
(31:23):
a half to develop our gummy formulation and texture.
Speaker 8 (31:27):
It's the fondest memory I have in my entire career
working anywhere.
Speaker 6 (31:31):
What it starts with us going to literally Asian markets.
Speaker 8 (31:35):
We grew up with like nine nine ranch age mark
picking up not just candy but like drink that we
really like.
Speaker 6 (31:42):
Nack that we really like a different type of textures
in the food and stuff.
Speaker 8 (31:45):
And we would bring all of this to our manufacturer
and we would sit there for hours R and D
tasting these different things can like sharing stories out growing up,
or like buying stuff after like actually going to Sunday School,
like buying Bova or like all these things.
Speaker 6 (32:02):
It was just a fun, fun experience with.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
The cannabis side of Sunday School dialed in. The clothing side,
thanks to the development of their fleeces, was about to
hit a new level.
Speaker 7 (32:13):
When we first made our first fleeces, we literally ordered
like fifty of it, and then it didn't sell out
through like a six month period. And then when the
broccoli fleeces came along, and then when like Pete Davidson
wore it.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
Yep, that Pete Davidson. He was photographed multiple times in
a Sunday School fleece.
Speaker 7 (32:37):
When celebrities started wearing it and it was being picked
up by press, oh my god, it started selling out instantly.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
I was like wholesale and the masks and then fleeces,
and then that kind of propelled us into like a
new chapter of Sunday School.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
How did one of their products end up on the
back of the King of Staten Island by sliding in
the DMS of course, So.
Speaker 7 (32:58):
When I first joined they were already like Sunday School
was already doing like influencer gifting, but it was like
very very micro micro influencers, and we wanted to tap
into like local community influencers for example, like skaters who
have a skating crew. But when I first went there,
like okay, this like these are two micro We're not
(33:21):
getting any like return by like targeting to local and
two micro of influencers. So they're like, you can own
this process, and you know.
Speaker 6 (33:33):
Let's try to find new people.
Speaker 7 (33:34):
So I was like, okay, I literally compile the list
of people who I follow and who I love like
looking at their content and get like influenced by their
like style, and I literally cold DMed all those people
on the list. And that was even that was back
when we didn't even have our blue check mark, so
(33:55):
it was even harder for us to be seen in
those dms.
Speaker 6 (34:00):
But that's how we started.
Speaker 7 (34:02):
We would just hold d all these like influencers and celebrities,
and surprisingly we got like a great response rate, like
just cold dming people, and then we would just send
it to them. They would send their addresses. I was
send it out. I would even like to save shipping
costs I would like drive all around La.
Speaker 5 (34:21):
To like physically drop it off to.
Speaker 7 (34:23):
Them and they would just post on stories because they
liked our products, and we just organically grew like that.
And then as that happened, we were getting big celebrities
like Chloe Moretz was responding to our dms, Dylan Sprouse
was responding to our dms. Jacob Elordi was responding to
our dms, and he.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Was so cute.
Speaker 7 (34:46):
He even like he even sent his own pop Parazzi
shot to us.
Speaker 5 (34:50):
He DMS it to us being like, look like you
guys can use it, which was like.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
So cute of him.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
Yeah, So, jacob Elordi, I saw you for yah, and
I was like, wow, like Nate is hot. So we
DMed him and then he didn't respond. We DMed him
again and then he responded and I was like.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (35:14):
He was like I really like, you know, we were
trying to gift him something else and he was like, oh,
but I would also really love that fleece and then
he like he's worn it so many times.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
With the help of a few celebrity endorsements, the fleeces
became a Sunday school staple and soon they couldn't keep
up with the demand.
Speaker 7 (35:35):
When we brought it back this year, it sold out
in like an hour, and like it went from fifty
to five hundred. We ordered five hundred and five hundreds
sold out within an hour, which was like so crazy,
like like I was almost in tears. That's how like
fulfilling and rewarding it is to like see those results
with your own eyes.
Speaker 6 (35:57):
It's just so exciting to see.
Speaker 7 (35:58):
Like that success, like the growth, because I have seen
it firsthand. How we were like shipping out five orders
and now it's like five hundred, and we have like
a whole their house team just dedicated to fulfilly orders.
Speaker 3 (36:28):
As Sunday School continues to explode in both the fashion
and cannabis spaces, the success isn't a surprise at all
to Cindy.
Speaker 4 (36:35):
I'm not surprised that the brand grew this much because
I knew that my brother is the kind of person
when he puts his head into something, not into something,
even if it sounds so ridiculous, he'll find a way
to get it done or like make it happen, even
if it takes a little bit longer than usual. And
right now, his vision is very much on staying authentic
(37:00):
and true to the brand image of Sunday School, which is,
you know, standing up for the Asian American playing funny
and punny jokes on the Asian American tiger mom culture
and promoting like counterculture with it among the youth, and
also just really fighting for legalization of weed and the
(37:24):
full decriminalization of cannabis in general, and everything he's fighting for,
like he does not compromise, and that's really inspiring for
me to watch as a leader because for me, like
as someone who is the biggest supporter of Sunday School,
being a former co founder and the brother and just
(37:47):
like I'm all of the key members that you've talked to,
Like I try to consider like my extended family, like
Gia j Tranja's boyfriend, Jas dog Gs whole.
Speaker 5 (37:57):
Family, like we treat as extended family.
Speaker 7 (38:00):
I've never felt more proud to be Korean than like
now working out Sunday School, telling people that this is
a Korean brand, Like Korean people can do dope shit
like this, you know, it's not just bts. So like
I'm more proud than ever to like representing Korea and
(38:21):
like you know, putting this brand out there for the
world to see.
Speaker 8 (38:26):
I think what we're doing is really important and it's
not cliche, but representation matters, and I'm really excited to
see how the landscape changes with people like us at
the forefront selfishly and really excited to like try new
flavors and see what kind of little products we make
here and there. I want to make sure that all
of this, we're going to grow our community and like, yeah,
(38:49):
have fun while we're at it. That's my biggest thing too,
Like I dropped everything to be here, and it's not
just to build my career. I kind of want to
have fun doing it. So in the next couple years,
I hope with everything we do we still have fun
doing it.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
Honestly, I think we just we always come back to
our mission. What is our mission?
Speaker 1 (39:10):
It's to globalize cannabis and globalized cannabis culture. And we
always think about how we're doing that, and it's through
community first and then culture and content and content for us.
You know, culture for us is where our product comes in, right, Like,
it's products with real stories. It's not product for the
sake of making new products. When people ask what is
(39:33):
Sunday School, is it a weed company. Is it a
fashion company? And whoever asks them, I tell them, hey,
like you're really thinking in a very like old fashioned mindset.
You know, you don't need to tell me you're a
millennial without telling me you're a millennial, right, And.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
I'm a millennial. But a lot of like my you know,
former bosses who like went to HBS and.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
You know whatnot like they are the ones kind of
like asking what is it really and what it really
comes down to is I really believe we are a
community of high achieving degenerates and we will make products
that is necessary for our community.
Speaker 3 (40:22):
The story of Sunday School is one of family creativity
and constantly thinking outside of the box. When Day had
his original idea for Sunday School, there was no one
better to tap than his sister Cindy. When they went
to create a new line of streetwear, their consistent creativity
helped them stand out amongst their peers, and when challenges arose,
Day and the team were always able to come together
to find a new solution and make sure that the
(40:44):
next Sunday School joint was rolled air tight for idea generation.
I'm Noah Callahan Bever, Thanks for listening. To the All
Angles Podcast presented by will Packer Media. If you've enjoyed
(41:06):
this episode, please don't hesitate to like, comment DM, or
tell a friend to tell a friend about Idea Generation
and the All Angles Podcast. We can't do any of
this without your help, and honestly, your support means everything.
We do this for you, and we can't do it
without you. This episode was brought to you by Will
Packer Executive produced by John Valachick and Helena Ox, original
(41:30):
music by Valentine Fritz, edit and sound mixed by Nonsensible Production,
and hosted by me Idea Generation founder Noah Callahan beveret
Idea Generations. All Angles is a Will Packer Media podcast
So I was like, you know, I'm gonna quit my job,
go to Korea, whip this out in two months, and
then showcase it in your fashion week, which is what
we did.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
And then we.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Got an order from Barney's and I was like, wow,
like this is like by making it in America moment.
And then a year and a half later, Barney's went bankrupt.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Welcome to Idea Generations All Angles, a podcast about culture's
most influential brands and the teams that built them. If
you're an entrepreneur, creative, or anyone interested in harnessing the
power of collaboration, join me Noah Callahan Bever each week
as we dissect the most dynamic companies in culture, because
(00:52):
the only way to truly understand success is to look
at it from all angles. Idea Generations All Angles is
a will Typomedia podcast. In twenty seventeen, Day Limb founded
(01:14):
Sunday School, a Korean smokewear brand born at the intersection
of cannabis and streetwear. With the help of his sister,
Cindy Limb, Sunday School started releasing collections of shirts and
jackets filled with weed references and plays on religion. In
the years that followed, Sunday School would grow from a
rack of T shirts to a full fledged global brand
(01:36):
offering cannabis products, accessories, and apparel worn by celebrities like
Pete Davidson and Jacob Alordi. On this week's episode of
All Angles, we talked to co founders day Limb and
Cindy Limb, head of business development Jennifer Tran, and head
of Fashion Gia Kim to hear the full story of
Sunday School and learn how a small team of high
(01:59):
achieving degenera It's created one of the most interesting and
exciting new brands and fashion in cannabis. But before any
of that happened, years before hosting pop ups in New
York City or developing their own weed gummies, daylim was
just sitting around his living room with his grandma, preparing
for his life as President of Korea.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I am born and raised in Korea. This is like
a very distinct memory of mine. But when I was
in second grade, I was watching TV with my grandma,
who was like my best dad. She pointed to this
like white guy like speaking and she was like, you
gotta be like him.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
And I was like, who is he? And She's like,
that's George W.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Bush and I was like, oh, okay, interesting, I'm not
white and I don't speak English. And she was like,
that's why you need to go to Yale and then
you can be the president of Korea.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
So honestly, I thought I was going to.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Be the president of Korea when I was in second grade.
So I started studying English super hard, started studying math,
and then I come from a family of doctors, typical
Korean parents.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
So when I went to college, I thought I was
going to be a doctor. So I was pre med.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
Day didn't end up at Yale like his grandma wanted,
and his presidential aspirations fell by the wayside. But he
did end up going to Harvard pre Med not a
bad backup plan. So Day left Korea to study in
the US. His interests been beyond the classroom.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
I have always had an interest for fashion, especially like
women's fashion. I was that kid making like dresses out
of toilet paper, you know. I would like sketch so
many things. I love anime too. My favorite anime was
like Card Capture Cherry, where there's amazing volume and amazing dresses,
(03:45):
and I was like, okay, this is what I've always
wanted to do, but I felt like, you know, I
gotta be a doctor.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
Despite a growing interest in fashion, Day stayed in school
and graduated from Harvard in twenty fourteen with a BA
in applied mathematics. He then moved to New York City
in search of his first real job.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
So I was like, Okay, I'll probably go into business.
So I started at a consulting company. I started at
McKinsey in New York, and that was very interesting because
you know, I am very much and very unorganized, Like
my MBTI type is e NTP. I'm the orator, you know,
I'm always like the one being like, let's do this
(04:28):
and then little to no follow through. So it really
helped me figure out like how to like structure my thoughts,
how to figure out what the steps are required for execution.
So it was a really great experience. Fast forward two years,
you know, I was like, Okay, this is not too bad.
And then I was on a project that puts me
(04:50):
on like the roadmap or promotion, and that was the
Perdue Pharma case.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
And more specifically, my workstream.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Was like working to extend the patent on oxycotton. And
then I quit five days later, I was like, you know,
if this is what it takes, this is not why,
this is not what I was meant to do.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
So that was twenty sixteen.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
Just like that, they quit his former job and decided
to return to his parents' home in Korea to contemplate
his next move.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
Thankfully, I was in a place where I had saved
up money, and you know, I don't have any student loans,
so I have like my parents to make for that.
And so I think, I you know, it comes from
a place of privilege for sure, because I didn't have
to worry too much, especially for two months. I was
like getting paid after the two months, and then I
had like a two month gap and I just came home,
(05:50):
you know. I came to Korea and where like my
mom made me food every day, you know, so I
could kind of be economical. Came home in the wintertime
and actually in this exact bed, which is my childhood bed,
I had smuggled in a faight pen.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I was like puffing it in my bed.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
I was wrapped underneath the blankets, underneath the sheets, and
I was just like, fuck, like what is life? What
am I supposed to do? I was just like thinking
about different things. And then I hear a super loud
banging in my door and I was just like.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Oh my gosh, you don't know, there goes my mom again.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
And then she barged in and started just ripping me
a new one. And then at that moment, I was
just like, Wow, the world is so beautiful and so chaotic.
I don't know what led to that moment, but I
was like, what if God was Korean and smoked weed
every day and created this world and that's why it's
so beautiful, but it's also such a mess. And what
(06:48):
if that God was my mom? And I think it
all started from like me thinking my mom needs to chill,
so she should probably smoke. And then that kind of thought,
you know, kept lingering, and for me, like I'm the
type of guy who when I'm on something, I'm just
like I need to like write this down. So I
just started like writing out a lot of ideas, started
(07:08):
like sketching as I do, like I love to sketch.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
And then I was like, you know, fashion is my passion,
so let's make some T shirts and hoodies, which is
my love language.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
And that was twenty seventeen, and that's how Sunday School
was born.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
Sunday School was alive, or at least the idea was,
but to actually create some shirts and jackets and to
bring the brand to life, they would need more than
just his creativity and high ideas. So he reached out
to the most reliable person he knew, his sister.
Speaker 4 (07:40):
When I was in college and my parents lived in Korea,
I would go back to Korea in the winter, and
Day also happened to be in Korea.
Speaker 5 (07:48):
He's not usually there all the time, but he was.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
This is Cindy Lynn, co founder of Sunday School Day.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
He always has been so interested in fashion since I
was growing up. I remember when I was in middle
school and he was in high school. He had a
fashion show in Korea and he was designing all these
clothes and going to fashion studios and sewing his own
designs and clothes. I think it was sophomore winter. My
(08:16):
brother was like, Oh, do you want to start a
clothing company with me? So I knew that this wasn't
out of the blue for him. I just love trying
new things. If it sounds like I won't regret it.
Speaker 5 (08:29):
So I was just like, Okay, why not. Where do
I start.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
With Cindy on board and both siblings together in Korea.
Day and Cindy went to work on building the first
Sunday School products.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
Yeah, so I didn't know anything and I just knew
one thing. I was like, I need to launch on
four to twenty, right obviously, and this was Christmas Eve,
so I had four months five months. I talked to
my sister, who was taking a gap year at the time,
and I was like, yo, do you want to do
this with me?
Speaker 2 (08:59):
Do you want to help me out out? And she
was like you know why not?
Speaker 1 (09:02):
So yeah, two of us we started Google starching, you
know Korea's version of Google's called Neighbors, started like screenprinting,
like T shirt links, you.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
Know, all of that. Started going around in the garment district.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
Buying people coffee, making friends, and then started sketching out ideas.
Speaker 5 (09:21):
He basically was like, I want to create a smokewear brand.
Speaker 4 (09:26):
You know, skate people have skatewear, surf people have surfware,
there's yoga wear. Smoking can be a sport, so we
should make smokewear. And I was just like, okay, you
can do all the design part for me. I'm focused
on Okay, if we're gonna make clothes.
Speaker 5 (09:43):
Where do we even start? Me and my brother had
zero experience.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
Maybe my brother a little bit with him in fashion
show and sewing, but for me, I was like, I
don't even know where you get the fabric, what kind
of fabric you need to get for a T shirt,
how you print on T shirts a different way, and
just like the whole factory line of how to do
the operations. So my first step was figure that out.
Number one. There's a neighborhood in Korea called kunde Mun.
(10:16):
It's like called d o mg dong dae day moonmo
n dong daemon in like more English pronunciation, and basically
that's where all the fabrics are sourced.
Speaker 5 (10:30):
That's where a lot of the clothes.
Speaker 4 (10:32):
Get manufactured in Asia, especially in Korea. I just went
there and I started knocking on every little fabric shop
showing them a design.
Speaker 5 (10:44):
That day had sketched out. It was just a T
shirt design. One of our first collections was a T.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
Shirt with a play on the old Korean king and
he's smoking a j I was just carrying that print around,
being like, I want to print this on a T shirt.
Speaker 5 (11:00):
I want to start a company.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
And everyone was like kind of laughing, but they thought
I was They thought it was cute because it's just
this twenty.
Speaker 5 (11:07):
Year old young girl carrying like.
Speaker 4 (11:10):
Something they didn't know, marijuana, so something like a cigarette,
like a king smoking a cigarette, asking them like how
to do anything.
Speaker 5 (11:18):
And then I actually found this girl who.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
Sat me down at a coffee shop and told me
all about how you need to choose the fabric and
you need to make the pattern, and then the pattern
is what the factories take and that's how the assembly
line or manufacturing starts. So then I hired her to
be kind of like my operations manager while I can
focus on other things.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
I Sidy built out the operation side of the company.
Day returned to New York to prepare the launch at
the first official Sunday School collection. With a rack of
sample clothes in hand, they hit his favorite spots to
find a place to pop up his brain.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
I started doing events outside of mister soft Ease. I
did events outside of my neighborhood, Boatdega, and then I
started doing events at like, you know, all the Korean
owned coffee shops.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
You know, just bring a.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
Rack, put some clothes on, and then did an event
at like, you know, different places wherever I could, you know,
try it off inness.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
As Day networked in the city and started to build
brand recognition in the streets of New York. Cindy was
busy trying to build a buzz around Sunday School online.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
It was during winter break, so I had a bit
of quality time dedicated to figuring out the operations and
how things should be structured. But I had to leave
actually to Milan. I was studying abroad in Milan the
next semester.
Speaker 5 (12:38):
So after that was set.
Speaker 4 (12:40):
Number one checked. I found someone who can at least
communicate with me if there's problems, and I can pay
her to go visit the factories or.
Speaker 5 (12:49):
Go source fabrics.
Speaker 4 (12:51):
And then number two was the other big part of
my job one being operations too, was marketing and the
growth part of it. Now that we know how to
make clothes and we made some samples and did some
quality control.
Speaker 5 (13:05):
And they're not too horrible, how do we market our brand?
Speaker 6 (13:08):
How do we grow our.
Speaker 4 (13:10):
Brand to beyond just our small group of friends who
will be there for us supporting this small clothing brand.
I would be asking a lot of different consumer startups in.
Speaker 5 (13:22):
The US, like how do you do? Facebook Ads?
Speaker 2 (13:25):
How do you bid?
Speaker 4 (13:26):
I would be learning everything from tactical and more technical
bidding strategies and digital advertising and marketing.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
One way to market the brand was by cold emailing
anyone and everyone. Just as Day was in the city
making connections, Cindy was knocking on doors online.
Speaker 4 (13:44):
So most of my job also during my semester in
Milan was to reach out to reporters in like Typeeast,
High Sobiety, Vogue Paper, every reporter outlet.
Speaker 6 (13:57):
We had a Excel sheet.
Speaker 4 (13:59):
Where I kind of tracked down what kind of articles
they wrote, basically just tracking down each reporter in each
of the major PR or like. Honestly, a lot of
the Times dms them and they were very responsive, so
we got a lot of the press from the cold outreach.
Speaker 5 (14:18):
We had our first launch.
Speaker 4 (14:20):
Party with PR close friends and like Instagram influencers that
we also calld outreach to and just DJs of the
creative voices of New York and we invited them to
join us in our launch where we will be selling
the samples that we've created.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
After building some buzz with press and public, Sunday School's
first four to twenty pop up was a success. People
bought the clothes and the event was a vibe amongst friends, supporters, press,
and any curious passer bys. And one of those guests
was to become a pivotal Sunday School player.
Speaker 7 (14:56):
We first met in Boston.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
He was a college student at Harvard.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
This is Gakim, head of fashion at Sunday School.
Speaker 7 (15:05):
We have these things called like long weekends, where like
they give you like a five day weekend, but because
like international students like me, there's like nowhere to go,
Like you can't go back home because our homes of
sixteen flight away Korean students would just go get a
hotel in Boston. And one of my friends from high
(15:26):
school was friends with Day. She introduced me to Day,
and that's when I first met him. I saw their
journey from the very beginning, and so I actually was
one of the first customers. I bought the first hoodie
ever since the beginning of their journey, I was there
as a customer though.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
Gia was an early Sunday School supporter, but after college
she moved to La keeping tabs on the brand from Afar.
After the four to twenty pop up, Day left feeling
optimistic about the event and what he was building, but
it still wasn't paying the bills, so we searched for
a full time job while working on Sunday School.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
On the side, I joined a company called v Files,
which is like fashion music and creator.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Program for a lot of young creative talent.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
I was kind of doing the same old business development
partnership sales, and that was amazing because it.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Really opened my eyes to so many young.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Creative talent across the world, got to connect with them.
And not only it, you know, it gave me like network,
but it really gave me hope and it really gave
me inspiration that I was like, oh, shoot, I too
can be a designer and I too.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
You know, before I would always be so.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Wary of calling myself a creative director, but now I
truly believe that I am a creative director because you know,
the main job of creative direction is telling a story visually,
telling a story emotionally.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
And that's what I focused most of my days on.
Speaker 3 (17:03):
As they kept building his idea for Sunday School, it
became more than a job, It became his purpose. But
Cindy found a hard time matching his intensity.
Speaker 4 (17:13):
The first five or six months of the brand. I
was a full time student who is studying abroad in
the lawn and day was a full time employee leading.
Speaker 5 (17:23):
Like a media company.
Speaker 4 (17:24):
So it was definitely challenging in terms of time allocation.
It's a safer way to do a very risky thing,
kind of juggling both testing it out until there's a
minimum reached where you know that at this point, there's
always going to be a point where you.
Speaker 5 (17:40):
Know that you're either going to have to go all
in or leave.
Speaker 4 (17:43):
So for my brother, it was at that point when
he quit his job and just decided to do Sunday
School full time because he believed in it and it
is his brain child. And for me, it was when
we started getting fiduciary responsibilities that I didn't want to
I just I just didn't want to be guilty about
(18:04):
not being not being as passionate as I could as.
Speaker 5 (18:07):
Other people could be. So that's why I left.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
She was like, yo, I got a like one.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Working with you is not fun because you are a
mean older brother and like you know, it gets so
personal with family because like you just treat them like
how you would treat them, But you can't do that
when you're working with someone and then two she went
back to school, so that was a big up. And
then yeah, I think every everything went wrong, you know,
(18:33):
production delays, and I like had to balance like my
full time job while doing this on the side.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
Cindy's departure was a major blow to Sunday School, but
the brand still had a good amount of recognition and
people willing to help build the brand, including Jia who
just finished school and was entering the workforce after graduating.
Speaker 7 (18:55):
I was like looking for jobs getting out of college,
and then that's when like Day hit me up and
he was like, we're hiring someone for the position for
a chief of staff, and he was like, do you
want to try it out? And I was like, I mean,
like why not try it out for like a month
as like a like a trial period, But that one
month became three years. My early responsibilities were when I
(19:18):
first started, it was we were doing our first ever
pop up in LA so they were like.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
Figure it out.
Speaker 7 (19:26):
So my task was to make this pop up come
to life. That was just like the big test, and
I guess I passed. That was like my big thing.
Everything went well, So as a chief of staff, I
really like did everything everything from like event planning production
to sampling clothes, following up with production on the clothing side,
(19:51):
setting up our websdite pages on Shopify, setting up social posts,
sourcing production people, sending shipping out orders. I just did
anything and everything I could do.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Sunday School continued to release products and to build a
name for itself within the fashion industry. Eventually, their hard
working consistency paid off and they landed a major opportunity.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
We got an opportunity to showcase New York Fashion Week
for free. We had to make a collection and I
was like ooh, and we had two months. So I
was like, you know, I'm gonna quit my job, go
to Korea, whip this out, and then showcase it in
New York Fashion Week, which is what we did. And
(20:39):
then we got an order from Barney's and I was
like wow, like this is like my making it in
America moment.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
And then a year and a half later, Barneys went bankrupt,
so they.
Speaker 6 (20:56):
Returned all their inventory to us.
Speaker 7 (20:58):
So like, our wholesale weren't going that great, so we
were like, okay, like let's stop doing this wholesale thing
and let's just do DTOC.
Speaker 5 (21:06):
At first, as like such a.
Speaker 7 (21:08):
Small brand being carried in Barney's. That was like such
a huge win for us. That was like a huge milestone.
So even the fact that we had that on our
like record, we were super proud of it. But ever
since Barney's went bankrupt, it was like, not too long
COVID hit and then ultimately like basically a lot of
(21:31):
our remaining wholesalers also went out of business. So I
think like Barney's was a good start in where we
had to prepare ourselves that, like wholesales cannot be like.
Speaker 6 (21:42):
Our main revenue, we have to shift gears.
Speaker 7 (21:45):
It was like a double edged sword. It hurt us
and we had to figure out a way to deal
with all that leftover inventory that they like sent back
to us. But at the same time, like it was
an opportunity where like it gave us meant to think
about what we need to do in order to be
alive on the e comm side.
Speaker 3 (22:15):
Looking for ways to increase their direct to consumer sales,
Day went for something that was right in front of
their faces.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Literally, we started selling masks.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
One of my favorite pants you know that I've been
wearing since college is a semaki pleated pants, and I
was like oh, let's make pleated masks.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
Met up with a bunch of factories.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
They had like patented materials that was encoated with silver
and that you know is super breathable.
Speaker 7 (22:41):
Even before March, people in Korea were like wearing masks,
Like everyone, like the whole country was wearing masks. No
one was wearing a mask in the state, but back
home everyone was wearing a mask. So we're like, oh
my god, maybe this is an opportunity for us to
like start early. Even like the in March of like
the beginning of COVID, like no one was wearing a mask.
(23:03):
We were already selling masks by then, so we were
almost like the first brand. I actually think one of
the very first brands in America to be selling like
fashion mask, like fashion brand selling masks, and that did
really well.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
The masks were successful, but they wanted to design actual garments.
So we would returned to Korea in search of new inspiration.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
I need to go back to Korea where I can
really be next to product development and really figure out
the future of our business.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
I you know, worked with GS.
Speaker 1 (23:39):
We were like, you know what else, like can kind
of showcase our brand message like high quality goods for
high achieving degenerates. And it's like, we got to make
clothes that are comfortable but you look fly af so
that it gives you, you know, that utmost confidence that
it gives you that like utmost high, which is how
(24:00):
we started making our fleeces.
Speaker 3 (24:02):
While the fleeces were in development, they also looked to
expand Sunday School into another lane near and dear to
his heart weed, so we went back to la to
build the cannabis division of Sunday School.
Speaker 8 (24:13):
I knew from a very young age that I wanted
to do something with the community.
Speaker 6 (24:19):
Whatever I was going to end up doing, I was like,
I'm going to have to come back to the community.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
This is Jennifer Tran, head of business development for Sunday School,
and I thought.
Speaker 8 (24:27):
My way of getting there would be get my political
science degree, go to law school.
Speaker 6 (24:33):
That was where I thought my trajectory to to take me.
Speaker 8 (24:36):
I like went really close by. I went to sax Day.
I was in political science and it was fun. Right
after that, I was like, Okay, I'm going to jump
into the most community thing, which is marketing.
Speaker 6 (24:48):
And I did that for a couple of years. I
went into.
Speaker 8 (24:52):
Multiple things fashion marketing, finance marketing, and then where I
really found my stride was consulting for different new and
emergingmpanies in Silicon Valley in LA and I really was like, Oh,
this is what I'm good at. I'm good at growing
small companies, launching small companies, and I loved meeting new people.
A couple years into consulting and doing all this, a
(25:15):
company came onto my lap and.
Speaker 6 (25:18):
It was checked all the boxes.
Speaker 8 (25:20):
It was community base, it was a new industry. It
was also located in Oakland, which is my hometown, and
it was a cannabis.
Speaker 6 (25:29):
Company, which got me really really excited.
Speaker 8 (25:32):
It was a small company, but what I worked on
was just understanding how we can have a company give
back to the community like Camvus is happening so so quickly.
This company was really focused on giving back to a
community that like really started all this. So it was
a one for one company where every.
Speaker 6 (25:51):
Product they sold they would give back to.
Speaker 8 (25:53):
Food and secure families. And that started my journey in cannabis.
Speaker 3 (25:57):
As Jennifer learned the ins and outs of the cannabis industry,
so connected with Day on social media. Eventually, while in LA,
the two linked planted the seeds for Sunday School's first
crop day and.
Speaker 8 (26:07):
I were friends and then we ended up at a
dinner together and that's.
Speaker 6 (26:12):
Where my journey with Studay School started.
Speaker 8 (26:14):
I think, like most people, we slid into each other's dms.
It was one of those things where I kind of
knew that Sunday School was something that was happening.
Speaker 6 (26:23):
I was really excited about.
Speaker 8 (26:24):
He kind of knew me as like another Asian person
in cannabis doing something.
Speaker 6 (26:30):
I was just really excited.
Speaker 8 (26:31):
After everything I was doing in cannabis, I felt very
much like there needs to be something more here. So
when Day I was in California, this was like years ago,
we ended up at dinner together and it was just
this really special moment where we're like, we want to
make Asian products, we want to do this, we want
to see this in cannabis, and like, I think there's
so much more.
Speaker 6 (26:52):
We can do with the space and really make it
more authentic and fun. And I was all down. I
was like, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 8 (27:00):
So when it came time for Sunday School to finally
pivot and finally start the canvas, I guess arm I
was like, yeah, let's do this.
Speaker 3 (27:12):
Having the idea for cannabis products is one thing, but
actually getting it manufactured and approved for legal sale is
a whole different ballgame.
Speaker 6 (27:20):
There is a whole system involved.
Speaker 8 (27:22):
Cannabis is heavily regulated, like more regularly than most. I
mean obviously more regulated than most because we were goods
out there, which is really shocking. Actually, the production manufacturing
coming from sourcing the flower, they have to pass certain
things that's tested before then it's tested and assured. Once
it's in the facility becoming pre roles, it's tested another
(27:43):
time for quality, all these other materials and stuff before
it reaches our distributor.
Speaker 6 (27:49):
So there is a lot of different checkpoints.
Speaker 8 (27:52):
One of the things that I said earlier was just
like you have to make sure you're working with the
right partners to make sure that your product is passing
all the test and stuff, because if you don't, your
product gets basically gets killed.
Speaker 6 (28:04):
You have to destroy everything.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
The regulations were tough, very very tough, and unfortunately Sunday
School had to learn this the hard way.
Speaker 8 (28:13):
There was a mislabeling of one of our products that
put the wrong year on it and it was supposed
to expire in two years or it was sust expire
a certain time, but we put it on an earlier
date accidentally, and because of that, we're like, oh, no, worries,
We'll just change the date. They're like, nope, you can't
change the date on it, and they made us take
(28:34):
all the product out and we had to basically.
Speaker 6 (28:37):
Destroy all the products.
Speaker 8 (28:38):
I mean a less of us. But there's lots of
moments that happened like that in cannabis. So that took
a little while to understand market and from there just
making all the connections, making sure we took meetings with everybody,
making sure we learned who to work with, who not
to work with. And yeah, that was step one. Finding
(28:58):
the right partner to launch with. We found that in
a couple local vendors and manufacturers, and then after that
it was on us to get the product out there.
With very little money, we were just knocking on doors.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Eventually, Sunday School was able to get their cannabis line
off the ground and launched their first official item, pre rolls.
But soon they would find another lane that would change
the company forever.
Speaker 8 (29:28):
We came out with the pre rolls first, it was
the right fit. We were one of the first companies
could have come out with like the many pre rolls.
They were like a pack. They fit in our little pockets.
It was different. We called them tiny bit.
Speaker 6 (29:40):
Mighty because that was kind of how we felt about it.
Speaker 8 (29:43):
The cannabis side really like launched probably a couple months
before lockdown. Yeah, we had like the pre rolls come
out and we were kind of excited about it, but
it was still kind.
Speaker 6 (29:54):
Of like beta testing.
Speaker 8 (29:55):
And then two months before the lockdown happened, we came
out with our Mochi dummies, which forever changed our business.
We have always wanted to make something that was authentic
to our roots.
Speaker 6 (30:07):
The motion gummies are based.
Speaker 8 (30:08):
Off of our childhood growing up like Asian in America,
and it was just something that changed the company forever.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
The gummies were a hit, And yes, developing weed gummies
sounds as fun as you'd imagine.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
It's a lot of work.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
It starts, it's gonna sound such like such degeneracy, but
it really starts with our teammates getting high and we're
just like, what are our favorite memories?
Speaker 2 (30:38):
Right?
Speaker 1 (30:38):
So, like how we came up with the milk Ti
Boba flavor is like you know, we have like a
five person cannabs team, and four of us all used
to go to Sunday School, like actual Sunday school, you know,
to pray and whatnot. But the highlight for all of
us was getting boba after you know, at Guncha, and
we were like, oh my gosh, that's iconic and like
(31:01):
a lot of gummies out there are super kind of
like fruity juicy, so we were like, you know, we
want to make some sort of like that savory sweet
savory gummy and then we're like, okay, like milk tea.
So basically we work with a food scientists and we
work with like a cannabis scientist that we like freelance with,
and then we you know, it took a year and
(31:23):
a half to develop our gummy formulation and texture.
Speaker 8 (31:27):
It's the fondest memory I have in my entire career
working anywhere.
Speaker 6 (31:31):
What it starts with us going to literally Asian markets.
Speaker 8 (31:35):
We grew up with like nine nine ranch age mark
picking up not just candy but like drink that we
really like.
Speaker 6 (31:42):
Nack that we really like a different type of textures
in the food and stuff.
Speaker 8 (31:45):
And we would bring all of this to our manufacturer
and we would sit there for hours R and D
tasting these different things can like sharing stories out growing up,
or like buying stuff after like actually going to Sunday School,
like buying Bova or like all these things.
Speaker 6 (32:02):
It was just a fun, fun experience with.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
The cannabis side of Sunday School dialed in. The clothing side,
thanks to the development of their fleeces, was about to
hit a new level.
Speaker 7 (32:13):
When we first made our first fleeces, we literally ordered
like fifty of it, and then it didn't sell out
through like a six month period. And then when the
broccoli fleeces came along, and then when like Pete Davidson
wore it.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
Yep, that Pete Davidson. He was photographed multiple times in
a Sunday School fleece.
Speaker 7 (32:37):
When celebrities started wearing it and it was being picked
up by press, oh my god, it started selling out instantly.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
I was like wholesale and the masks and then fleeces,
and then that kind of propelled us into like a
new chapter of Sunday School.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
How did one of their products end up on the
back of the King of Staten Island by sliding in
the DMS of course, So.
Speaker 7 (32:58):
When I first joined they were already like Sunday School
was already doing like influencer gifting, but it was like
very very micro micro influencers, and we wanted to tap
into like local community influencers for example, like skaters who
have a skating crew. But when I first went there,
like okay, this like these are two micro We're not
(33:21):
getting any like return by like targeting to local and
two micro of influencers. So they're like, you can own
this process, and you know.
Speaker 6 (33:33):
Let's try to find new people.
Speaker 7 (33:34):
So I was like, okay, I literally compile the list
of people who I follow and who I love like
looking at their content and get like influenced by their
like style, and I literally cold DMed all those people
on the list. And that was even that was back
when we didn't even have our blue check mark, so
(33:55):
it was even harder for us to be seen in
those dms.
Speaker 6 (34:00):
But that's how we started.
Speaker 7 (34:02):
We would just hold d all these like influencers and celebrities,
and surprisingly we got like a great response rate, like
just cold dming people, and then we would just send
it to them. They would send their addresses. I was
send it out. I would even like to save shipping
costs I would like drive all around La.
Speaker 5 (34:21):
To like physically drop it off to.
Speaker 7 (34:23):
Them and they would just post on stories because they
liked our products, and we just organically grew like that.
And then as that happened, we were getting big celebrities
like Chloe Moretz was responding to our dms, Dylan Sprouse
was responding to our dms. Jacob Elordi was responding to
our dms, and he.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Was so cute.
Speaker 7 (34:46):
He even like he even sent his own pop Parazzi
shot to us.
Speaker 5 (34:50):
He DMS it to us being like, look like you
guys can use it, which was like.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
So cute of him.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
Yeah, So, jacob Elordi, I saw you for yah, and
I was like, wow, like Nate is hot. So we
DMed him and then he didn't respond. We DMed him
again and then he responded and I was like.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (35:14):
He was like I really like, you know, we were
trying to gift him something else and he was like, oh,
but I would also really love that fleece and then
he like he's worn it so many times.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
With the help of a few celebrity endorsements, the fleeces
became a Sunday school staple and soon they couldn't keep
up with the demand.
Speaker 7 (35:35):
When we brought it back this year, it sold out
in like an hour, and like it went from fifty
to five hundred. We ordered five hundred and five hundreds
sold out within an hour, which was like so crazy,
like like I was almost in tears. That's how like
fulfilling and rewarding it is to like see those results
with your own eyes.
Speaker 6 (35:57):
It's just so exciting to see.
Speaker 7 (35:58):
Like that success, like the growth, because I have seen
it firsthand. How we were like shipping out five orders
and now it's like five hundred, and we have like
a whole their house team just dedicated to fulfilly orders.
Speaker 3 (36:28):
As Sunday School continues to explode in both the fashion
and cannabis spaces, the success isn't a surprise at all
to Cindy.
Speaker 4 (36:35):
I'm not surprised that the brand grew this much because
I knew that my brother is the kind of person
when he puts his head into something, not into something,
even if it sounds so ridiculous, he'll find a way
to get it done or like make it happen, even
if it takes a little bit longer than usual. And
right now, his vision is very much on staying authentic
(37:00):
and true to the brand image of Sunday School, which is,
you know, standing up for the Asian American playing funny
and punny jokes on the Asian American tiger mom culture
and promoting like counterculture with it among the youth, and
also just really fighting for legalization of weed and the
(37:24):
full decriminalization of cannabis in general, and everything he's fighting for,
like he does not compromise, and that's really inspiring for
me to watch as a leader because for me, like
as someone who is the biggest supporter of Sunday School,
being a former co founder and the brother and just
(37:47):
like I'm all of the key members that you've talked to,
Like I try to consider like my extended family, like
Gia j Tranja's boyfriend, Jas dog Gs whole.
Speaker 5 (37:57):
Family, like we treat as extended family.
Speaker 7 (38:00):
I've never felt more proud to be Korean than like
now working out Sunday School, telling people that this is
a Korean brand, Like Korean people can do dope shit
like this, you know, it's not just bts. So like
I'm more proud than ever to like representing Korea and
(38:21):
like you know, putting this brand out there for the
world to see.
Speaker 8 (38:26):
I think what we're doing is really important and it's
not cliche, but representation matters, and I'm really excited to
see how the landscape changes with people like us at
the forefront selfishly and really excited to like try new
flavors and see what kind of little products we make
here and there. I want to make sure that all
of this, we're going to grow our community and like, yeah,
(38:49):
have fun while we're at it. That's my biggest thing too,
Like I dropped everything to be here, and it's not
just to build my career. I kind of want to
have fun doing it. So in the next couple years,
I hope with everything we do we still have fun
doing it.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
Honestly, I think we just we always come back to
our mission. What is our mission?
Speaker 1 (39:10):
It's to globalize cannabis and globalized cannabis culture. And we
always think about how we're doing that, and it's through
community first and then culture and content and content for us.
You know, culture for us is where our product comes in, right, Like,
it's products with real stories. It's not product for the
sake of making new products. When people ask what is
(39:33):
Sunday School, is it a weed company. Is it a
fashion company? And whoever asks them, I tell them, hey,
like you're really thinking in a very like old fashioned mindset.
You know, you don't need to tell me you're a
millennial without telling me you're a millennial, right, And.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
I'm a millennial. But a lot of like my you know,
former bosses who like went to HBS and.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
You know whatnot like they are the ones kind of
like asking what is it really and what it really
comes down to is I really believe we are a
community of high achieving degenerates and we will make products
that is necessary for our community.
Speaker 3 (40:22):
The story of Sunday School is one of family creativity
and constantly thinking outside of the box. When Day had
his original idea for Sunday School, there was no one
better to tap than his sister Cindy. When they went
to create a new line of streetwear, their consistent creativity
helped them stand out amongst their peers, and when challenges arose,
Day and the team were always able to come together
to find a new solution and make sure that the
(40:44):
next Sunday School joint was rolled air tight for idea generation.
I'm Noah Callahan Bever, Thanks for listening. To the All
Angles Podcast presented by will Packer Media. If you've enjoyed
(41:06):
this episode, please don't hesitate to like, comment DM, or
tell a friend to tell a friend about Idea Generation
and the All Angles Podcast. We can't do any of
this without your help, and honestly, your support means everything.
We do this for you, and we can't do it
without you. This episode was brought to you by Will
Packer Executive produced by John Valachick and Helena Ox, original
(41:30):
music by Valentine Fritz, edit and sound mixed by Nonsensible Production,
and hosted by me Idea Generation founder Noah Callahan beveret
Idea Generations. All Angles is a Will Packer Media podcast
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