August 16, 2023 • 11 mins
In this episode, join us as Jessica "Judy" Harris-Dupart delves into the fascinating journey behind her accidental product creation, the remarkable Miracle Drops, which has achieved sales of over 4 million units. She opens up about the challenges of introducing products that didn't resonate with the market and offers insights on how to pivot effectively when faced with setbacks. Tune in to discover her invaluable rule of thumb when it comes to inventory management and gain a deeper understanding of the strategic decisions that have driven her entrepreneurial success.
Host IG:@itstanyatime
Guest IG: @darealbbjudy
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks to MasterCard for sponsoring this episode. Head to MasterCard
dot com Backslash Small Bids to learn how they're amplifying
and supporting black women entrepreneurs.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
The Miracle Drops.
Speaker 3 (00:12):
Remember, I only had one client that was dealing with
a hair issue, but I wanted to get something for her.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
So that was the last thing I actually put on
a market, not to.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Know that it was gonna be skew, but it was
the last thing that I put on the market, and
I was just selling the things that I wanted my
clients to be able to buy as a maintenance bundle,
and then selling online. Once we took to social media,
it was the edges. It was it was called sleek edges,
So that's that's that's where we started. It's crazy because
Miracle Drops to date has probably sold over four million pieces.
(00:44):
And that's not a million pieces, y'all pieces pieces.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
That's not four million dollars four million times.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
I want, I want people to hear that pieces. So
but yeah, she has moved four million pieces Miracle Oil alone.
You're listening to Money Moves powered by Greenwood, a finance
podcast dedicated to dropping all the knowledge and gems from
the world's leading celebrities, entrepreneurs and experts, and tech business
and more. I'm your host, angel investor, technology enthusiast, and
(01:15):
media personality Tanya Sam. Each week we talk with guests
who are making significant strides in their fields and learn
how they are making their money move. If you're someone
who's looking to make your money move, you're in the
right place. So open up your notes app and lock
us in, because this podcast will give you the keys
to the kingdom of financial stability, wealth and abundance you
(01:36):
so rightly deserve. Before we start the episode, I'd like
to remind you to check us out at gogreenwood dot
com and follow us on social media at Greenwood and
me on all things social at It's Tanya. Time to
stay locked in to new episode. Okay, so go back.
We're still at these early early days. Talk about your
(01:57):
first product.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
So I came out with four in the beginning. Actually
it was and I'm sorry, I have six dogs. It
was a sprints because I was a hairstylist and I
felt like I want to sell my clients so when
they leave they're able to keep up with their hairstyle.
It was something called Diamond Shine, which was a shine
spray for my clients for maintenance, Miracle Drops, and then
(02:24):
it was Edge Control, and out of all of them,
the very first one that I put out was the
Edge Control because a lot of people like it was
a big thing. And then I sold the Sprits and
the Shine as a bundle pack. But the Miracle Drops.
Remember I only had one client that was dealing with
a hair issue, but I wanted to get something for her,
So that was the last thing I actually put on
a market, not to know that it was gonna be skew,
(02:48):
but it was the last thing that I put on
the market, and I was just selling the things that
I wanted my clients to be able to buy as
a maintenance bundle, and then selling online. Once we took
to social media, it was the edges. It was it
was called sleek Edges, So that's that's where we started.
It's crazy because Miracle Drives to date has probably sold
over four million pieces. And that's not million pieces, y'all
(03:11):
pieces pieces.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
That's not four million dollars four million, pime.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
I want people to hear that pieces, so you but yeah,
she has moved four million pieces of Miracle oil alone,
and not again like sometimes part of the journey is
so amazing because it surprises you. You think you're building
a product, a product, and it was the spread share
that people would like, and you're like, oh, let me
add this, and you have to really understand what your
(03:38):
customers want. Take us back, how many how many years
ago did you first launch the line?
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Twenty fourteen? It was July twenty fourteen. We have our
birthday month this month, and I put a screenshot and
I was gonna put it on social media, screenshot of
what my first month looked like. I sold one hundred
and ten products, and this month we've sold over sixty
thousand pieces online. And that's online alone. It has nothing
to do with thor sales are nothing. And so it's
(04:05):
just a great thing to sit back and reflect on
because I would have never thought I so I couldn't
afford to buy sixty thousand pieces, much less have them
in house to be able to sell.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
I know, in July of twenty fourteen, Wow, I love that.
I love that.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Okay, so we're almost at the ten year mark. You
have how many skews? Now?
Speaker 3 (04:29):
Oh Jesus, last time, I kind of way and I say,
I feel like I'm about to fail as says.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
No, no, no, no failing somewhere like thirty if we
include all of the premiums like our brushes, our bonnets.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Yeah, it's probably thirty something thirty.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
And Miracle Drops is the number one selling. Let's talk
about some of the ones that you've launched that people
did not like.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Oh girls, See that's the thing, that's what saying. People
don't talk about all of it. And I was super
excited about this collection called a Unicorn collection, right because
I'm a person. I like all the glitz and the
unicorn and this and and that, and it was a great
it was great products. People actually loved it, but they
didn't understand the purpose of it or what it did,
(05:16):
so the messaging wasn't strong on what it did. So
that same exact formula, I made the Miracle Drops collection.
I put Miracle Drops in it, and I gave better
wording to it.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
I made it, you know.
Speaker 3 (05:30):
So you fully understand the use of each of the products.
And we came out with the Miracle Drops collection because
I never had I had never had a miracle Drop shampool,
a miracle drop condition of a miracle Drop masks, none
of that. All we had was the miracle drops. They
were just shampoo to compliment it or nothing. So then
once I started the Unicorn line, for some reason, it
wasn't moving. It just people didn't understand, and people had
(05:53):
all these questions were trying to answer it. For me,
it was the un The corn is the person that
likes to switch it up, and they like to they
like to.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Keep that had health.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
You know, I thought it was gonna be the best
thing ever, and it was. I guess you could consider
it a flop, just like we had. And I don't
mind ever telling people about my missus because my wings
always far surpassed my missus. We had gold Men, which
did okay, But I didn't know, like I.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Never I've never been in the space before.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
I didn't know to look in the market for competitive
things and all the rest of that. We were so hot.
We was like twenty dollars and men don't buy to
like we. Men don't buy nothing for no damn twenty dollars.
Find no body washed for twenty twenty five dollars. So then,
understanding how to stage it properly, you go back to
the drawing board and just fix it. Yep, Yeah, that's
(06:41):
all you do is you fix it, and then that's
gonna be time. Like there's always ebbs and flows. Think
about it, hairstyles. You have different hairstyles between the years
that change and so on and so on. So there's
gonna be things that probably sold a lot and then
eventually doing them down.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Okay, find something else.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
To sell, Find something else.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
It's not squirrel, just get something else.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
So to your point on that, how do you manage
holding inventory? So you know, and I think there's this
question is different for people who are later stage entrepreneur entrepreneurs,
but early stage entrepreneurs when you're like trying to get
your samples out, you're testing things, you know, do you order?
You know, these places ask you for a minimum order
of quantity, right, and sometimes it's like ten thousand units,
(07:26):
sometimes it's one hundred thousand units.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Don't don't do it.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
My minimum order the quantity when I first thought it
was three hundred pieces, and now my minimum order quantity
is one hundred thousand pieces.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
I didn't start off with.
Speaker 3 (07:39):
And how about there was a manufacturer I was trying
to work with that does really great stuff, but their
minimum order is five hundred thousand pieces.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
I'm not tell you, wow, had to say one.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
Hundred thousand pieces is good, but you got somebody bigger
than that. Yeah, but at three hundred, at three hundred pieces,
it's hot me that out of my four skills, when
I buy these three hundred pieces, this one skew, I'm
having to buy three hundred pieces two and three times
a month. This other one hundred pieces last me for
(08:13):
three months, This other skewed te hundred pieces last me
for two months. So that way I now know a
monthly order. So now I'm buying twelve hundred pieces of this,
three hundred pieces of this, six hundred pieces of that,
and nine hundred pieces of that, and that should last
me about three months versus because let me tell you something,
(08:33):
one of the biggest mistakes I made very recently. And
a lot of people think once you, once you make
all this money, you arrive that that's not true. Just
last year, I was putting different people in place so
I can just sit in my creative seat, and I didn't.
I'm gonna say I took my hand off the wheel,
but I put somebody in the place of inventory management,
not realizing that they didn't have the skill set for that,
(08:56):
and they were ordering seventy five thousand pieces this flatline
of everything. So now in my warehouse. So since you
tell me about I have, I have one product that
we have seventy five months on hand?
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Why do we have seventy five months on hand of anything?
Speaker 3 (09:13):
Yep, yep, you get and I feel like and that's
still a lesson learned.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
I don't feel like it's a loss.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
It's now forced me to talk to my team and
tell them we need to talk about this product more.
We get this in front of more people. What are
the stars can we get this in? What else can
we put this at? Because now it's like, Okay, it's
a mistake. I can't change it. I can't charge it
to the person because they can't afford it that they're
no longer with me and they can't afford the amount
(09:40):
of inventory that that is, they can't afford this mistake.
So what I do is I take and just focus
on how do we fix it?
Speaker 2 (09:49):
What's supposed to be my lesson of this? How can
I grow out of this?
Speaker 3 (09:52):
And in scaling, if this mistake was to happen larger,
how could I have prevented it or how can I
fix it?
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (10:01):
And there's so much there to unpack. I love even
just you saying like, listen, the bigger you are, like
sometimes the bigger the mistakes are and you got to work.
You got to figure it out. And this is the
thing about I think that people don't understand about pivoting.
You could you looked at that seventy five thousand chunk
of inventory and you're like, Okay, I got to do
something different here to make sure this moves. So I
(10:21):
either got to push it harder because mistakes happen, you know,
and even though you are the CEO, you have to
hire a team under you that will execute. And I've
you know, Judy and I I've seen her team. I've
seen how she operates. She's an incredible leader. I've sat
in meetings with you for previous interviews and stuff where
(10:42):
you were leading a team and they love to be
led by you. Tune in Friday for the conclusion of
our conversation with hair care entrepreneur Judy Harris Depart. Thanks
for listening to today's episode. If we helped you make
your money move, please share it with your community, Subscribe
and leave us a review on iHeart Radio and Apple Podcasts.
Follow us on social media at Greenwood and visit us
(11:04):
at Gogreenwood dot com for more financial tips and remember,
money Movers. If this were easy, everyone would do it.
So take the lessons you've learned from this episode and
apply it to your life. Money Moves is an iHeartRadio
podcast powered by Greenwood Executive produced by Sunwise Media, Inc.
For more podcasts on iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
(11:27):
or wherever you get your podcasts from. Make sure to
tune in Monday, Wednesday and Friday and subscribe to the
Money Moves podcast powered by Greenwood, so that you too
can have the keys to financial freedom you so rightly deserve.
Until next time,
Thanks to MasterCard for sponsoring this episode. Head to MasterCard
dot com Backslash Small Bids to learn how they're amplifying
and supporting black women entrepreneurs.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
The Miracle Drops.
Speaker 3 (00:12):
Remember, I only had one client that was dealing with
a hair issue, but I wanted to get something for her.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
So that was the last thing I actually put on
a market, not to.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Know that it was gonna be skew, but it was
the last thing that I put on the market, and
I was just selling the things that I wanted my
clients to be able to buy as a maintenance bundle,
and then selling online. Once we took to social media,
it was the edges. It was it was called sleek edges,
So that's that's that's where we started. It's crazy because
Miracle Drops to date has probably sold over four million pieces.
(00:44):
And that's not a million pieces, y'all pieces pieces.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
That's not four million dollars four million times.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
I want, I want people to hear that pieces. So
but yeah, she has moved four million pieces Miracle Oil alone.
You're listening to Money Moves powered by Greenwood, a finance
podcast dedicated to dropping all the knowledge and gems from
the world's leading celebrities, entrepreneurs and experts, and tech business
and more. I'm your host, angel investor, technology enthusiast, and
(01:15):
media personality Tanya Sam. Each week we talk with guests
who are making significant strides in their fields and learn
how they are making their money move. If you're someone
who's looking to make your money move, you're in the
right place. So open up your notes app and lock
us in, because this podcast will give you the keys
to the kingdom of financial stability, wealth and abundance you
(01:36):
so rightly deserve. Before we start the episode, I'd like
to remind you to check us out at gogreenwood dot
com and follow us on social media at Greenwood and
me on all things social at It's Tanya. Time to
stay locked in to new episode. Okay, so go back.
We're still at these early early days. Talk about your
(01:57):
first product.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
So I came out with four in the beginning. Actually
it was and I'm sorry, I have six dogs. It
was a sprints because I was a hairstylist and I
felt like I want to sell my clients so when
they leave they're able to keep up with their hairstyle.
It was something called Diamond Shine, which was a shine
spray for my clients for maintenance, Miracle Drops, and then
(02:24):
it was Edge Control, and out of all of them,
the very first one that I put out was the
Edge Control because a lot of people like it was
a big thing. And then I sold the Sprits and
the Shine as a bundle pack. But the Miracle Drops.
Remember I only had one client that was dealing with
a hair issue, but I wanted to get something for her,
So that was the last thing I actually put on
a market, not to know that it was gonna be skew,
(02:48):
but it was the last thing that I put on
the market, and I was just selling the things that
I wanted my clients to be able to buy as
a maintenance bundle, and then selling online. Once we took
to social media, it was the edges. It was it
was called sleek Edges, So that's that's where we started.
It's crazy because Miracle Drives to date has probably sold
over four million pieces. And that's not million pieces, y'all
(03:11):
pieces pieces.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
That's not four million dollars four million, pime.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
I want people to hear that pieces, so you but yeah,
she has moved four million pieces of Miracle oil alone,
and not again like sometimes part of the journey is
so amazing because it surprises you. You think you're building
a product, a product, and it was the spread share
that people would like, and you're like, oh, let me
add this, and you have to really understand what your
(03:38):
customers want. Take us back, how many how many years
ago did you first launch the line?
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Twenty fourteen? It was July twenty fourteen. We have our
birthday month this month, and I put a screenshot and
I was gonna put it on social media, screenshot of
what my first month looked like. I sold one hundred
and ten products, and this month we've sold over sixty
thousand pieces online. And that's online alone. It has nothing
to do with thor sales are nothing. And so it's
(04:05):
just a great thing to sit back and reflect on
because I would have never thought I so I couldn't
afford to buy sixty thousand pieces, much less have them
in house to be able to sell.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
I know, in July of twenty fourteen, Wow, I love that.
I love that.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Okay, so we're almost at the ten year mark. You
have how many skews? Now?
Speaker 3 (04:29):
Oh Jesus, last time, I kind of way and I say,
I feel like I'm about to fail as says.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
No, no, no, no failing somewhere like thirty if we
include all of the premiums like our brushes, our bonnets.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Yeah, it's probably thirty something thirty.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
And Miracle Drops is the number one selling. Let's talk
about some of the ones that you've launched that people
did not like.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Oh girls, See that's the thing, that's what saying. People
don't talk about all of it. And I was super
excited about this collection called a Unicorn collection, right because
I'm a person. I like all the glitz and the
unicorn and this and and that, and it was a great
it was great products. People actually loved it, but they
didn't understand the purpose of it or what it did,
(05:16):
so the messaging wasn't strong on what it did. So
that same exact formula, I made the Miracle Drops collection.
I put Miracle Drops in it, and I gave better
wording to it.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
I made it, you know.
Speaker 3 (05:30):
So you fully understand the use of each of the products.
And we came out with the Miracle Drops collection because
I never had I had never had a miracle Drop shampool,
a miracle drop condition of a miracle Drop masks, none
of that. All we had was the miracle drops. They
were just shampoo to compliment it or nothing. So then
once I started the Unicorn line, for some reason, it
wasn't moving. It just people didn't understand, and people had
(05:53):
all these questions were trying to answer it. For me,
it was the un The corn is the person that
likes to switch it up, and they like to they
like to.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Keep that had health.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
You know, I thought it was gonna be the best
thing ever, and it was. I guess you could consider
it a flop, just like we had. And I don't
mind ever telling people about my missus because my wings
always far surpassed my missus. We had gold Men, which
did okay, But I didn't know, like I.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Never I've never been in the space before.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
I didn't know to look in the market for competitive
things and all the rest of that. We were so hot.
We was like twenty dollars and men don't buy to
like we. Men don't buy nothing for no damn twenty dollars.
Find no body washed for twenty twenty five dollars. So then,
understanding how to stage it properly, you go back to
the drawing board and just fix it. Yep, Yeah, that's
(06:41):
all you do is you fix it, and then that's
gonna be time. Like there's always ebbs and flows. Think
about it, hairstyles. You have different hairstyles between the years
that change and so on and so on. So there's
gonna be things that probably sold a lot and then
eventually doing them down.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Okay, find something else.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
To sell, Find something else.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
It's not squirrel, just get something else.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
So to your point on that, how do you manage
holding inventory? So you know, and I think there's this
question is different for people who are later stage entrepreneur entrepreneurs,
but early stage entrepreneurs when you're like trying to get
your samples out, you're testing things, you know, do you order?
You know, these places ask you for a minimum order
of quantity, right, and sometimes it's like ten thousand units,
(07:26):
sometimes it's one hundred thousand units.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Don't don't do it.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
My minimum order the quantity when I first thought it
was three hundred pieces, and now my minimum order quantity
is one hundred thousand pieces.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
I didn't start off with.
Speaker 3 (07:39):
And how about there was a manufacturer I was trying
to work with that does really great stuff, but their
minimum order is five hundred thousand pieces.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
I'm not tell you, wow, had to say one.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
Hundred thousand pieces is good, but you got somebody bigger
than that. Yeah, but at three hundred, at three hundred pieces,
it's hot me that out of my four skills, when
I buy these three hundred pieces, this one skew, I'm
having to buy three hundred pieces two and three times
a month. This other one hundred pieces last me for
(08:13):
three months, This other skewed te hundred pieces last me
for two months. So that way I now know a
monthly order. So now I'm buying twelve hundred pieces of this,
three hundred pieces of this, six hundred pieces of that,
and nine hundred pieces of that, and that should last
me about three months versus because let me tell you something,
(08:33):
one of the biggest mistakes I made very recently. And
a lot of people think once you, once you make
all this money, you arrive that that's not true. Just
last year, I was putting different people in place so
I can just sit in my creative seat, and I didn't.
I'm gonna say I took my hand off the wheel,
but I put somebody in the place of inventory management,
not realizing that they didn't have the skill set for that,
(08:56):
and they were ordering seventy five thousand pieces this flatline
of everything. So now in my warehouse. So since you
tell me about I have, I have one product that
we have seventy five months on hand?
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Why do we have seventy five months on hand of anything?
Speaker 3 (09:13):
Yep, yep, you get and I feel like and that's
still a lesson learned.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
I don't feel like it's a loss.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
It's now forced me to talk to my team and
tell them we need to talk about this product more.
We get this in front of more people. What are
the stars can we get this in? What else can
we put this at? Because now it's like, Okay, it's
a mistake. I can't change it. I can't charge it
to the person because they can't afford it that they're
no longer with me and they can't afford the amount
(09:40):
of inventory that that is, they can't afford this mistake.
So what I do is I take and just focus
on how do we fix it?
Speaker 2 (09:49):
What's supposed to be my lesson of this? How can
I grow out of this?
Speaker 3 (09:52):
And in scaling, if this mistake was to happen larger,
how could I have prevented it or how can I
fix it?
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (10:01):
And there's so much there to unpack. I love even
just you saying like, listen, the bigger you are, like
sometimes the bigger the mistakes are and you got to work.
You got to figure it out. And this is the
thing about I think that people don't understand about pivoting.
You could you looked at that seventy five thousand chunk
of inventory and you're like, Okay, I got to do
something different here to make sure this moves. So I
(10:21):
either got to push it harder because mistakes happen, you know,
and even though you are the CEO, you have to
hire a team under you that will execute. And I've
you know, Judy and I I've seen her team. I've
seen how she operates. She's an incredible leader. I've sat
in meetings with you for previous interviews and stuff where
(10:42):
you were leading a team and they love to be
led by you. Tune in Friday for the conclusion of
our conversation with hair care entrepreneur Judy Harris Depart. Thanks
for listening to today's episode. If we helped you make
your money move, please share it with your community, Subscribe
and leave us a review on iHeart Radio and Apple Podcasts.
Follow us on social media at Greenwood and visit us
(11:04):
at Gogreenwood dot com for more financial tips and remember,
money Movers. If this were easy, everyone would do it.
So take the lessons you've learned from this episode and
apply it to your life. Money Moves is an iHeartRadio
podcast powered by Greenwood Executive produced by Sunwise Media, Inc.
For more podcasts on iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
(11:27):
or wherever you get your podcasts from. Make sure to
tune in Monday, Wednesday and Friday and subscribe to the
Money Moves podcast powered by Greenwood, so that you too
can have the keys to financial freedom you so rightly deserve.
Until next time,
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