April 1, 2025 • 32 mins
You may know Sloane Stephens from her prowess on the tennis court. You should also know her for her business savvy. She launched the Sloane Stephens Foundation in 2013 to get rackets into the hands of the Compton Unified School District. Ten years later she was set to launch Doc & Glo, her self-funded skincare company, when a web designer noticed all of the product packaging she’d approved had been ripped off from another company. But Sloane never backs down from a challenge.
Join Ben Walter and Kathleen Griffith as they chat with Sloane about a champion’s mindset toward business. Discover how to align a new company with an existing brand image and hear how Sloane moves through bad news with ease. These are The Unshakeables.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Ruby.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Globe trotting is one of the big perks of tennis
player Sloane Stephen's career.
Speaker 3 (00:12):
It's Rome, it's Paris, it's New York, it's all of
these places.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Right the downside, she's always on the go.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
We're away from home. Well, I would say probably more
than you. We traveled like forty weeks a year.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Sloane has traveling down, but the personal care products available
to her left a lot to be desired, especially for
a woman playing tennis all day every day. During COVID,
she was inspired to start her own company, Doc and
Glo to provide the clean beauty products. She's so craved
she has put her heart, her energy, and her own
(00:46):
money into the company. A few weeks before launch, she
heard from her website designer.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
We hired a company to do all of our branding,
and we were working on the website. We had already
had the products, and one of the website designers called
us and was like, hey, do you guys know that
your website looks exactly like this other company's everything down
to like the packaging like identical.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
She couldn't believe it. She had the products in her hand.
The branding was set and now she couldn't use any
of it.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
That was my Like, oh shit, I just paid so
much money for this. We literally have to start over
from scratch completely.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Welcome to The Unshakeables from Chase for Business and Ruby
Studio from iHeartMedia. I'm Ben Walter, CEO of Chase for Business.
On the Unshakeables, we're sharing the daring moments of small
business owners facing their crisis points and telling the stories
of how they got through it. Joining me today once
again is Kathleen Griffith. Kathleen, have you ever worked with
(01:58):
an athlete business owner before?
Speaker 4 (02:00):
I have not directly worked with an athlete business owner,
but it's who I admire most.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
And our guest today is absolutely someone to admire. On
today's episode, Doc and Glo from the globe trotting Sloane Stevens.
As much of the world knows, Sloane Stevens is a
tennis player. This informs so much of what she does
and who she is. You'll hear more about it over
(02:29):
the course of the episode, but it's also how she
came up with the idea for Doc and Glow in
the first place.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
I came up with the concept and the idea. During COVID,
when we were like playing and obviously being a professional
tennis player, we were traveling, but we were in bubbles,
so we were always all together, but we could never use.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
The locker rooms.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Everyone just smelled really bad, and I was like, there
has to be a better way, Like why is it
so smelling? Why is everyone stinky?
Speaker 2 (02:55):
In between sessions, Sloane and the other players mostly just
hung out in their rooms. She always loved cosmetics and
skincare products, so she started experimenting. Soon she was giving
out little samples to family and friends.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
I started off thinking very small. I wanted to create
something that fit my lifestyle and the struggles that I
have gone through as an athlete and just being an
active person in general. And I always take everything I
have with me on the go because I travel forty
weeks a year, so to be able to have like
my favorite perfume or my favorite lotion, like, I literally
(03:32):
am a traveling hotel.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
So for me, it's very normal.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
But I wanted to create products for people who could
also have their own little hotel in their bag.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Okay, so what are your products do? What's the premise?
Speaker 3 (03:47):
So basically they're all fragrance free except for one, which
is a body scrub. But I'm a fragrance girly, so
I wear a ton of fragrance. And I always felt
like when you wear deodorant, everything is always like masking
your smell but not actually taking away the odor, so
you still have BO. You're just putting like a very
heavy scented deodorant.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
On top of it. It's bo and flower. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 3 (04:11):
I just wanted something that was clean and for the
purpose of taking away the BO, but also just so
that you could still express yourself through your fragrance or
your perfume or whatever your cologne.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Her sample products were well received by friends, which inspired
her to make some products for real.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
We custom formulated six products. It was like a whole
process of figuring out what ingredients we wanted to put
in it. Obviously, like the whole brand story kind of
when you develop products, like you have to stick to
whatever that is.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
So talk to me a little bit about the brand identity.
As a professional sports player, you already have an image
and a brand and a following, So whatever you come
up with has to work with that image and brand,
because that's part of how you're going to sell your product.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Definitely, so I wanted to be in clean beauty things
like that. That for my personal preference of what I
wanted to create and what my vision was for the brand,
and obviously being an athlete, like all of those things
are very important. Just in general, the brands that I
resonate with the most are the ones that have the
most connection and have the best storytelling. I name the
company Doc and Glow after my grandparents, who I feel
(05:18):
like in my life taught me the most about self
care and my vision. I feel like for my brand
is very clear. My vision for my tennis career has
been very clear, and for the brand, I know clearly
like what I want to work towards where I want
the brand to live. I know what consumers I want
to reach. Is that difficult?
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Absolutely?
Speaker 3 (05:34):
The same thing with tennis, Like I knew I wanted
to win a Grand Slam one day.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
Is that difficult? Absolutely?
Speaker 3 (05:38):
I had to train every day and do all these things.
And I think in any job that you do, or
any passion project that you have, you have to have
a clear vision in order to execute it. And I
feel like the way the space is moving and where
wellness is going and where self care is going, it's
become more of like a premium thing. But I feel
(05:59):
like self cared wellness is literally for everyone.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
So you found a chemist to make the product that
you wanted, and then I assume you found a manufacturer
to make the stuff.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
Yeah, we did, and all this has been very expensive.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I should mention Sloane has been funding all of this
on her own, using her tennis money to pay for
doc and Glow.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
We found a manufacturer, we created our bottles, our packaging.
Did all of that process started with the first two SKUs.
And it's been obviously a very long process in terms
of me being a tennis player and learning from scratch,
learning it on the fly has been interesting and difficult,
super challenging, but also super rewarding just to be able
(06:43):
to do something different.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Most of the small business owners we talked to on
the show have a ton of energy and a great
deal of focus on their business. But Sloane, she's next level.
I just want to back up for a second. So
you're still playing professional tennis, right, Yeah, you haven't retired.
That's still like quite a job.
Speaker 4 (07:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
You have to train, you have to tour, you have
to do all the things that go along with being
on the professional tennis Tour. You got your MBA while
you were doing that, which pretty impressive. I have to
say that didn't sound easy.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
No, No, definitely was not.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
When I started knowing nothing about scale, knowing nothing about
how I was going to get the brand out there,
knowing nothing about retail. My biggest and best skill is like,
I'm not the smartest, I don't know everything, but I
am the most resourceful person you'll ever meet in your life,
and I will find someone to teach me. I will
find someone who knows how to do it. Very similar
to tennis, like watching people, seeing them play, and then
(07:38):
being able to play with them at some point in
my life. I'm very much in my learning period right now,
but I'm using all of the resources I have to
make the business as successful as I can with what
I have right in front of me. It sounds so cliche,
but the championship mindset of like you keep going, like
you bet on yourself, you keep going, you keep fighting,
you keep competing until eventually you get to where you
(07:59):
want to be.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Kathleen, what did you think of Sloane's story?
Speaker 4 (08:04):
I love all things sport. I love athletes. I'm so
excited to dig into this one. I don't know if
you're familiar with John Wooden's Pyramid of Greatness. No, He's
got this great pyramid of success where the top of
the pyramid is competitive greatness. And so the whole concept
is just about embracing competition. That's where you've got to be.
(08:24):
And I think for business owners, we think there's almost
something wrong with that too, because there is such a
spirit of collaboration, which is great, but at a certain point,
as Sloan talked about, you've got to have grit, you've
got to know when to battle back, and you've got
to know when to put your elbows out.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
This is sort of the golden age of athletes as entrepreneurs,
and I think that's driven almost entirely by social media.
I mean, it used to be you had a career
and then the most you could hope to do after
that is maybe the occasional endorsement deal. Whereas now, because
athletes are brands themselves and they have a megaphone in
the form of social media, they take that competitive spirit
and they channel it and it's a smart thing to
(09:03):
do financially given what they do for a living and
how long they can do it.
Speaker 4 (09:07):
Yeah, they've gotten so much more savvy, not only in
creating their own brands, but taking equity in bigger brands
that ask them to do commercial endorsements. I think Naomi
Osaka she had something like twenty equity positions across SweetGreen
and all of these different brands that she was asked
to endorse, so a lot smarter. I mean, I think
going back to Sloan and the mindset of an athlete
(09:30):
in general, that's so fascinating to me is the singularity
of focus, Like you have to have such a strong vision,
which is what she talked about. And one of the
things I encourage entrepreneurs to do is think about, what
is the vision of what you're looking to create? If
you could remove every limiting belief, every aspect of self doubt,
(09:54):
every constraint, what would you go create if you could
do be have anything and then five x that, like
it should be something that you can't do in five lifetimes.
And she talked about having a vision that is so
lucid and clear. For her team, everyone knows how to
go and execute. So for anyone who's listening, I think
(10:16):
spend time there really solid time on crafting your vision
and then you have that singularity of focus to realize
that vision. That's what great athletes do and it's something
that we can adopt as entrepreneurs.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
Yeah, well, she seems to have cracked the code.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
That is true.
Speaker 4 (10:35):
One other thing that's interesting, and I'm curious what you
see on the corporate side of the house, but I'd
come across a study years ago that I think it
was like ninety five percent of women who are in
the C suite played competitive sports at some point. So
do you see the athlete mindset also playing out internally
(10:55):
where you are?
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Oh? Yeah, I mean a lot of the senior executives
I've worked with over the years, and by the way,
this was true. I've been an executive in the US
and the UK, so I've been on both sides of
the Atlantic, so they were different sports, but a huge
percentage men and women. Doesn't matter. Of the executives that
I have worked with played competitive sports and were reasonably
successful at it, there is no doubt that that competitive
(11:18):
mindset translates. I'm always wary of sort of causation and correlation,
so I think there's something to the sports piece of it,
and the fact that you have to work on it,
you know, compete as a team or as an individual
and be driven and all that. But I think it's
also the bigger driving forces the fact that when you
play sports or do any other sort of outside activity
that requires a lot of time, it forces you to
(11:41):
focus that energy that much more succinctly all the time. Right.
If you're a varsity athlete in high school and you
got good enough grades that you did well, you had
your stuff together, I think that's a pretty potent combination. Okay,
let's get back to sloan. So you have a vision
for your brand. You launched the product just last year, right.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
And yeahs old, wow, we're a baby, we're newborns.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
Now, what I find amazing is so our show, The
Unshakeables is all about the tough moments that entrepreneurs and
business owners have to go through. And you're pretty new
and you've kind of already had one, right, Oh my god.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
So before we even launched, we hired a company to
do all of our branding. We went through a whole
brand discovery. We created basically an entire company, and we're
moving forward in the market with it and This was
going to be our launch, This was going to be
what our brand represented going to market. And we were
(12:36):
working on the website. We had already had the products.
We were in full motion, and one of the website
designers called us and was like, hey, do you guys
know that your website looks exactly like this other company's
down to, Like the packaging like identical. It was basically
(12:57):
like a knockoff, so much so that the website developer
would not create our website. The company that designed all
of our stuff didn't take any accountability for it. We
got a bunch of emails back being like, oh, things
are always similar in the market and things look alike.
That was like the worst thing that's happened to us.
Everything else has just been like a oh damn, but
(13:18):
we'll figure out a way, we'll pivot. That one was
like I felt like I had just got stabbed in
the heart because I was like, oh my god, what
are we going to do?
Speaker 2 (13:27):
And of course, while all of this is going on,
Sloane still has to show up and play tennis.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I was at a tournament in Rome as one is Yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
Everyone was just like, wait, we can't tell her, and
I was like, what do you mean?
Speaker 2 (13:41):
Sloane wanted to know what was happening. And if you
thought getting bad news about your business during a huge
tournament would stop her, think again.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
One of my better skills is that I move on
fairly quickly, which everyone thinks I'm a little bit crazy for.
But I am able to just kind of put it
in back of my mind. When I was younger, sports
psychologists told me, like, when you get upset or things happen,
you got to.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Just flush it.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Got to flush the emotional energy down the toilet. You
just got to flush it from your brain. If I'd
let tennis affect the rest of my life, you know,
something is always affected the Doc and Glo side, Like,
I can't let that affect me at practice the next
day or my match the next day or whatever it is.
So being able to flush things and move on has
been super helpful.
Speaker 2 (14:23):
Even though she wasn't able to move forward with the
first round of Doc and Glo designs, she was able
to find the bright side.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
Imagine if we went to market with that brand and like,
it would have been like Sloane Stephens copy someone else's brand.
And I'm happy that we were able to catch it.
The brand that you see now is a completely different
brand than what we started with. But what I really
do think about is the people who don't have the
means or the money to pivot in those situations and
(14:52):
start from scratch. So a lot of like amazing ideas
get squashed at the very beginning because there's not enough money,
not enough funding. At that point, I was like, Okay,
I can either let this kick my ass or I'm
gonna have to fight back. And I think that was
when we like really buckled down and like figured out
what we're gonna do, how we're gonna do it. And
then the vision became even more clear because we were like.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Up against it more constraints.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Yeah, exactly, and I was like, we've come this far,
Like we can't stop here, Like we have to have
this brand launch. People have to see it. They have
to see what we worked hard to get to, what
we've created, the products we've gotten here, so we need
to like finish it.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Okay, So how long did it delay your launch? Oh?
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Easily, like a year and a half. Oh wow, Yeah,
it was a long process. It was a.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Lot of burning cash while you were figuring out.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
Yeah, a lot of burning of cash, a lot of
trying to find ways to be scrappy and like figure out, okay,
like we've already done this, we need to just like
change the color. We need to change this. And like
going through all those details were tough, which.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
The grit feels a little bit different than when you're
grinding it out there on the court.
Speaker 3 (15:55):
Everything about tennis is definitely a grind between the travel,
the tournament and like, again, tennis has afforded me so
many amazing things in my life, and like, I love
tennis and the sport of tennis.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
But it's hard.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Yeah, it sounds hard, Yeah, but.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
So is entrepreneurship. It's all hard.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
So once you got through that moment and you redid
your brand, what was your proudest moment? Was it sort
of seeing that product out there for the first time?
Was it your first sale? Talk to me about some
of the highs since.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
Then, Oh, so many good things.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
So when we launched, we like I had like a
little on the Nasdaq billboard, which was super cute, and
then we did a launch party, and then when we
launched the actual brand, when it went live, seeing like
the first person like buy something that wasn't my mom
or my husband.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
I was like, this is a random person.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
They just bought something that was super fun, and I
feel like, you work so hard.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
You don't know if anyone's going to buy it.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
You don't know if anyone's going to be interested, you
don't know if anyone's going to cover it. And Vogue
covered it and Glossy and ESPN, like all these people
covered it, and I was so thankful for that, but
I was like, you never actually know what the response
is going to be.
Speaker 2 (17:01):
Well, congratulations on your success, thank you. Let's take a
second here, and let's really dig in. I was struck,
particularly by her oh my goodness moment, because today's world
is so filled with near copies and sort of copies
(17:25):
and almost copies and fast followers. I mean, there are
whole brands out there whose stated raison deetra is I'm
going to watch for what someone else does that hits,
and I'm going to copy it as fast as I
can and be really efficient at manufacturing it and take
market share. So I'm curious your view on that, because
(17:46):
she got to a point where she couldn't do it
because she felt like it was too close of a copy.
How do you think about that.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
I'm of the school that nothing is original anymore. So
everything is a remix, a revamp. You're not coming up
with anything original. And my lawyer once said to me,
and don't come to me for legal advice. But would
the reasonable person of sound mind see this as being
a knockoff or being a dupe? So I think that's
first and foremost a really good question to ask yourself
(18:16):
when you're creating something. We've seen recently more and more
of what you're describing Burkin bags. Are you familiar with
Burkin bags?
Speaker 2 (18:24):
First of all, I mean to the degree that I
know anything about any bags, Yes, but not as far
as I would take it.
Speaker 4 (18:30):
So wildly overpriced bag by Hermes. They can range anywhere
from twenty to thirty grand a pop. And Walmart just
came out with their dupe, which is unapologetically a dupe.
I mean it is pretty much in your carbon copy
minus not having the Hermes logo on it, and this thing,
it was so brazen of them they marketed that way,
(18:51):
and it's selling like hotcakes. I mean, it's completely sold out.
So I think it is something that you need to
ask yourself. Am I copying or am I setting my
business up for someone to copy me?
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Yeah? I also think there's a difference between copying a
product and copying a brand. You know, a brand is
something that really will be likely copyrighted or patented, or
it'll have some kind of anti infringement legal framework around it.
Number one. Number two, how do you define a product?
I mean, is it a Burkin bag, is it a purse?
Is it a bag of a certain shape and size?
(19:26):
Versus if it's a brand, then you're talking about colors
and logos and trademarks and things that are likely a
bit easier to protect. The last thing I would say
about that, though, is I would rather be copied than
accused of copying, because you want to start with something
that you think is original, and if someone is copying you,
that's a sign that you're doing something right, Versus if
(19:49):
you are accused of copying someone, then you're just in
a mess of stuff that you don't want to be in. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:54):
I remember someone gave me that advice early days, that
you can try to protect your brand as much as possible,
but it ultimately comes down to how much you're willing
to reinforce that legally in market and take action, and
for a lot of small businesses, it's something that you
can't do. So I'm definitely aligned on the school of
better to be copied than get caught copying. That is
(20:16):
not a place you want to be, And it's smarter
to go back to square one and start from scratch
and scrap what you've done if you find yourself in
that position.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Really good insight, Kathleen. Thanks. Let's hear how Sloane story ends.
Tennis in particular, offers an interesting analogy for entrepreneurship because
you know, if you play in the NBA, you're a
salaried player. You get paid to show up. Yeah, tennis
and golf and these individual sports aren't like that. You're
essentially a small business yourself. Right. You have a team
and you win, and you pay them whether you win
(20:45):
or not. So tell me about some of the things
you learned about managing a team, leading people, pulling the
right people together that you've been able to port over,
because that is a different experience than many other team sports.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
Yeah, definitely. From fifteen years old, I've had a coach,
a physio, an agent, I've had massage therapists, I've had
all these people on my team, you have to manage
like weekend and week out and pay, yeah, and pay,
and they travel.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
With you all year long.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
Like you see your team members more than you see
your family. It's not really managing them. I just know
like how to handle it. I know my boundaries, I
know what keeps me balanced. I know how much or
how little or whatever it is. And then I also
know how much they all cost. So it's like not
wasting anyone's time and making sure that everyone is here
to do a job. We're here to win, we're here
to work hard, and we're here to go home.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
So is your relationship with your doc and Glo team
different than your relationship with your tennis team.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
There is actually some overlap of team members too, Yes,
but I would feel like, no, it's pretty much the same.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
I'm like so blind.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
I'm just like business is business and we need to
figure it out and we need to move on. And
in tennis, I'm like, Okay, we show up, we're here
to play. Coach, come with a plan, physio, come with whatever,
massage sticks and things and exercise quit Like everyone has
like a plan. And I feel like with a startup
and a small business, you have to be so scrappy
(22:06):
and like everyone kind of has to do a bunch
of different things whether they like it or not.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
You have to right now.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Yeah, Like that's what you have to do as a
small business owner.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
And I feel like my relationship with both sets of
team members are very strong, but very different just in
terms of Dock and Glow is like so much more
fun and we get to do other things and we
don't have to be on a tennis.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Court, and like everyone's like, this is great, and I.
Speaker 3 (22:28):
Feel like my tennis career has been also so fun
because it's like it's Rome, it's Paris, it's New York,
it's all of these places. Right, But it's like physical labor.
That's a very it looks like is physical labor. And
I would say running a business is more emotional labor
(22:48):
for sure.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Interesting. Yeah, Now this wasn't the first enterprise you founded, right,
You found it a foundation. Yeah, tell us about your
foundation and tell us how running a foundation is a
bit different than running a business, right, Oh.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
Man, Yeah, it very much so is.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
So.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
I founded the Sloane Stephens Foundation in twenty thirteen. We do all
of Compton Unified School District. We do recess tennis, after
school tennis, and Saturday tennis. So every school in Compton
has the opportunity to play tennis. The goal of getting
rackets in hands of people who would never even consider
tennis or think about tennis or tennis is too expensive,
(23:23):
it's inaccessible, all of those things, getting access to those
kids to be able to play the sport of tennis,
and then on top of that, also having the educational
component be very important. So during the summer we do
summer reading camps, we do SAT and ACT prep like
we do all of those things. Go mom's a school psychologists,
so she's been in schools for a really long time
(23:43):
and education has been a really big part of our
family in our lives. And then obviously the tennis part
is really important. And my true belief is like one
of the best players in the world probably is just
sitting on their couch and they just haven't picked up
a racket yet. So finding those kids, it's giving them
the access, introducing them to something new, whether it be
(24:04):
you can be a professional player, or just get college scholarship,
or work as a commentator or work as a PA,
whatever it is. There's so many opportunities and I feel
like tennis is so overlooked because it's seen as a
sport that's very rich or inaccessible, and so giving kids
access to that and showing them that there's a little
bit more on the other side is a main coal.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Now, obviously running a nonprofit is different than running a
small business. One of the biggest differences for Sloane has
been the need to fundraise.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Fundraising is difficult, Grant writing is extremely hard, and then
I feel like begging people for money is so weird,
Like it's been very hard.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
No matter how good the cause is.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
No exactly some people are like, I'll give you money
for doc and Glow.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
I'm not going to give you money to your foundation.
Speaker 3 (24:49):
I'm like, this is basically free for you, Like you
could help a thousand kids with your donation or your
whatever it is.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
And I feel like it's difficult. Again.
Speaker 3 (24:59):
Something that was funded for the first seven years was
the foundation. I funded it myself just to keep it going.
And JPMorgan Chase does our financial literacy classes, so that's
been super helpful. Our parents and our kids love that.
So we've had some amazing sponsors come in and really
help us and give us support, and I think that's
kind of what keeps us going.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
The Sloane Stephens Foundation is still going strong, and it's
almost time for Doc and Glo to go out fundraising
if it's going to scale and succeed. Sloan has some
conflicting thoughts about that.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
Figuring that out is quite stressful, but I feel like
in due time. But where do you find the money?
Who do you ask money of? How much percentage of
your company do you give away? Like the company is me,
I'm one hundred percent me and like my mom like
that's it. So it's like where do you go from there?
How much do you give away? What's smart? All of
(25:52):
those questions are now coming into play because I want
the brand to scale. I want the brand to do well,
but it takes a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
It does take a lot of money, and raising money
is difficult and it's a very personal decision. So successful
tennis career, successful foundation, and now an emerging successful business,
what's next for Dock and Glow?
Speaker 3 (26:14):
Next for Doc and Glo, I would say, we're going
to do some really fun collaborations in twenty twenty five,
which is really exciting. And then our retail arm is growing,
which we're very excited about. And yeah, I just want
more people who live active lifestyles on the go to
be able to experience the product and just try it.
(26:34):
And even if that means giving people a product for
free so they can just experience it. I created something
for people for it to be accessible and for it
to be fitting to their lifestyles and whatever that may
be and whatever movement that may be. And that's just
the goal to get as many people product in their
hands to try it and experience it.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
That means the better it goes, the more you have
to invest.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Definitely, but we're on the way. We're on the way.
Speaker 3 (26:58):
I feel like money is definitely an obstacle, but when
you're putting it towards your dreams and something that you
really care about and you're passionate about, it's not an obstacle.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
That's awesome. So I have one last question for you,
which I ask every guest on the show, which is,
if you could give one piece of advice to an
aspiring or current business owner, what would it be.
Speaker 3 (27:18):
Oh right, Well, my favorite quote of all time I
always say this is it's not if, it's when. So
I feel like, if you work hard, and you fight
for your dreams and you again rowing in the same boat.
It's not if it's going to happen, it's when it's
going to happen, because you put all the work in,
you've dedicated yourself to doing whatever it is, and you
will be rewarded.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
In the end. So the end is when, not if.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
That's terrific advice. Sloane Stephens from Doc and Glo, Thank
you for being on the show.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Okay, just thinking about her story, she's really running three businesses.
She's running her tennis career, which is a business. She's
running Doc and Glo, which is absolutely a business. And
she's running her foundation, which you know is not for profit,
but it's certainly a business. I was just in awe
that she can do all three of those things. That
seems like a lot.
Speaker 4 (28:08):
Yeah, I actually loved your point. It was something I
hadn't thought about before that when you are an individual
athlete in certain sports like a tennis you're essentially an
entrepreneur because you're making money if you in and you're
not if you lose, and you still have a team
to play. So I thought that was brilliant I'd never
thought about it that way, the breath of responsibility that
(28:29):
she's taken on. I see a lot of this with entrepreneurs,
and it was certainly my own experience. I had this
very thriving, successful brand consultancy.
Speaker 1 (28:39):
Then my next thought.
Speaker 4 (28:40):
Was how do I pay this forward to other women
entrepreneurs who are starting out who don't necessarily have the
network or the resources or the tools that they need.
And so started channeling and funneling a lot of the
money that we were making in my business into this
passion project that has now certainly taken on a life
(29:00):
of its own. And so I think you can absolutely
do well by doing good.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
And it's something.
Speaker 4 (29:07):
Ideally though, that you can embed in your existing business
as opposed to needing a separate business that does well.
That's something I'm still looking to do, like how do
you reconcile those two worlds? And perhaps there's something she
can do to bring her foundation more front and center
into Doc and Glo. Have a percent of the proceeds
get donated, just make that more obvious for consumers, because
(29:30):
we know that model works. We've seen it work with
Tom's and other brands. Buy one, get one, give one.
It's a formula that consumers really love.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
We see so many entrepreneurs trying really hard to either
pay it back or pay it forward. I mean pay
it back just in terms of how philanthropic they are,
and pay it forward. And I'll give some examples. You know,
we're lucky enough to Chase to run programs for veterans,
for diverse women, all kinds of areas that have been
historically underpenetrated with respect to entrepreneurship. To help coach those
(30:02):
individuals and help them develop the skills they need, we
have something called coaching for Impact. We coach all these
entrepreneurs they graduate from the program. We've graduated thousands, and
so many of them come back to us and say,
how can I help? Who can I mentor who can
I coach? I've gotten so much out of this I
want to give to the small business community around me.
We've had guests on the show who tell us how
(30:23):
they helped the competitor get off the ground because they
just believed in that person and what they were doing,
and they wanted to be constructive, and they figured they
could handle another competitor and they'd rather that than someone
they really believed did not ever get their start.
Speaker 4 (30:36):
Yeah, it's incredible to see how small business owners rally
around each other too.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Kathleen, this has been one of my favorite stories, and
I'm super grateful that you came on the show to
explore it with me. Thanks for being here.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
Same here. I'm so inspired.
Speaker 4 (30:50):
I think I'm going to go pick up a racket
or something this weekend, try my hand at tennis again.
But yeah, super inspiring. Loved her story, and I think
we can all embrace that athlete mindset just a little
bit more.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
All right, watch the Backhand. Thanks so much for listening
to this episode of The Unshakeables. If you liked this episode,
please rate and review it. Our next episode is exciting
because it's right here in my own backyard in New
York City's thriving Chinatown. Five friends who really wanted to
preserve their neighborhood ended up opening one of New York's
(31:25):
coolest restaurants.
Speaker 5 (31:27):
It's a love letter to our community. We are Cantonese
kids born and raised in New York. During the millennium,
you got the Internet, you got trl you got pop culture.
So it's a mix of both worlds and that's what
we want. It to feel like we want to celebrate
our culture, be unapologetic about it, and just show people, Hey,
this is what we're about.
Speaker 2 (31:46):
I'm Ben Walter, and this is the Unshakeables from Chase
for Business and Ruby Studio from iHeartMedia. We'll see you
back here soon.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
Real customer compensated
Ruby.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Globe trotting is one of the big perks of tennis
player Sloane Stephen's career.
Speaker 3 (00:12):
It's Rome, it's Paris, it's New York, it's all of
these places.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Right the downside, she's always on the go.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
We're away from home. Well, I would say probably more
than you. We traveled like forty weeks a year.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Sloane has traveling down, but the personal care products available
to her left a lot to be desired, especially for
a woman playing tennis all day every day. During COVID,
she was inspired to start her own company, Doc and
Glo to provide the clean beauty products. She's so craved
she has put her heart, her energy, and her own
(00:46):
money into the company. A few weeks before launch, she
heard from her website designer.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
We hired a company to do all of our branding,
and we were working on the website. We had already
had the products, and one of the website designers called
us and was like, hey, do you guys know that
your website looks exactly like this other company's everything down
to like the packaging like identical.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
She couldn't believe it. She had the products in her hand.
The branding was set and now she couldn't use any
of it.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
That was my Like, oh shit, I just paid so
much money for this. We literally have to start over
from scratch completely.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Welcome to The Unshakeables from Chase for Business and Ruby
Studio from iHeartMedia. I'm Ben Walter, CEO of Chase for Business.
On the Unshakeables, we're sharing the daring moments of small
business owners facing their crisis points and telling the stories
of how they got through it. Joining me today once
again is Kathleen Griffith. Kathleen, have you ever worked with
(01:58):
an athlete business owner before?
Speaker 4 (02:00):
I have not directly worked with an athlete business owner,
but it's who I admire most.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
And our guest today is absolutely someone to admire. On
today's episode, Doc and Glo from the globe trotting Sloane Stevens.
As much of the world knows, Sloane Stevens is a
tennis player. This informs so much of what she does
and who she is. You'll hear more about it over
(02:29):
the course of the episode, but it's also how she
came up with the idea for Doc and Glow in
the first place.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
I came up with the concept and the idea. During COVID,
when we were like playing and obviously being a professional
tennis player, we were traveling, but we were in bubbles,
so we were always all together, but we could never use.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
The locker rooms.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Everyone just smelled really bad, and I was like, there
has to be a better way, Like why is it
so smelling? Why is everyone stinky?
Speaker 2 (02:55):
In between sessions, Sloane and the other players mostly just
hung out in their rooms. She always loved cosmetics and
skincare products, so she started experimenting. Soon she was giving
out little samples to family and friends.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
I started off thinking very small. I wanted to create
something that fit my lifestyle and the struggles that I
have gone through as an athlete and just being an
active person in general. And I always take everything I
have with me on the go because I travel forty
weeks a year, so to be able to have like
my favorite perfume or my favorite lotion, like, I literally
(03:32):
am a traveling hotel.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
So for me, it's very normal.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
But I wanted to create products for people who could
also have their own little hotel in their bag.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Okay, so what are your products do? What's the premise?
Speaker 3 (03:47):
So basically they're all fragrance free except for one, which
is a body scrub. But I'm a fragrance girly, so
I wear a ton of fragrance. And I always felt
like when you wear deodorant, everything is always like masking
your smell but not actually taking away the odor, so
you still have BO. You're just putting like a very
heavy scented deodorant.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
On top of it. It's bo and flower. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 3 (04:11):
I just wanted something that was clean and for the
purpose of taking away the BO, but also just so
that you could still express yourself through your fragrance or
your perfume or whatever your cologne.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Her sample products were well received by friends, which inspired
her to make some products for real.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
We custom formulated six products. It was like a whole
process of figuring out what ingredients we wanted to put
in it. Obviously, like the whole brand story kind of
when you develop products, like you have to stick to
whatever that is.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
So talk to me a little bit about the brand identity.
As a professional sports player, you already have an image
and a brand and a following, So whatever you come
up with has to work with that image and brand,
because that's part of how you're going to sell your product.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Definitely, so I wanted to be in clean beauty things
like that. That for my personal preference of what I
wanted to create and what my vision was for the brand,
and obviously being an athlete, like all of those things
are very important. Just in general, the brands that I
resonate with the most are the ones that have the
most connection and have the best storytelling. I name the
company Doc and Glow after my grandparents, who I feel
(05:18):
like in my life taught me the most about self
care and my vision. I feel like for my brand
is very clear. My vision for my tennis career has
been very clear, and for the brand, I know clearly
like what I want to work towards where I want
the brand to live. I know what consumers I want
to reach. Is that difficult?
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Absolutely?
Speaker 3 (05:34):
The same thing with tennis, Like I knew I wanted
to win a Grand Slam one day.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
Is that difficult? Absolutely?
Speaker 3 (05:38):
I had to train every day and do all these things.
And I think in any job that you do, or
any passion project that you have, you have to have
a clear vision in order to execute it. And I
feel like the way the space is moving and where
wellness is going and where self care is going, it's
become more of like a premium thing. But I feel
(05:59):
like self cared wellness is literally for everyone.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
So you found a chemist to make the product that
you wanted, and then I assume you found a manufacturer
to make the stuff.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
Yeah, we did, and all this has been very expensive.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I should mention Sloane has been funding all of this
on her own, using her tennis money to pay for
doc and Glow.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
We found a manufacturer, we created our bottles, our packaging.
Did all of that process started with the first two SKUs.
And it's been obviously a very long process in terms
of me being a tennis player and learning from scratch,
learning it on the fly has been interesting and difficult,
super challenging, but also super rewarding just to be able
(06:43):
to do something different.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Most of the small business owners we talked to on
the show have a ton of energy and a great
deal of focus on their business. But Sloane, she's next level.
I just want to back up for a second. So
you're still playing professional tennis, right, Yeah, you haven't retired.
That's still like quite a job.
Speaker 4 (07:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
You have to train, you have to tour, you have
to do all the things that go along with being
on the professional tennis Tour. You got your MBA while
you were doing that, which pretty impressive. I have to
say that didn't sound easy.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
No, No, definitely was not.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
When I started knowing nothing about scale, knowing nothing about
how I was going to get the brand out there,
knowing nothing about retail. My biggest and best skill is like,
I'm not the smartest, I don't know everything, but I
am the most resourceful person you'll ever meet in your life,
and I will find someone to teach me. I will
find someone who knows how to do it. Very similar
to tennis, like watching people, seeing them play, and then
(07:38):
being able to play with them at some point in
my life. I'm very much in my learning period right now,
but I'm using all of the resources I have to
make the business as successful as I can with what
I have right in front of me. It sounds so cliche,
but the championship mindset of like you keep going, like
you bet on yourself, you keep going, you keep fighting,
you keep competing until eventually you get to where you
(07:59):
want to be.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Kathleen, what did you think of Sloane's story?
Speaker 4 (08:04):
I love all things sport. I love athletes. I'm so
excited to dig into this one. I don't know if
you're familiar with John Wooden's Pyramid of Greatness. No, He's
got this great pyramid of success where the top of
the pyramid is competitive greatness. And so the whole concept
is just about embracing competition. That's where you've got to be.
(08:24):
And I think for business owners, we think there's almost
something wrong with that too, because there is such a
spirit of collaboration, which is great, but at a certain point,
as Sloan talked about, you've got to have grit, you've
got to know when to battle back, and you've got
to know when to put your elbows out.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
This is sort of the golden age of athletes as entrepreneurs,
and I think that's driven almost entirely by social media.
I mean, it used to be you had a career
and then the most you could hope to do after
that is maybe the occasional endorsement deal. Whereas now, because
athletes are brands themselves and they have a megaphone in
the form of social media, they take that competitive spirit
and they channel it and it's a smart thing to
(09:03):
do financially given what they do for a living and
how long they can do it.
Speaker 4 (09:07):
Yeah, they've gotten so much more savvy, not only in
creating their own brands, but taking equity in bigger brands
that ask them to do commercial endorsements. I think Naomi
Osaka she had something like twenty equity positions across SweetGreen
and all of these different brands that she was asked
to endorse, so a lot smarter. I mean, I think
going back to Sloan and the mindset of an athlete
(09:30):
in general, that's so fascinating to me is the singularity
of focus, Like you have to have such a strong vision,
which is what she talked about. And one of the
things I encourage entrepreneurs to do is think about, what
is the vision of what you're looking to create? If
you could remove every limiting belief, every aspect of self doubt,
(09:54):
every constraint, what would you go create if you could
do be have anything and then five x that, like
it should be something that you can't do in five lifetimes.
And she talked about having a vision that is so
lucid and clear. For her team, everyone knows how to
go and execute. So for anyone who's listening, I think
(10:16):
spend time there really solid time on crafting your vision
and then you have that singularity of focus to realize
that vision. That's what great athletes do and it's something
that we can adopt as entrepreneurs.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
Yeah, well, she seems to have cracked the code.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
That is true.
Speaker 4 (10:35):
One other thing that's interesting, and I'm curious what you
see on the corporate side of the house, but I'd
come across a study years ago that I think it
was like ninety five percent of women who are in
the C suite played competitive sports at some point. So
do you see the athlete mindset also playing out internally
(10:55):
where you are?
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Oh? Yeah, I mean a lot of the senior executives
I've worked with over the years, and by the way,
this was true. I've been an executive in the US
and the UK, so I've been on both sides of
the Atlantic, so they were different sports, but a huge
percentage men and women. Doesn't matter. Of the executives that
I have worked with played competitive sports and were reasonably
successful at it, there is no doubt that that competitive
(11:18):
mindset translates. I'm always wary of sort of causation and correlation,
so I think there's something to the sports piece of it,
and the fact that you have to work on it,
you know, compete as a team or as an individual
and be driven and all that. But I think it's
also the bigger driving forces the fact that when you
play sports or do any other sort of outside activity
that requires a lot of time, it forces you to
(11:41):
focus that energy that much more succinctly all the time. Right.
If you're a varsity athlete in high school and you
got good enough grades that you did well, you had
your stuff together, I think that's a pretty potent combination. Okay,
let's get back to sloan. So you have a vision
for your brand. You launched the product just last year, right.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
And yeahs old, wow, we're a baby, we're newborns.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
Now, what I find amazing is so our show, The
Unshakeables is all about the tough moments that entrepreneurs and
business owners have to go through. And you're pretty new
and you've kind of already had one, right, Oh my god.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
So before we even launched, we hired a company to
do all of our branding. We went through a whole
brand discovery. We created basically an entire company, and we're
moving forward in the market with it and This was
going to be our launch, This was going to be
what our brand represented going to market. And we were
(12:36):
working on the website. We had already had the products.
We were in full motion, and one of the website
designers called us and was like, hey, do you guys
know that your website looks exactly like this other company's
down to, Like the packaging like identical. It was basically
(12:57):
like a knockoff, so much so that the website developer
would not create our website. The company that designed all
of our stuff didn't take any accountability for it. We
got a bunch of emails back being like, oh, things
are always similar in the market and things look alike.
That was like the worst thing that's happened to us.
Everything else has just been like a oh damn, but
(13:18):
we'll figure out a way, we'll pivot. That one was
like I felt like I had just got stabbed in
the heart because I was like, oh my god, what
are we going to do?
Speaker 2 (13:27):
And of course, while all of this is going on,
Sloane still has to show up and play tennis.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I was at a tournament in Rome as one is Yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
Everyone was just like, wait, we can't tell her, and
I was like, what do you mean?
Speaker 2 (13:41):
Sloane wanted to know what was happening. And if you
thought getting bad news about your business during a huge
tournament would stop her, think again.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
One of my better skills is that I move on
fairly quickly, which everyone thinks I'm a little bit crazy for.
But I am able to just kind of put it
in back of my mind. When I was younger, sports
psychologists told me, like, when you get upset or things happen,
you got to.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Just flush it.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Got to flush the emotional energy down the toilet. You
just got to flush it from your brain. If I'd
let tennis affect the rest of my life, you know,
something is always affected the Doc and Glo side, Like,
I can't let that affect me at practice the next
day or my match the next day or whatever it is.
So being able to flush things and move on has
been super helpful.
Speaker 2 (14:23):
Even though she wasn't able to move forward with the
first round of Doc and Glo designs, she was able
to find the bright side.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
Imagine if we went to market with that brand and like,
it would have been like Sloane Stephens copy someone else's brand.
And I'm happy that we were able to catch it.
The brand that you see now is a completely different
brand than what we started with. But what I really
do think about is the people who don't have the
means or the money to pivot in those situations and
(14:52):
start from scratch. So a lot of like amazing ideas
get squashed at the very beginning because there's not enough money,
not enough funding. At that point, I was like, Okay,
I can either let this kick my ass or I'm
gonna have to fight back. And I think that was
when we like really buckled down and like figured out
what we're gonna do, how we're gonna do it. And
then the vision became even more clear because we were like.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Up against it more constraints.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Yeah, exactly, and I was like, we've come this far,
Like we can't stop here, Like we have to have
this brand launch. People have to see it. They have
to see what we worked hard to get to, what
we've created, the products we've gotten here, so we need
to like finish it.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Okay, So how long did it delay your launch? Oh?
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Easily, like a year and a half. Oh wow, Yeah,
it was a long process. It was a.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Lot of burning cash while you were figuring out.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
Yeah, a lot of burning of cash, a lot of
trying to find ways to be scrappy and like figure out, okay,
like we've already done this, we need to just like
change the color. We need to change this. And like
going through all those details were tough, which.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
The grit feels a little bit different than when you're
grinding it out there on the court.
Speaker 3 (15:55):
Everything about tennis is definitely a grind between the travel,
the tournament and like, again, tennis has afforded me so
many amazing things in my life, and like, I love
tennis and the sport of tennis.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
But it's hard.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Yeah, it sounds hard, Yeah, but.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
So is entrepreneurship. It's all hard.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
So once you got through that moment and you redid
your brand, what was your proudest moment? Was it sort
of seeing that product out there for the first time?
Was it your first sale? Talk to me about some
of the highs since.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
Then, Oh, so many good things.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
So when we launched, we like I had like a
little on the Nasdaq billboard, which was super cute, and
then we did a launch party, and then when we
launched the actual brand, when it went live, seeing like
the first person like buy something that wasn't my mom
or my husband.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
I was like, this is a random person.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
They just bought something that was super fun, and I
feel like, you work so hard.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
You don't know if anyone's going to buy it.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
You don't know if anyone's going to be interested, you
don't know if anyone's going to cover it. And Vogue
covered it and Glossy and ESPN, like all these people
covered it, and I was so thankful for that, but
I was like, you never actually know what the response
is going to be.
Speaker 2 (17:01):
Well, congratulations on your success, thank you. Let's take a
second here, and let's really dig in. I was struck,
particularly by her oh my goodness moment, because today's world
is so filled with near copies and sort of copies
(17:25):
and almost copies and fast followers. I mean, there are
whole brands out there whose stated raison deetra is I'm
going to watch for what someone else does that hits,
and I'm going to copy it as fast as I
can and be really efficient at manufacturing it and take
market share. So I'm curious your view on that, because
(17:46):
she got to a point where she couldn't do it
because she felt like it was too close of a copy.
How do you think about that.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
I'm of the school that nothing is original anymore. So
everything is a remix, a revamp. You're not coming up
with anything original. And my lawyer once said to me,
and don't come to me for legal advice. But would
the reasonable person of sound mind see this as being
a knockoff or being a dupe? So I think that's
first and foremost a really good question to ask yourself
(18:16):
when you're creating something. We've seen recently more and more
of what you're describing Burkin bags. Are you familiar with
Burkin bags?
Speaker 2 (18:24):
First of all, I mean to the degree that I
know anything about any bags, Yes, but not as far
as I would take it.
Speaker 4 (18:30):
So wildly overpriced bag by Hermes. They can range anywhere
from twenty to thirty grand a pop. And Walmart just
came out with their dupe, which is unapologetically a dupe.
I mean it is pretty much in your carbon copy
minus not having the Hermes logo on it, and this thing,
it was so brazen of them they marketed that way,
(18:51):
and it's selling like hotcakes. I mean, it's completely sold out.
So I think it is something that you need to
ask yourself. Am I copying or am I setting my
business up for someone to copy me?
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Yeah? I also think there's a difference between copying a
product and copying a brand. You know, a brand is
something that really will be likely copyrighted or patented, or
it'll have some kind of anti infringement legal framework around it.
Number one. Number two, how do you define a product?
I mean, is it a Burkin bag, is it a purse?
Is it a bag of a certain shape and size?
(19:26):
Versus if it's a brand, then you're talking about colors
and logos and trademarks and things that are likely a
bit easier to protect. The last thing I would say
about that, though, is I would rather be copied than
accused of copying, because you want to start with something
that you think is original, and if someone is copying you,
that's a sign that you're doing something right, Versus if
(19:49):
you are accused of copying someone, then you're just in
a mess of stuff that you don't want to be in. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:54):
I remember someone gave me that advice early days, that
you can try to protect your brand as much as possible,
but it ultimately comes down to how much you're willing
to reinforce that legally in market and take action, and
for a lot of small businesses, it's something that you
can't do. So I'm definitely aligned on the school of
better to be copied than get caught copying. That is
(20:16):
not a place you want to be, And it's smarter
to go back to square one and start from scratch
and scrap what you've done if you find yourself in
that position.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Really good insight, Kathleen. Thanks. Let's hear how Sloane story ends.
Tennis in particular, offers an interesting analogy for entrepreneurship because
you know, if you play in the NBA, you're a
salaried player. You get paid to show up. Yeah, tennis
and golf and these individual sports aren't like that. You're
essentially a small business yourself. Right. You have a team
and you win, and you pay them whether you win
(20:45):
or not. So tell me about some of the things
you learned about managing a team, leading people, pulling the
right people together that you've been able to port over,
because that is a different experience than many other team sports.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
Yeah, definitely. From fifteen years old, I've had a coach,
a physio, an agent, I've had massage therapists, I've had
all these people on my team, you have to manage
like weekend and week out and pay, yeah, and pay,
and they travel.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
With you all year long.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
Like you see your team members more than you see
your family. It's not really managing them. I just know
like how to handle it. I know my boundaries, I
know what keeps me balanced. I know how much or
how little or whatever it is. And then I also
know how much they all cost. So it's like not
wasting anyone's time and making sure that everyone is here
to do a job. We're here to win, we're here
to work hard, and we're here to go home.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
So is your relationship with your doc and Glo team
different than your relationship with your tennis team.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
There is actually some overlap of team members too, Yes,
but I would feel like, no, it's pretty much the same.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
I'm like so blind.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
I'm just like business is business and we need to
figure it out and we need to move on. And
in tennis, I'm like, Okay, we show up, we're here
to play. Coach, come with a plan, physio, come with whatever,
massage sticks and things and exercise quit Like everyone has
like a plan. And I feel like with a startup
and a small business, you have to be so scrappy
(22:06):
and like everyone kind of has to do a bunch
of different things whether they like it or not.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
You have to right now.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Yeah, Like that's what you have to do as a
small business owner.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
And I feel like my relationship with both sets of
team members are very strong, but very different just in
terms of Dock and Glow is like so much more
fun and we get to do other things and we
don't have to be on a tennis.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Court, and like everyone's like, this is great, and I.
Speaker 3 (22:28):
Feel like my tennis career has been also so fun
because it's like it's Rome, it's Paris, it's New York,
it's all of these places. Right, But it's like physical labor.
That's a very it looks like is physical labor. And
I would say running a business is more emotional labor
(22:48):
for sure.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Interesting. Yeah, Now this wasn't the first enterprise you founded, right,
You found it a foundation. Yeah, tell us about your
foundation and tell us how running a foundation is a
bit different than running a business, right, Oh.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
Man, Yeah, it very much so is.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
So.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
I founded the Sloane Stephens Foundation in twenty thirteen. We do all
of Compton Unified School District. We do recess tennis, after
school tennis, and Saturday tennis. So every school in Compton
has the opportunity to play tennis. The goal of getting
rackets in hands of people who would never even consider
tennis or think about tennis or tennis is too expensive,
(23:23):
it's inaccessible, all of those things, getting access to those
kids to be able to play the sport of tennis,
and then on top of that, also having the educational
component be very important. So during the summer we do
summer reading camps, we do SAT and ACT prep like
we do all of those things. Go mom's a school psychologists,
so she's been in schools for a really long time
(23:43):
and education has been a really big part of our
family in our lives. And then obviously the tennis part
is really important. And my true belief is like one
of the best players in the world probably is just
sitting on their couch and they just haven't picked up
a racket yet. So finding those kids, it's giving them
the access, introducing them to something new, whether it be
(24:04):
you can be a professional player, or just get college scholarship,
or work as a commentator or work as a PA,
whatever it is. There's so many opportunities and I feel
like tennis is so overlooked because it's seen as a
sport that's very rich or inaccessible, and so giving kids
access to that and showing them that there's a little
bit more on the other side is a main coal.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Now, obviously running a nonprofit is different than running a
small business. One of the biggest differences for Sloane has
been the need to fundraise.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Fundraising is difficult, Grant writing is extremely hard, and then
I feel like begging people for money is so weird,
Like it's been very hard.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
No matter how good the cause is.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
No exactly some people are like, I'll give you money
for doc and Glow.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
I'm not going to give you money to your foundation.
Speaker 3 (24:49):
I'm like, this is basically free for you, Like you
could help a thousand kids with your donation or your
whatever it is.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
And I feel like it's difficult. Again.
Speaker 3 (24:59):
Something that was funded for the first seven years was
the foundation. I funded it myself just to keep it going.
And JPMorgan Chase does our financial literacy classes, so that's
been super helpful. Our parents and our kids love that.
So we've had some amazing sponsors come in and really
help us and give us support, and I think that's
kind of what keeps us going.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
The Sloane Stephens Foundation is still going strong, and it's
almost time for Doc and Glo to go out fundraising
if it's going to scale and succeed. Sloan has some
conflicting thoughts about that.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
Figuring that out is quite stressful, but I feel like
in due time. But where do you find the money?
Who do you ask money of? How much percentage of
your company do you give away? Like the company is me,
I'm one hundred percent me and like my mom like
that's it. So it's like where do you go from there?
How much do you give away? What's smart? All of
(25:52):
those questions are now coming into play because I want
the brand to scale. I want the brand to do well,
but it takes a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
It does take a lot of money, and raising money
is difficult and it's a very personal decision. So successful
tennis career, successful foundation, and now an emerging successful business,
what's next for Dock and Glow?
Speaker 3 (26:14):
Next for Doc and Glo, I would say, we're going
to do some really fun collaborations in twenty twenty five,
which is really exciting. And then our retail arm is growing,
which we're very excited about. And yeah, I just want
more people who live active lifestyles on the go to
be able to experience the product and just try it.
(26:34):
And even if that means giving people a product for
free so they can just experience it. I created something
for people for it to be accessible and for it
to be fitting to their lifestyles and whatever that may
be and whatever movement that may be. And that's just
the goal to get as many people product in their
hands to try it and experience it.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
That means the better it goes, the more you have
to invest.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Definitely, but we're on the way. We're on the way.
Speaker 3 (26:58):
I feel like money is definitely an obstacle, but when
you're putting it towards your dreams and something that you
really care about and you're passionate about, it's not an obstacle.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
That's awesome. So I have one last question for you,
which I ask every guest on the show, which is,
if you could give one piece of advice to an
aspiring or current business owner, what would it be.
Speaker 3 (27:18):
Oh right, Well, my favorite quote of all time I
always say this is it's not if, it's when. So
I feel like, if you work hard, and you fight
for your dreams and you again rowing in the same boat.
It's not if it's going to happen, it's when it's
going to happen, because you put all the work in,
you've dedicated yourself to doing whatever it is, and you
will be rewarded.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
In the end. So the end is when, not if.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
That's terrific advice. Sloane Stephens from Doc and Glo, Thank
you for being on the show.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Okay, just thinking about her story, she's really running three businesses.
She's running her tennis career, which is a business. She's
running Doc and Glo, which is absolutely a business. And
she's running her foundation, which you know is not for profit,
but it's certainly a business. I was just in awe
that she can do all three of those things. That
seems like a lot.
Speaker 4 (28:08):
Yeah, I actually loved your point. It was something I
hadn't thought about before that when you are an individual
athlete in certain sports like a tennis you're essentially an
entrepreneur because you're making money if you in and you're
not if you lose, and you still have a team
to play. So I thought that was brilliant I'd never
thought about it that way, the breath of responsibility that
(28:29):
she's taken on. I see a lot of this with entrepreneurs,
and it was certainly my own experience. I had this
very thriving, successful brand consultancy.
Speaker 1 (28:39):
Then my next thought.
Speaker 4 (28:40):
Was how do I pay this forward to other women
entrepreneurs who are starting out who don't necessarily have the
network or the resources or the tools that they need.
And so started channeling and funneling a lot of the
money that we were making in my business into this
passion project that has now certainly taken on a life
(29:00):
of its own. And so I think you can absolutely
do well by doing good.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
And it's something.
Speaker 4 (29:07):
Ideally though, that you can embed in your existing business
as opposed to needing a separate business that does well.
That's something I'm still looking to do, like how do
you reconcile those two worlds? And perhaps there's something she
can do to bring her foundation more front and center
into Doc and Glo. Have a percent of the proceeds
get donated, just make that more obvious for consumers, because
(29:30):
we know that model works. We've seen it work with
Tom's and other brands. Buy one, get one, give one.
It's a formula that consumers really love.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
We see so many entrepreneurs trying really hard to either
pay it back or pay it forward. I mean pay
it back just in terms of how philanthropic they are,
and pay it forward. And I'll give some examples. You know,
we're lucky enough to Chase to run programs for veterans,
for diverse women, all kinds of areas that have been
historically underpenetrated with respect to entrepreneurship. To help coach those
(30:02):
individuals and help them develop the skills they need, we
have something called coaching for Impact. We coach all these
entrepreneurs they graduate from the program. We've graduated thousands, and
so many of them come back to us and say,
how can I help? Who can I mentor who can
I coach? I've gotten so much out of this I
want to give to the small business community around me.
We've had guests on the show who tell us how
(30:23):
they helped the competitor get off the ground because they
just believed in that person and what they were doing,
and they wanted to be constructive, and they figured they
could handle another competitor and they'd rather that than someone
they really believed did not ever get their start.
Speaker 4 (30:36):
Yeah, it's incredible to see how small business owners rally
around each other too.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Kathleen, this has been one of my favorite stories, and
I'm super grateful that you came on the show to
explore it with me. Thanks for being here.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
Same here. I'm so inspired.
Speaker 4 (30:50):
I think I'm going to go pick up a racket
or something this weekend, try my hand at tennis again.
But yeah, super inspiring. Loved her story, and I think
we can all embrace that athlete mindset just a little
bit more.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
All right, watch the Backhand. Thanks so much for listening
to this episode of The Unshakeables. If you liked this episode,
please rate and review it. Our next episode is exciting
because it's right here in my own backyard in New
York City's thriving Chinatown. Five friends who really wanted to
preserve their neighborhood ended up opening one of New York's
(31:25):
coolest restaurants.
Speaker 5 (31:27):
It's a love letter to our community. We are Cantonese
kids born and raised in New York. During the millennium,
you got the Internet, you got trl you got pop culture.
So it's a mix of both worlds and that's what
we want. It to feel like we want to celebrate
our culture, be unapologetic about it, and just show people, Hey,
this is what we're about.
Speaker 2 (31:46):
I'm Ben Walter, and this is the Unshakeables from Chase
for Business and Ruby Studio from iHeartMedia. We'll see you
back here soon.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
Real customer compensated
Hosts And Creators
Ben Walter
Kathleen Griffith
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com