David Alan's Fashion Journey and the Resilience Behind It

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
well, welcome to another edition of hold my
cutter.
As you can see, we're nottonight at burned by rocky patel
.
This episode a special treat.
You know michael mckenry and Ihave always talked about
especially the fort.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
He's mobile still even at this old age he's yeah,
yeah, you get me all the timeright off.
Old, going to start right off.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
Old age.
Yep, I cut you off at the fortWow.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
That's usually my line.

Speaker 1 (00:30):
We're here at I know we're here at David Allen
Clothing Showroom and ourspecial guest is David Allen,
who's been kind enough to let usbarge in on his incredible
showroom, this place isspectacular, his story is
spectacular, and he's uh, andthat jacket is spectacular made

(00:52):
by david.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Oh, this outfit, thank you krista.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
Thank you, david, yeah, I know we're gonna.
We're gonna get you all fixedup.
Yeah, well, but before you andI chat.

Speaker 2 (00:59):
Let's, let's go.
Let's, then we will.
We got a guy here, let's yeahdavid is here.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
David, thank you so much for letting us again barge
in, and your story is absolutelyincredible.
You've become a friend to us,to the Pirates and certainly to
Michael and me.
Start out with growing up inFinleyville and going to high
school and then going toDuquesne and what you thought
you were going to do when yougrew up.

Speaker 3 (01:24):
Yeah Well, first of all, I appreciate you guys
having me and it's been apleasure just becoming
friendlier and friendlier withyou guys and I just genuinely
appreciate that from the bottomof my heart.
That's the most important thingto me.
So, and just having me on here.
You know, I grew up in westernPennsylvania, about 30 minutes
south of here in Finleyville,and you know, growing up it was
kind of a blue collar household.

(01:45):
There was no sleeping in duringthe week, during the weekends.
My dad was a you know 435 amwake up person and what did he
do, David, for a living?
He throughout the 90s.
He actually he had lost his joba handful of times throughout
the 90s and then after that heended up getting in the
construction space and he ranconstruction on nuclear power
plants on the.

Speaker 2 (02:04):
East Coast Nuclear.
Hello yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:07):
So out in the Harrisburg area.
He lived there for about 15years, wow, and he would drive
out there every week and comehome every weekend and
oftentimes one or two, threetimes per week.
He would come back just to seesporting events or to see, you
know, his dad was sick at thetime my grandfather so he

(02:28):
actually took care of him a ton,made sure he was, you know,
going to his doctor'sappointments and all that stuff.
And it's pretty ironic becauseI think out of all the my you
know he had a sister and abrother and my dad was was
treated the most challenging outof the three and my dad was the
one that really took care of mygrandfather on his last couple
of years.
So it was really cool to see mydad and his mindset and his
discipline of just being a greathuman being and just working
his ass off in every aspect oflife.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
You think he was challenged because they saw his
potential.
Is that what it is?
Because, like sometimes youjust see someone and you're like
he's got more.
I can push him a little bitfurther, because I know they
influence you a ton, the hardwork I mean just your story is
amazing.

Speaker 3 (03:07):
I can't wait to get deeper into it.
Yeah, no, I, you know I don'tknow the answer.
I, my dad, ended up going toOklahoma university.
He actually hitchhiked tocollege um, just to get away as
far away as possible from youknow, from the situation he was
in and um worked 60, 70 hoursaway managing a pizza shop while
going to school and paying hisway through school and
everything.
So I have a lot of admirationfor my dad my mom as well, but
my dad especially from abusiness standpoint.

(03:28):
And I think a lot of mydiscipline and reason I've stuck
with a lot of things was theway that my dad kind of raised
me specifically on just gettingthings done and not making
excuses for anything.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
But you've built this incredible business.
It still continues to grow, butwhen you were growing up you
had the work ethic but nodisrespect.
But were you a big fashion guygrowing up in Pittsburgh?

Speaker 3 (03:52):
No, for school we got one pair of shoes a year.
We didn't really have a ton ofmoney.
And then we got our sportscleats or whatever that was, and
that was the extent of it, andwe would shop at Gabriel
Brothers because we didn't havea ton of money.
So we of it, and we would shopat Gabriel brothers cause we
didn't have a ton of money.
So, um, we went to the discountstore whatever we could buy for
the year and that's what we had.

(04:12):
So, um, I always appreciated um, fashion and you know, look
good, feel good in sports waskind of my mom, my mindset.
So I always had the wristbandsand and the cool stuff from a
sporting standpoint.
Yeah, I tried to and it looks sostupid back then now that I
look at it, but to, and it looksso stupid back then now that I
look at it.
But yeah, it was just I didn'thave the means to really to go
above and beyond from a fashionstandpoint.
So I certainly understand that,especially now with our

(04:32):
business, that it's an expensiveproduct and unfortunately not
everybody can indulge in what weoffer.
So when people do support us, Igenuinely it means a lot
because I know there's a lot ofoptions for other people to go
and purchase from.
But yeah, we didn't have a tongrowing up and I felt like we
were very wealthy by the lovethat we had for my family for
sure.

Speaker 1 (04:53):
How you've grown so fast is unbelievable Feels like
forever and the clients you have.
I mean talk about some of theclients you have in the sports
world and outside celebritiesWith you guys.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
you know, paul skeens is one of our bigger pittsburgh
clients and he decked him outat the all-star gala so um you
know, we've done, I was alwayswondering, until I found out
like where do you get that stuff?

Speaker 1 (05:15):
where do you get these California kids?
Right here in pittsburgh, righthe?

Speaker 2 (05:18):
suits up every single start no so he's representing
every single time he starts yeah, and krista, who works with me.

Speaker 3 (05:24):
She's been the one that's been kind of designing
and dressing him since we gotconnected.
Derek Shelton kind ofintroduced us.
I guess he was going to go toMen's Warehouse to buy something
and Shelty just basically said,no, you're going to call Krista
.
And from then he's just beensuch a big proponent of
supporting our business.
That's awesome.
We've done a ton for a lot ofthe Steelers.
More in the previous years forthe Steelers I did Ryan

(05:45):
Shazier's wedding, stefan Tuittwhen he played Roosevelt, nix
Tyler Medekiewicz, terrellEdmonds we had a whole roster.

Speaker 2 (05:52):
Is that him.

Speaker 1 (05:53):
Yeah, right, right Hello.

Speaker 3 (05:57):
We've done stuff for Omar Khan and then Ryan Shaya,
the Penguins, drew O'Connor, andthen through ryan shay of the
penguins, um drew o'connor, andthen, through wrestling
community, we just dressed, uh,the rock for wrestlemania.

Speaker 2 (06:10):
How did that happen?
Because I mean, I'm walking theback, I'm looking at all the
rocks photos yeah, like how didthat happen?
Yeah, john cena too, which youhave a great story I want you to
share yeah so.

Speaker 3 (06:18):
So the rock came up about a month before
wrestlemania this this year andwwe called me and they just said
, hey, it was about 30 days outand they said, david, we have a
client that we want you to workwith for WrestleMania and you
know but why you?

Speaker 1 (06:31):
Yeah why WWE?

Speaker 2 (06:32):
contact you.
That's a billion dollar brand.

Speaker 3 (06:35):
Yes, we that's awesome.
Back in 2015, before I even hada clothing brand officially, I
was kind of that was the 2014,.
2015 is when I started dabblingand trying to figure out can I
make custom suits?
And the purpose in thebeginning was purely if I could
sell a couple of suits a monthto friends of mine, I can make
enough money to buy freeclothing.
And that was all I really wantedto do was get my wardrobe paid

(06:57):
for, and that was really theextent of it.
Through that, I got connectedwith the gentleman in WWE, titus
O'Neil.
I got connected with thegentleman in WWE, titus O'Neil.
Titus was the first WWEwrestler, first athlete or
celebrity in any capacity that Ihad a chance to sit down with
him, and I was actuallyintroduced to him through a
gentleman at Point ParkUniversity, justin Labar.
Justin had a segment everyThursday called Chair Shot

(07:20):
Reality, which was aired atPoint Park University.
I sent Justin a product that Ihad developed, which are
interchangeable necktie knots.
I did that before the suits,sent him those for a year.
He would wear them everythursday on his show.
One day he just said I'm goodfriends with one of the
wrestlers I want to introduceyou, and that was titus.
So, october of 2015, I I mettitus at the marriott next to

(07:40):
the arena and I I show up atlike nine 30 at night waiting
for him to drive down fromBuffalo, and I think he arrived
at 1230, one o'clock in themorning.
And so then walks this guy sixfoot six, six foot seven three,
280 pounds tiny.
And at that time I had no ideahow to do anything, but I had
this, these books of fabric withme and I just played the game
Like I knew what I was doing,and um build a good rapport with

(08:04):
him.
Yeah, it was.
It was interesting.
I my my mindset was this is thefirst celebrity or athlete I
have a chance to work with.
It's obviously the huge networkthrough WWE.
It could lead to a lot ofthings.
I really want to make sure Ibuild rapport and take care of
this gentleman and I would dothat for anybody but especially
with this, it's like my mindstarted churning of the
opportunity that could stem fromthis.
So Titus ended up purchasing 10suits off me the first night

(08:26):
that I met him.
I did all of those for him atcost, because I was just trying
to get in and network with him.
And a month later they come inand none of them fit.
So it was a disastrous start,but it was a really good start
from a relationship Right fromthe get-go.
Just like entrepreneurship ingeneral.
It's super easy and everybodyshould do it.
So that led to.
So that led me to start workingwith WWE.

(08:48):
Wait, how did you get the suitsto fit?
So what happened with that wasI basically had to remake all of
them.

Speaker 2 (08:55):
This is coming from a guy that has ripped a lot of
pants.

Speaker 3 (08:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (08:58):
All right Used to.

Speaker 3 (09:00):
No, still do, Okay, so yeah.
So the ten I had to remakebecause they weren't close
enough to be altered, becausethere wasn't enough seam
allowance inside each seam.
So to open it up, there neededto be more fabric and there just
wasn't.
So I made 10 more suits andsent them to him, and then that
didn't fit.
So I wasted 20 suits right outof the gate, did 10 more suits
that didn't fit and then all ofa sudden I had a genius idea to

(09:22):
make one see if it fits and thenmake the rest after that.
So it was like a lot how welearn right.

Speaker 2 (09:27):
The trial and error is pretty crazy 31.

Speaker 3 (09:32):
You got it Nailed on that 31st.
So I started out in the holepretty, pretty aggressively and
then basically we justthroughout that time I just had
a good rapport with him, spoketo him and was transparent about
everything.
He knew where I was at the timefrom a business standpoint.
I kind of let him under thehood that I was just trying to
build a business and grow, andhe was very generous and
courteous about that.
And January of 16, he justcalled me one day and said David
, I want you to book a flightand travel with WWE and I want

(09:54):
to introduce you to everybody inthe locker room.
And that was kind of the start.
So I always tell this story.
It's hilarious.
Um, so I was getting ready tofly to Orlando for the Royal
Rumble and it was on a Sunday.
Then Monday was in Miami forMonday Night Raw and then
Tuesday was Tampa for Smackdown.
So I booked my flight on Sundayto fly down there and this time

(10:14):
I didn't have much money.
I was blowing through it leftand right.
And so I book a flight and I'mflying out of La Trobe Airport
and I'm like man, I can't waitto get there.
It's going to be awesome, thebest trip ever.
And I get to the gate and I'mlike there's no flight going to
Orlando out of La.
Trobe, I went to the wrongairport.

Speaker 1 (10:28):
No, get out of here.
You're so geeked out, you're soready.
I was so pumped up.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
I actually hired a driver to take me out there
because I'm like I'm on thisbusiness trip.

Speaker 1 (10:46):
then you got to La Trobe and realized yeah, there
was no flight leaving for that,so it was pretty humiliating
internally, but I didn't tellanybody until then, so
fortunately he didn't leave.

Speaker 3 (10:51):
The driver ended up driving me to Pittsburgh.
I booked a flight, so I waslike two hours late for Royal
Rumble and on the flight down Iwas just so embarrassed and I
was like, man, this is like anopportunity of a lifetime.
And here I just messedeverything up, like how crazy is
that?
Uh.
And then it ended up going well.
I sold 52 suits in three days,the nine different wrestlers.

(11:12):
So that was the start of okay,I think I have something here.
And then, um, I just came homeone day and I said it's time to
open up a bank account.
And that was, uh, january 28thof 2016, and that's when david
allen clothing was formed.

Speaker 1 (11:25):
So where were they getting fitted?
Do you any idea?
You?
Know, I just like wonder like,so they weren't real thrilled
with it.
You knew you had to topwhatever.

Speaker 3 (11:34):
Yeah, they were doing so a lot of at the time.
It was actually great becausewwe was trying to go through a
transition where they wereasking or requiring their, their
, uh talent to start dressing alittle bit better for
appearances, and Titus was oneof the best dressed and is one
of the best dressed athletesthere, so they kind of leaned on
him heavily when it came tosuggestions from that.
So what I would do is I wouldjust go set up in the catering

(11:56):
area backstage and I would justset my fabric books up and one
wrestler would walk by hey,what's this here?
And I would explain what I wasdoing and, all right, cool, come
measure me.
And then someone else andsomeone else, and at that time I
was only selling suits for $500or $550.
So sorry about your price thatyou paid on yours.

Speaker 1 (12:14):
Well worth it.

Speaker 3 (12:17):
The beginning was just selling whatever I could
and I didn't have any thresholdto go off of.
So at the time the pricewarranted our product.
Because threshold to go off of?
So at the time the pricewarranted our product, cause I
didn't know anything and theproduct wasn't that great then.
Um, I was very proud of it atthe time but I knew it had to
get a lot better, um, you know.
So that's kind of how thereputation with WWE started,
leading up to them calling meand contacting me for
WrestleMania this year.

(12:37):
I've done business with a lotof the talent for seven years, a
lot of the big projects.
I did a couple Colonel Sanders,kfc projects with Ric Flair and
Shawn Michaels where I had toturn them into Colonel.

Speaker 2 (12:49):
Sanders yeah, sorry, I couldn't help myself.
No, that's all right.

Speaker 3 (12:53):
So there was a lot of experience with my name with
WWE that they were comfortablethat I could pull something off.
And then John Cena is one of mybiggest clients.
He's definitely financiallyspent the most out of any client
and I think he's purchased ithas to be near 600 suits in the
last seven or eight years.
What, yeah, 600?
Yeah, he usually gets 50 to 75a year off of me.

Speaker 1 (13:16):
You've got to be kidding.

Speaker 3 (13:17):
So his name is gold obviously with WWE and you know,
anytime they've suggested it tohim.
He's mentioned my name and he'sgotten me into movies and doing
a lot of big productions forhim.
So the reputation, thankfullywe've we've we've earned the
badge and the stripes ofbuilding a good reputation for
our brand and our name, andthat's why they contacted me for

(13:37):
and after getting those guysfitted.

Speaker 2 (13:39):
Is everything else just so easy?
I mean they're built.
I mean they're just not builtnormal.
Yeah, it's right, john cena.
I mean he's yoked out of hismind, was he?
He's not that tall, is he?

Speaker 3 (13:48):
he's a little bit.
I'm 5, 11.
He's probably two inches tallerthan me, so he's not a mass,
but he's very broad shoulder andhis hands are massive.
So he's just a very, just, a,just a thick human being.
Um, ironically, you know,shaking his hands versus shaking
the rocks hands john's hand canconsume my complete hand which
is kind of crazy, but at the endof the day and I tell my team

(14:10):
this all the time too is, if youtake your time and you measure
properly and you do what we'vetaught you, you can measure
anybody.
It's really not that difficult.
When you break it down, there'sa science to it and you learn
more from postures.
Learn more from posturesVisually, you see certain things
and you can make adjustments toit, but the foundation and the
fundamentals of doing it reallyis not that different from one
person to another.

Speaker 1 (14:30):
But, David, once you got into the ground floor with
WWE and those guys, theneverything took off right from
there, essentially.

Speaker 3 (14:38):
Yeah, I mean it was.
You know the beginning stageswere just very challenging.
My biggest holdup my businesswas always profitable.
The biggest challenge I had inthe beginning was I was in
medical sales before I got intothis was making great money,
spent every dollar that I madeat the time.
So you know, it was kind of oneof those things.
But then when I lost my job, Ipaid off a student loan, I built

(14:58):
a house and I lost my job allwithin probably 16 months or 18
months.
So I had no liquid cash otherthan my 401k.
So whenever I lost my job, mybusiness was bleeding because I
had to fund my lifestyle as Iwas downsizing.
So I would sell rentalproperties, but I probably
almost put my house on themarket 15 times in a handful of

(15:21):
three to four years because Iwas figuring out hey, the last
thing I'm willing to do is getrid of my house, but if I have
to, I'll do that and I'll livewherever I have to.
So you know there was a lot ofthat that took place and when I
had $180,000 saved in my 401k,called my financial advisor and
I was like man, I want to drainthis money.
It's probably going to last mea couple of years and it lasted

(15:42):
probably six months.
So, um, because of all themistakes that I made, not
knowing, you know, rolling thedice on this or that and not
having a mentor at the timereally challenged my growth.
So, you know, a lot of thetimes in the beginning was we
just had to sell more so wecould order clothing.
And you know I had to payemployees and pay vendors.
Never one time did we ever notpay anybody, not never one time

(16:02):
did we not pay an employee.
I suffered through all of that,but I was willing to do that
and that was the way I wanted toconduct and grow the business,
if that was going to be the case.

Speaker 2 (16:10):
Yeah, that oozes off of you.

Speaker 3 (16:13):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (16:13):
Your humility and your want to help people that
you really care about.
You seem just like a loyalhuman being.

Speaker 3 (16:19):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (16:19):
So yeah, that's cool to hear and not a surprise at
all.

Speaker 3 (16:22):
That's important to me and I realize whether you
spend $180 on a dress shirt,whether you spend $10,000 to
$50,000 a year on suits, orwhether you just compliment what
we're doing as a business, itall means equally the same to me
, because there's other optionsand there's a lot of other
options and I don't believe I'mdifferent than any other person

(16:42):
out there.
I just like to treat peoplewell because I just enjoy people
and I'm fascinated withpeople's stories, their
backgrounds, what drives them,how they've gotten places, and
then challenges and obstaclesthat they've overcome, and that
gives me a lot of energy and joyto hear those things.
And if I could talk to somebodyand make somebody happy by
treating them good, it's likewhat's the other option?

Speaker 2 (17:02):
Well, that's what makes you different.
Everything you just said makesyou different.
I appreciate that it's notalways like that.

Speaker 1 (17:06):
David, what about the tattoo?
Well, I'm covered the originalone, I guess it was right the
bank account.

Speaker 3 (17:13):
Yeah, so that one is right here 86-40.

Speaker 1 (17:17):
Negative 86-40.
Minus 86-40.
Overdraw.
What's that mean?

Speaker 3 (17:26):
That was the most challenging part of my life, um,
by far.
Uh, that was back in 2017 and Iwas at giant Eagle getting
groceries and I was going up tothe register to pay my groceries
and I got declined in front ofa handful of people and I had to
pull the whole.
Um, so my, uh, my wallet's inthe car, I'll go out and grab
that.
And and I had no money at thattime.
So we were at a point where wewere growing as a business.

(17:49):
Things were going well, made alot of mistakes, so the cash
flow wasn't there Again.
Going back to paying people andmaking sure I never screwed
anybody over, never hurt anybody.
I was the one that sacrificed alot of that stuff.
So we were just at a crossroadsof I'm not sure how to get
through this stage.
At that time, I had taken loansout from people.
We had a couple hundredthousand dollars worth of debt

(18:09):
on the business.
All my personal credit cardswere maxed out and I had to sign
up with the program throughNational Debt Relief, and I
always tell people I should betheir spokesperson, but I didn't
know who to call.
I didn't know how to getthrough the process, but when I
was building my business, I puteverything on my personal credit
cards and I think one card wasmaxed at $30,000.
One card was maxed at $24,000.
One was at $17,000.

(18:31):
And, paying the minimum, you'renever going to chip away at
that card.
So at that time I made adecision to basically default on
all my credit cards.
I just built a house and boughta car, so I wasn't going to
have to.
You know, those were the thingsthat you can't do if you have
bad credit.
So I was like, okay, I'm safefrom this standpoint, I'll just
deal with whatever happens frommy credit.
And I know, five to seven years, if things go well, I'll be

(18:53):
okay and and I'll be good.
But, um, so I you know, we'recompletely maxed out financially
and we were probably two weeks,three weeks, away from
completely losing everything andme having to really just
liquidate my house.
And, um, it was just a, it wasa dark point for me.
You know, leading up to that,collections agencies are calling
me, harassing me from eighto'clock in the morning until 10

(19:14):
o'clock at night.
Um, you know, internallydealing with stuff, when my
parents were like what are youdoing?
Why are you chasing this dream?
You had this great job, go,stick with it go get your resume
ready.
I was in a very terriblerelationship at that time, so I
had a lot of chaos that I wasdealing with and I just kept it
internal because so many peopledid not believe in me in the

(19:34):
beginning that I didn't want toask for help from certain people
, even though I probably couldhave got it and made my life a
lot easier.
I just wanted to figure out away that I can kind of escape
and get through this.
And, um, you know, I took alife insurance policy out of
myself and my thought was, ifsomething happened to me, I
didn't want to leave debt to myfamily or anybody else.
And, um, I had some depressingthoughts at the time and, um,

(19:57):
you know, am I going to eatpills?
Am I going to shoot myself?
Am I going to drive off a cliff?
Um, you know, and going throughthat stuff alone is very, very
challenging and it, you know,it's tough to talk about.
Um, you know, but so that's whyit's, you know, super
meaningful for me.
Um, but you know, we just keptfighting and fighting and we
were owed a bunch of money byclients and, um, at that time, I
was learning the process ofmake sure you get paid upfront.

(20:20):
Where in that and that's whereI learned now is in the
beginning was oh, I trust thatperson.
They're gonna pay, and then it's.
You have to hound people to getpaid and do all this other
stuff, and at that stage weweren't a credible business.
So what?

Speaker 2 (20:31):
does probably know your personality either.
What?
No at all.

Speaker 3 (20:34):
You don't want to help people no yeah especially
because I'm trying to play thishigh-end game.
I'm trying to.
I don't want people to reallyknow my financial situation
because, I wanted to havecredibility and and I wanted to
be able to get through this messthat I've kind of put myself in
.
So it was kind of a fine line.
Also, hey, this guy's workingwith all these celebrities and
athletes, but why is he broke?
So there was kind of thatthreshold that you re.

(20:54):
And that's why my goal from thebeginning was always be
transparent about the story.
And why I'm so open about thejourney is because it's not easy
and it's very hard.
And you see all this stuff intoday's world on social media,
where all they do is talk abouthow easy it is and how cool it
is and it's like that's thefurthest thing.
It's so hard, like it is sohard.

Speaker 1 (21:12):
David, how many years after you started the business
did you have this, these, thesemoments where it was so bleak?

Speaker 3 (21:20):
I mean, it was pretty much right away it was right
away.
Yeah, I mean it was pretty muchright away.
It was right away, yeah,because again the big thing was
my financial situation is whathurt me the most.

Speaker 2 (21:27):
And it looked different from the outside, for
sure, every bit of it.
And you're battling demonsinside, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 (21:33):
I mean, I was making $250,000 a year selling medical
equipment and I was spending$250,000 a year, being a 24
25-year-old, that got this bigsalary and commission and all
that stuff.
So I didn't know what to dowith the money and my mindset
has always been I can alwaysmake more money and I still live
my life that way, but I'mliving within means and I do

(21:55):
things more responsible.

Speaker 2 (21:56):
You believe in yourself when it comes to work.

Speaker 3 (21:58):
Yeah, I just don't believe I'll ever be outworked
or put myself in a situationwhere I can't be successful.
So, as much as I made, I spenta lot of money and I was
generous with a lot of people.
I helped people out, I loaned alot of money to people that I'd
never got back and a lot oflife lessons along the way, but
my purely my financial situationmade this ride a lot harder
than it should have been.

Speaker 1 (22:17):
But how?
What got you through the reallyreally bleak dark times?
What was it?

Speaker 3 (22:25):
Yeah, that turning point, I think for me.
So from a mentality standpoint,I use this analogy that the
light was always at the end ofthe tunnel when I started the
business.
How long the tunnel was was thechallenge, and I would use
things like hey, I bought a suitoff you, I loved it and that
was fuel for me in the beginning.

Speaker 2 (22:41):
My current was like a flash, yeah.

Speaker 3 (22:43):
My currency was never money in the beginning and
still isn't now.
Currency was always weighed infrom a standpoint of
relationships, friendships, allthose things and, um, you know,
it was one of those situationswhere I just believe that if we
kept going, we would continue tothrive, we would continue to
grow and we would be in a goodspot.
Um so, just knowing that peoplewere buying off of us, knowing

(23:04):
that we were getting new clientson a monthly basis, knowing
that new celebrities andathletes were reaching out to us
, that was all stuff that saidkeep pushing, just keep.
Whatever you got to do to getthrough this, keep pushing and
be fine.
And then to when all this stuffreally took off for us.
You know we got through thatbeginning stages 2017, 2018,
2019, and things startedshifting in 2019 for us.

(23:24):
I was like man, I'm okay, Ithink in 2018, I paid myself
$7,000 or something like that.
In 2019, $7,000.
So then you get through allthis stuff, you're finally okay,
I feel like I'm making somemoney now, I'm able to live my
life a little bit.
And then comes 2020, the end ofthe world for everybody in the
pandemic.
So it's like you went from thisride of like it's going to.

(23:47):
I'm going to lose everything to.
I don't want to live anymore.
To like, okay, we're okay.
To Holy hell, this thing thatcame out of nowhere is going to
wipe us out.
We did, I think, $1,200 insales of March of 2020.
And that was when I was like,oh shit, we're in some trouble.

Speaker 1 (24:02):
But you you guys.

Speaker 2 (24:06):
It got dark and then came to light.
It was not accidental.

Speaker 1 (24:10):
It was all part of the set.

Speaker 3 (24:11):
It is on a timer, but the ironic timing of the
conversation happened.

Speaker 1 (24:16):
It happens intentionally.

Speaker 2 (24:17):
I love the fact that you use what you go through.
Brene Brown talks about all thetime.
If you walk through thedarkness, the light's always
greater.
On the other side, a lot ofpeople aren't willing to walk
far enough to see the light, andyou just painted that perfect
picture.
So for Brene's Brown's book youshould probably be able to, you
know, be a spokesperson as well.

Speaker 1 (24:36):
No, I appreciate that For the tax creditors or
whatever you're talking about.

Speaker 2 (24:39):
You got Brene Brown.

Speaker 3 (24:41):
Yeah, it's where we are now as a business.
It's funny because the goalline always moves, like I feel
like we're so far from where weshould be and there's so much I
want to accomplish and this teamI'm trying to build and the
great people that we have aroundus.
I feel like we're so far still,but I'm so happy and thankful
right now, and the people wemeet along the way are just the

(25:01):
most amazing human beings ever.

Speaker 1 (25:03):
Do you feel like?
You'll always feel far.

Speaker 2 (25:04):
Yeah, yeah, you know what I mean.
He's the epitome of it.
Like I don't think you'll everbe satisfied and I'm the same
way.
Do you feel like that goalpostwill always be moving?

Speaker 3 (25:12):
For sure, do you feel like?

Speaker 2 (25:13):
it's kind of your purpose right.

Speaker 3 (25:15):
Yeah, I mean, we've had people express interest in
buying a piece of our businessand figuring out the future of
what we're going to do, and forme it's like there's nothing I
would do.
I'm doing what I'm doing, loveit, nothing, I wouldn't change
it, you couldn't pay me any.
There's not a dollar in theworld where I would stop doing
this right now.
But I'm trying to build thisand do some stuff with our team

(25:37):
make sure everybody's taken careof, and then family down the
road and who knows what happenswith it.
But I now know like right, wehad goals in, you know, 2016
that are different than 17 and18 and 19 and so on.
You know 2016 that aredifferent than 17, then 18 and
19 and so on.
And our goals in going into2025 are just different than
they were last year and we'regetting ready to open up other
locations and expand.
So, as these ideas come tofruition, the goal line has to

(25:59):
move in order to keep growing.

Speaker 1 (26:01):
Well, what'd you do, though, with COVID?
You spun it into a positive.

Speaker 3 (26:04):
Yes, we ended up.
You know, I think we hadpurchased bolts and bolts of
fabric for dress shirts at thetime.
And I remember calling Derekand Chris, who are my marketing
business partners.
You met them and at that time,you know, our marketing agency
was so young and so new.
I was always the crazy weirdotrying to throw ideas at them.

(26:25):
Hey guys, I think we should dothis, hey guys, I think we
should do this.
And I called them and you know,derek is on the other end of
the equation, where I'm.
I'm very much, we could figureit out, I know that.
And um, derek's, on the otherhand, is like no, you need to
show me by numbers.
You needed to prove this isgoing to work.
And then Chris is the hybridbetween both of us because he's
a creative.
And, um, I remember Chris hadtold me the one time when I

(26:47):
reached out to him he wasdriving on 79.
And I was like, hey, we need tohave a call.
And he actually pulled off thehighway and typically, you know,
chris and Derek are like I'malways throwing a curveball at
them back in that time frame andbasically, I just called him.
I said, guys, I think thepandemic is going to be around
for a lot longer than we think.
We need to start making masks.
And you know, I think theconversation was all right,

(27:08):
maybe next week we'll get itgoing or whatever.
It's like no, no, we need to dothis now.
And those guys pulled anall-nighter.
We built a mask company in lessthan 24 hours and we launched
one Facebook post at 12 noon ona Saturday and within 24 hours
we sold $54,000, $55,000 worthof face masks.
And then Sunday, in a 24-hourcycle, we sold about $110,000

(27:34):
worth of face masks.

Speaker 2 (27:34):
And then Sunday, uh, in a 24 hour cycle, we sold
about $110,000 worth of facemasks.
Come on and at that point, likeit was, it was pretty crazy.
Like, what type of face mask?
Um, did they shimmer in gold?

Speaker 3 (27:40):
The goal was like at that time, messaging was super
important because nobody knewwhat the hell was going on, and
it just it said on the sidewe're in this together, and it
had David Allen underneath of it.

Speaker 2 (27:50):
Oh, that's amazing.

Speaker 3 (27:51):
It was a triple, it was a community thing For sure,
and that was the big purpose ofthat was hey, like, let's at
least get some exposure to thebrand, but also the mentality of
, like, we are in this together,like, truly, let's figure this
out and try to have a solutionto it.
So you know, it got to a pointwhere we were spending $10,000 a
day on marketing andadvertising and getting a 10
times return on our money, whichwas pretty crazy.

(28:13):
And then I started looking backat things and, as business was
unfolding, facebook would shutus down, google would shut us
down, paypal would hold ourmoney and at one point, paypal
held about $90,000 of ours andwouldn't give it back to us.
So I went on LinkedIn and wasfiring off every message to
every executive I could find Ifyou don't give me my money,
we're going to sue you.
And what happened was theyflagged us because we were

(28:36):
making money during a pandemic,so then we just had to submit
our business information, tax ID, all that stuff, but it would
take three or four days to get anew Facebook account up and
running, so it just starteddriving me.
That's unreal.
It was crazy.
And the biggest frustrationabout it is, every time we got
back into business, our ROI wentfrom 10X to 8X to 7X to 5X and

(28:56):
so on and by that time you couldget them at Giant Eagle, gecko,
all those other places.
So we just exited the businessat that time.
But it was really cool.
I was able to pay off all mydebt.
So that was my saving grace.
From being able to be debt-free, chris and Derek were both able
to quit their jobs and diveinto the marketing full-time and

(29:17):
we donated a bunch of money andwe donated thousands of masks
to different hospital systems atthe time across the country.
They couldn't get anyprotection or anything
throughout the government.
So I mean, there was a handfulof hospitals which I forgot
about till now.
They'd send us pictures withall the staff wearing our masks
and whatnot.
And then we donated $25,000 toAllegheny Health Network for

(29:39):
women's behavioral studies andthe goal was to be able to, in
this transitional phase, buy abunch of iPads and add
technology to single mothersthat were trying to take care of
their kids and do some stuffwith the hospital systems and
whatnot.
So it was pretty surreal to be-.

Speaker 2 (29:53):
Totally rewarding time.
Once again dark time.
You brought some light, that'sincredible.

Speaker 3 (29:57):
Yeah, it was kind of crazy At that time.
I wish COVID wasn't going tolast forever because we were
making a lot of money.
But then I'd wake up at two orthree in the morning and Chris
and I joke about this all thetime.
But in the morning and Chrisand I joke about this all the
time, but on we would look atour app of Shopify, which is
what we do our payment systemsand uh, the cool thing is
there's a map of the world onthere and if somebody's on your
website, it has a little flashlike a little star on the map

(30:19):
and it's just your phone's ding,ding, ding, ding, ding.
And it was just transactionafter transaction, three in the
morning or three in theafternoon, it didn't matter.
People were buying from us andit was a very eye-opening
experience for us.

Speaker 2 (30:30):
We really heard cha-ching cha-ching Every time.
Yeah, that was crazy Wow.

Speaker 1 (30:36):
I still can't understand.
You've got to explain this tome.
You're growing up inFinleyville.
Did you ever think that youwould end up?

Speaker 2 (30:42):
doing something like this.
Yeah, what did you want to do?

Speaker 3 (30:54):
Growing up as a kid you thought, thought, yeah, I
kind of like what they'rewearing In the back of your mind
, did you kind of like clothing?
I've always liked it but, likeI said, I just never had the
means for it.
I always wanted to be like NewYork's Wall Street stockbroker
or investment guy.
You did, yeah, it was kind ofmy fascination.
My cousin left Pittsburgh yearsago, went to Manhattan and was
on Wall Street.
He's 15 years older than I am,or so 10 years older than I am.
So I got to watch his journeykind of unfold.
So you know, I didn't reallyknow anything at that timeframe,

(31:17):
didn't know what I wanted to do.
But I like business, I like thesexiness of business and the
uniqueness of it.
So I thought I'd sell, you know, stocks, bonds, mutual funds,
and tried taking the test andfailed two times.
So I knew that wasn't going tobe my path.
So I never.
Fashion was never a thing Iwanted to make a career out of.

(31:37):
It was never even in the radar,never in my sights down in the
past.
It just made sense as businesskind of progressed.

Speaker 1 (31:42):
But don't you have to know I've talked to Krista
about this and the folks thatyou have to have something
inside you, that, that, thatknowledge about what works right
, or you don't learn that andalmost you don't learn fashion.
It's something, it's, it'sgiven, it's for sure I.

Speaker 3 (31:59):
So I think I think I have a skill set of being able
to see things from a combinationcolors, how it based off who
they are, what their personalityis.
Um, like, I'm doing a um, agarment for next saturday for
pat mcafee actually, and he justtexted me and said, hey, I need
a tuxedo and I need a touch ofpink in it, and he doesn't like

(32:19):
to decide anything and pat has avery strong personality.
So, like I'm, I'm like man.
I hope I really hit a home runand I've done something really
crazy and unique for this thatI've never done before.
No, no idea what it's going tolook like, but I believe it's
going to look really, reallygood, is he?
going to have the belt buckle ontoo.

Speaker 2 (32:33):
No, he may wear his own.
Yeah, yeah, I like the beltbuckle.
It's cool to see.
Yeah, those are sick For sure.
I can't wait to see it.

Speaker 1 (32:41):
So anyway, that's an opportunity to help somebody who
it's not really necessarilyinto clothing.
I guess it just.
Hey, you do it for me.

Speaker 3 (32:49):
You know my personality, I think I've just
been able to put things togetherfor people that don't have that
skill set.

Speaker 1 (32:55):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (32:56):
And I do think it is unique, especially men.
Some guys don't even want todeal with clothing or or go into
a shop or do anything which Iget that Hate it.
And that's the fun part for usis like we.
That's why we like buildingsuch good relationships with our
clients, because A they becomefriends of ours, they're
choosing to support us.
And when I started the businesswas we need to be good enough
to not advertise to besuccessful.

(33:16):
And we didn't advertise for thefirst year or first five years.
It was word of mouth.
I wanted to be good enough thatpeople.

Speaker 2 (33:22):
That's how you keep people right, for sure, yeah.

Speaker 3 (33:33):
The goal was just be good enough that people wanted
to call us, to buy off of us andsupport us.
And if we had to pay foradvertising or marketing back
then also, I didn't have thebudget to do it too.
But the goal was to truly justbe good enough where we were
first of thought when it came toclothing.

Speaker 2 (33:40):
And when you think about someone's personality,
like, how do you piece thattogether?
What's that process look like?
Like I think about calling agame for a guy.
You know leagues.

Speaker 1 (33:48):
I'm thinking about his personality what makes him
tick and everything else.
He's a catcher, as you know,former catcher, and he's trying
to get into the pitcher'smindset, right?
Yeah, yeah, the pitcher'spersonality is different.

Speaker 2 (33:59):
Yeah, trying to figure out how to flow a game
and win no matter what, becausethey don't always have their
good stuff.
Those scouting reports are offto the side and I feel like you
kind of have that ability.
When it comes to people walkingin, you kind of identify okay,
talk about their posture, right.
Same way, like I think, aboutthe way they move, like how do
you do that?
You know, and you do itrelatively quick For sure.

Speaker 3 (34:20):
Yeah, a lot of it is.
That's why I tell our team it'slike the importance of you got
to ask questions and you got toget to know somebody, and if you
don't ask questions and don'tget to know them, you're never
going to be able to service themthe proper way that you need to
.
So for me, a lot of it comesBecause we don't know what we're
asking for right, correct, yeah.
So a lot of it comes down to whois the person.
What type of communicationstyle do they have?
Are they reserved?
Are they easy to talk to?
Are they shy?

(34:40):
All that stuff plays into it.
What do they do for a career?
Are they just more of a?
Hey, I want the traditionalstuff and it's for, you know, an
accounting meeting or a legalmeeting or whatever it is where
I'm going to an event and I wantto stand out, regardless of

(35:00):
what you're doing or what eventor what the purpose is.
We can.
We can make something that's sotasteful and so powerful that
could build somebody'sconfidence and make them feel
like a different person, man andwoman.
And that's the fun part aboutit is the amount of people that
you know, and I use Krista as anexample.
She had a couple that the onegal her whole life didn't know

(35:21):
what she was going to wear toher wedding.
And you know she sent Kristathis amazing message saying
you've made me feel comfortablein my own wedding because I was
fearful of getting marriedbecause I didn't know what I was
going to wear.
And you hear stuff like thatall the time and you realize
we're not just selling clothingwe're changing people's lives.
One suit at a time or onegarment at a time, because if

(35:42):
you have something on that'sfitted right, looks good, feels
good, you really become adifferent person and it can
bring out some positivity andmake you feel like a different
person throughout.

Speaker 1 (35:53):
Paul Skeens.
So what was it like fittingthis pirate great a rookie of
the year in 2024?

Speaker 3 (36:00):
So I did not do any of the fitting, so I can't take
that credit.
Krista did all that stuff.

Speaker 2 (36:04):
I feel like girls' mustaches would maybe collide a
little.
Well, this is a baby mustacheright now, yeah, but I mean I
I'm just saying he's young, yeah, maybe a little jealous, I'm
not gonna lie, I trimmed minedown a little bit, so upper lip
magic going on right there, justsaying yeah, just saying yeah
well, it's only it's gonna behere for another week or maybe,
maybe tonight I'll it'll be gonebecause of this conversation.
But no, I have a chance, Ithink I met him two or three

(36:29):
times.

Speaker 3 (36:29):
um chris, that does all the business with him and
he's been so supportive.
And you know he said if, evenif he does leave the Pirates,
he's going to still stick withus.
That's awesome and you knowhe's just leave, I know Right,
but chatting with him wasawesome because he's such a
humble human being.
He truly is appreciative of theopportunities and experiences

(36:50):
that he has, and we love workingwith him and having him
represent our brand because ofwho he is as a person Wow.

Speaker 1 (36:56):
When it comes to fitting guys like this, is the
sports world different?
Just because the athletes aredifferent, right, Fitting them
is.
It's a different entity.

Speaker 3 (37:07):
Yeah, it's for sure.
And also, though, just likesports, just the same thing in
accounting, legal, anything elsethere's different personalities
in every field yeah so, as muchas you think sports are so
different, there's a ton ofattorneys or a ton of doctors or
a ton of business people thatlike to dress different and be
loud.
From a fit standpoint, we mayhave a, you know, a client

(37:28):
that's just a bodybuilder thathas equally a most challenging
body, just like a professionalathlete.

Speaker 2 (37:33):
Oh man, that got to be tough because they go through
waves yeah.

Speaker 3 (37:36):
So for us it's people are people, regardless of what
industry they're in or whatprofession they have.
It's our job to adapt to thatand be able to make sure we can
kind of complete and make thingshappen that they want.

Speaker 1 (37:50):
How about your sports heroes growing up?
Yes, All three sports.
Big fan of the Penguins,Pirates and Steelers, I was yeah
, I mean Pirates, you know.

Speaker 3 (37:58):
Unfortunately, it was one of those things like I
remember J-Bell back in the dayand the 90s guys and loved
baseball, then Fell off a littlebit when we had a big dip until
he came on board and I became ahuge fanatic.

Speaker 1 (38:10):
How fell off a little bit when we had a big dip until
he came on board and I became ahuge fanatic.
How about that?
And I was a catcher that washumbling.
If you're not watching onYouTube, if you've got just the
audio version.
David Allen just pointed toMichael McHenry.

Speaker 2 (38:20):
Wow, that was humbling.

Speaker 1 (38:22):
I was a catcher too, and an all-star, by the way.

Speaker 2 (38:25):
Oh, I love it.
Big fan of baseball.

Speaker 3 (38:27):
I could have guessed that Football was my sport
growing up.
I played, you know, 14 years.
I played two years of collegefootball at Duquesne University.
So football was just always mypassion.
I was convinced I was going toplay in the NFL when I was
younger.
And then when I got to collegeI really, you know, partied and
drank and didn't do any of thefootball side of it and realized
I wasn't going to ever make theNFL.

(38:48):
So it was kind of a pipe dream.
So I wanted to leave there andjust be a college student and
enjoy life and make the mistakesthat a lot of college students
do.
But I was always a sports fan.
Deion Sanders was one of myfavorite athletes.

Speaker 2 (39:03):
What he's doing right now is incredible.

Speaker 3 (39:05):
It's incredible.
Yeah, but from a fashionstandpoint, he was always the
flash guy.
He was always the loud guy andI think I've gravitated towards
him because that and he backedit up by playing on the field,
which was important.

Speaker 1 (39:17):
Any favorite moments that you were either witness to
in the arena, the ballpark.

Speaker 3 (39:25):
I'll be honest, I've been so fortunate to attend a
lot of games, both locally,outside of Pittsburgh, so I just
the experience of people that Igo with, you know, as a kid,
going with my dad and making thetrek down to the Three Rivers
Stadium at the time.
And you know, when I got alittle bit older he just really
lost the appetite for going togames.
So we didn't really do that atan older age.
For me it wasn't really sportsmoments that did you know

(39:47):
anytime've won, you know thesuper bowl or any big events
obviously I was very thrilled,yeah um, but I just think it's
the moments that I shared withthe people for those events that
were more important to me, umthan the event itself.
and then, as I got into business, I really lost interest in
sports a lot because for thefirst five years I didn't have
the time, I couldn't take theeye off the the of what I was

(40:09):
doing, and I stopped watchingsports for a couple of years
because I couldn't spend anentire Sunday watching football
or watching a Penguins orPirates game.
And then, not until about threeyears ago is when I started
watching sports again.

Speaker 2 (40:20):
It feels good, doesn't it?
It's awesome.
Yeah, it feels good to be backand able to enjoy it.
You need something to kind ofget away from it all, absolutely
.
Yeah, that's really good tohear.

Speaker 3 (40:27):
And I like the business side of sports too, so
I'm so fascinated with that sideof things too, why teams or
organizations make decisions andwhy they change things or hire
people, fire people, and theneven the economics of athletes
and athletes being treated aspawns and stuff in the business

(40:47):
game.
And at the end of the day, theyknow.
They know that signing up forit as well, and that's why you
want to maximize the time youcan play.

Speaker 2 (40:54):
And then business.
Let's stay in that Like, do youstudy a lot of other industries
?
I think that's brilliant to doif you're in the clothing
industry and that's all you'relooking at, right.
That's, that's your competitorslooking outside.
So what drew you to sports?
And start looking at that?
Because I mean, that's adifferent way to go.
Right, you've got clothes,you've got sports.
Right, they obviously combine,but the business side is
completely different.

Speaker 3 (41:18):
Yeah, I've always looked at other.
I don't look at a ton ofactually don't look at anybody
in the clothing space.

Speaker 2 (41:21):
I think that's brilliant.

Speaker 3 (41:21):
I don't care about anything in the clothing space.
I just genuinely I'm focused onwhat we're doing.
I love staying in our lanebecause what other people are
doing doesn't matter to meyou're nailing the people.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
That makes any business successful to that
point.

Speaker 3 (41:36):
Whether it's a professional sports organization
or a small business inPittsburgh, everything's the
same.
It's people, it's the product,it's the process, it's how you
treat people, it's how youexecute.
So the most successfulfranchises I talk to a lot of
people specifically for theSteelers and a lot of those
gentlemen when they go to otherorganizations and play for other
teams.
They really speak so highly ofPittsburgh and and what their

(41:59):
experience is here.
It's really cool to see that.
And one one good friend of minewent to another team I think he
went to the Colts for for abrief time and he was just he
was just like it's sodisappointed by the experience
and how they treated theirathletes the experience from a
training standpoint,expectations from leadership
there.
So, hearing those things, younow see why there's the Walmarts

(42:19):
of the world, the Amazons ofthe world, the Steelers of the
world and so on, and it allcomes down to the culture of the
organization.

Speaker 2 (42:25):
You think it's the standard that's set by the
leadership.

Speaker 3 (42:29):
It has to be.
Yeah, even with our smallorganization, and that's why I'm
so.
To me, the people make thissuccessful.
It's not me.
There's so many people aroundthis business and this brand
specifically that make ussuccessful, and out of all the
people here, I'm probably theleast important.
In reality, there's so manyother people doing things Krista
, dana, jesse, derek, matt,chris I mean, I could go on

(42:54):
Rocco Stan, my accountant, like.
There's so many people that aredoing things.
I get a lot of the credit,unfortunately, for that, but
this doesn't happen withouteverybody else that's involved,
and even the people that havenot worked or that no longer
work with us, that have come andgone.
They've given me an opportunityto try to be here and try to
build this.

Speaker 2 (43:10):
Great leaders always take the blame and never want
the credit, but it's true though.
I know, I'm just saying Right.

Speaker 1 (43:16):
I appreciate that.
That defines you right there myfriend.

Speaker 3 (43:18):
Yeah, I just it's enjoyable to.
I've realized that doing what Ido now I wake up every day
doing what I love, I come and goas I please.
I work very, very hard at whatwe do, but being able to control
my life and be able to controlthe decisions of my time is the
most rewarding thing.
All I want is other people tobe able to experience that and

(43:39):
hopefully money comes along theway so they can, you know, go on
vacations with their familiesor treat people with the
holidays, or help people who areless fortunate, and I hope
that's the case, and, and our Iknow, with our team that's the
case, but for me that's thereward for this is I.

Speaker 2 (43:54):
I how's that?

Speaker 3 (43:55):
feel.

Speaker 2 (43:56):
Right, Like when that .
When that happens, one of youremployees get to do something
they've never done and you getto be just that little piece of
it, Does that make you justbounce off the walls a little?

Speaker 3 (44:08):
Yeah, it makes me want to do more, it makes me
want to help more, and my lifehas completely changed.
I live a dream.
I truly mean that.
I'm very thankful foreverything that everybody's done
, but seeing other people beable to experience this is the
coolest thing in the world,especially from.
This just started from an idea,and I go back to being a child.

(44:30):
In first grade I got in troublefor selling candy at school.

Speaker 2 (44:34):
It started early, huh , slanging the candy yeah.

Speaker 3 (44:37):
I went to Gabriel Brothers when we would buy our
clothes and every time we wouldcheck out they'd have all the
candy stacked there and you'dget a box of Skittles for $1, $2
, and I would go and sell thispack for 50 cents in school.

Speaker 2 (44:49):
Oh, you'd just turn it around, yeah, so I just
always had a knack for kind ofunderstanding that.

Speaker 3 (44:52):
And then you grow up to an adult and it's like— you,
yeah, big time, I just I don'tknow.
I just enjoy hustling, I enjoypeople, I enjoy earning things.

Speaker 2 (45:01):
And I think Sounds like you love the grind.

Speaker 3 (45:03):
More than anything.

Speaker 2 (45:03):
Yeah that's my favorite part.
Yeah, that's what I miss themost about playing.
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (45:06):
Yeah, because it's when you get somewhere you're
chasing this thing.
And then you get there and thenit moves.
So you realize the goal lines,like from the time I'm born to
the time I die, and what type ofreputation can I leave behind,
how many people can I help alongthe way, how many people can I
impact?
And you know, especially thistight-knit family that we have

(45:28):
here is just it's awesome.
It's just it's really, reallyrewarding.

Speaker 1 (45:32):
Are you looking to change Pittsburgh in terms of?
I mean, I know your goal is toexpand this business, but when
it comes to Pittsburgh fashion,again, we don't want to
disrespect Pittsburgh, but it'strue, it's fact.
It's not known as the hub offashion, right?
So do you think you could kindof help change that?

Speaker 3 (45:51):
Yeah, I think we slowly are changing that Really,
and I mean that from astandpoint.
I see the clients that walkthrough our door and have
conversations with them and justas my team does, and, um, there
a lot of our clients, obviouslyother people that wear suiting
on a regular basis, professionalwear on a regular basis but we
have a substantial amount ofclients who are like I just want

(46:12):
to wear something one time or Ihave this unique event coming
out.
So it's people that typicallywouldn't dress up or committing
to dressing up and changingtheir attire.
You know, Pittsburgh is also avery blue collar town, so to be
able to spend a significantamount of money on a wardrobe is
not an easy task when you haveinflation, all this other stuff
happening in the world, familiesthat take care of schools, and

(46:34):
there's a lot of variables tochoose where you spend your
money.
So I realize we're not anattainable product for a lot of
people and that's why we'retrying to come out with other
solutions to be able to includeother people into our product.
But we also have a very highexperience that I demand and
require our team to have tovalidate and warrant the prices

(46:57):
that we charge for things,because experience is everything
to us.

Speaker 1 (47:07):
Wow, what about the work that you've done?
The fashion?

Speaker 3 (47:08):
shows and charity work.
You also think that's important, don't you?
Yeah, we've done seven fashionshows.
Two we did not do due to COVID.
I think we're about $550,000raised to charities throughout
the seven that we've done.
Yeah, it's pretty awesome.
It's something that we did.
The first one we did was 2016,and we did it in the Strip
District and I was doingsomething for the American

(47:31):
Cancer Society called Real MenWear Pink, and we were raising
money for breast cancerawareness.
And that was my first thing oflike, hey, I got to raise money
and I don't know how to raisemoney, so maybe we should have a
fashion show.

Speaker 2 (47:43):
It's a common theme, right?
Yeah, I don't know how to dothis, but I'm going to do it.
I'm just going to do it.

Speaker 3 (47:48):
And I remember my parents whenever they were
driving down for our first event.
I had no idea who was going toshow up.
I had no idea we were going tothat time.
I invited them to come in.
So were these people that aresuper busy going to even make
their flights, or they can allstand me up and you know my I

(48:09):
remember my mom always tells memy dad was like I like nervous,
Cause he's like I hope peopleshow up so he's not embarrassed.
And when he pulled up, pulledup to the fat first event I mean
there was a line out the door,we had 300, some people show up
and I think the first event weraised, I would guess, 16,000.
So it wasn't anything crazy14,000, something like that,
cause we didn't know how toraise money either at the event.

(48:30):
We had auction items and thingsof that nature, but we're so
green 14,000 is a long way fromzero.

Speaker 2 (48:35):
For sure, yeah, for sure.

Speaker 3 (48:36):
It's pretty good.
Feet, no, I appreciate that,yeah.
So every year we pick adifferent charity.
We fly in 40 to 50 celebritiesfrom across the country, we
dress six, seven, ten kids fromChildren's Hospital, we let them
walk in the show and we letthem kind of be the stars of the
show.
And we just pick differentcharities.
And next year we're doing itfor Sean Casey.
His charity Casey's ClubhouseToo cool, yeah.

(48:59):
So we're excited to bring himin and he's been a great
supporter of our business andour brand for years and this is
kind of our way to pay back forall the support is try to raise
a boatload of money for hischarity, david you said earlier
that when you were going throughthe tough times it was really
doubly difficult because youdidn't have really a mentor.

Speaker 1 (49:18):
Did you ever really have one?

Speaker 3 (49:27):
You've kind of done this on your own, haven't you my
?

Speaker 1 (49:28):
mentors were podcasts .
That was back in 2000.
Preach, yeah, yeah, it'shonestly this before Hold my
Cutter.
Too bad, because it could havereally helped you.
This would have changed my lifeif this was a little sooner.

Speaker 3 (49:34):
So whenever I was in medical sales, I covered Western
New York, harrisburg, all ofWest Virginia.
So I had a ton of windshieldtime and I just got tired of
listening to music and I justwanted to be more productive.
And there was a podcast calledthe Founder Podcast, f-o-u-n-d-r
, and a gentleman named NathanChan and that's about when
podcasts really started catchinga little bit of wind and he

(49:56):
just interviewed he was anAsian-Australian gentleman,
would interview people from allover the world and it was just
all business stuff.
And the one thing that justresonated to me from every
person that he brought on therewas there's nothing different
from anybody of these people.
They all just work their assesoff to be successful.
And then, as I started, you knowgetting the knack, so it made

(50:16):
you not feel alone, right Forsure.
So it made me realize, like,this person went through
something and they were able toget it.
Okay, cool.
So what?
I'm struggling right nowfinancier, this is happening, or
you know, I'm having an issuewith my family over this or that
.
Like cool, other people gothrough it.
And somebody told me a long timeago if everybody put all their
problems together in a hat, youwould reach in and take your own
problems out, and that kind ofstuck with me and I was like,

(50:39):
okay, cool, we're onto something, because life to me is about
perspective, and perspectivechanged my life and perspective
is the key to being successfuland happy.
Um, there's a million reasonswe can complain about a lot of
things, um, but also, when youlook around the world and, um,
people in general, there's a lotof people going through a lot
worse things than we are, andyou're always going to be able
to say that, just like you'realways going to be able to say

(51:01):
there are people doing a lotbetter than I am.
So, for me, perspective is whatkeeps me grounded and keeps me
staying focused and stayingstrong as we continue to pursue.

Speaker 2 (51:10):
Did you feel like, when you were looking for that
podcast, the right one wouldshow up at the right time?
Yeah, isn't that crazy?

Speaker 3 (51:15):
Yeah, I was, and at that time I mean they weren't
everywhere, so there was a lotof.
You know, his was the main onethat I would listen to.
And then you try to find acouple others, but Flo, the host
, how they kind of run the showis all very important.
So the experience that you haveas a listener is top notch.
So it was tough to find ones atthat time frame because I was

(51:37):
looking for specific onesbusiness people, people who have
done stuff directly from thevoice of the person.
In my position At that stage Ididn't care about a CEO of a
company, I cared about thefounder of a company and who was
building the business.

Speaker 2 (51:50):
You're looking for a mentor, correct Right.
Yeah, and you got that, that'sso cool.
You just pieced it together asyou went along.

Speaker 3 (51:55):
For sure, yeah, I didn't have a friend or a
business person.
I wasn't connected like that.
Back then, A lot of it waspeople that I met that did sales
or did things that, so it wasvice presidents of companies,
presidents of companies, but itwasn't anybody who was a true
entrepreneur.
So for me, the advice that theywere going to give me wasn't
going to be the advice that theyunderstood that I needed.

Speaker 2 (52:15):
Well, I have the same story when it comes to business
.
I dove directly into podcastsand it changed everything yeah
it can get really weird and darkand everything else.
And I was just getting doneplaying and I was I was
searching yeah, and it was tough.
What's really cool to hear?

Speaker 3 (52:29):
it's hard, man, and especially when you go from one
thing and you're used to it andyou're you're comfortable with
it to to the unknown, is isdevastating and um, it's not for
everybody, cause it is hard,but um, I think there's the one
thing I really get frustratedwith people is is hearing I
don't know, or I'm not sure, orI can't do this cause it's just

(52:50):
a matter of like, the resourcesfor everybody are out there and
I truly don't care where youstart.
Everybody starts at a differentspot.
Fully understand that.
But move forward, just justmove forward.

Speaker 2 (53:00):
I always say fail forward.
You have to, that's so good.

Speaker 1 (53:03):
But because of what you've been through.
Whenever you have an issue.
Is it okay to talk about theThailand story?
Yeah, for sure Okay, take usthrough that yeah so we did a
movie.

Speaker 3 (53:17):
This was pretty brutal.
This was spring of 2023.
It was the last year A moviewas pretty brutal.
this was, uh, spring of 2023 thelast year and, um, it was a
fitting, fitting actors.
Yeah, so it was for john cena.
Um, a movie called I think itwas called jackpot or lotto, or
it just came out this year inaugust.
And um, what happened was thethe costume department came to
me and they said hey, we have ahundred meters of fabric left.

(53:38):
There's no other fabric in theworld like this.
It was a Brown Tweed ish fabricwith a like a cream pinstripe
in it.
So he needed a handful of suitsfor John.
They needed a handful of suitsfor a stunt double a and then a
handful for stunt double B, alldifferent sizes and everything.
And this was a prettysubstantial transaction for me,
the biggest one to date.
So it was a pretty big deal andI transaction, for me the

(54:02):
biggest one to date.
So it was a pretty big deal and, um, and you had how many?

Speaker 2 (54:05):
meters A hundred, so um, you know, and it takes.
I don't know what that means.

Speaker 3 (54:12):
It takes like four to five for a garment.
Um and I we needed, you know,50 some or 40 some garments.
So pants are a little bit less,1.5 or so.
So the mathematics worked outto they gobbled up 100.
And everything we were puttingtogether was maxed out at 100.
So we needed every bit ofyardage or meters yardage that
we got.

Speaker 2 (54:31):
This makes this even more intense.

Speaker 3 (54:33):
Yeah, it was pretty crazy.
So do the deal.
And then all of a sudden, atthat time I had probably made
250 suits for John.
So I knew we were dialed in.
We never had a problem, neverhad a hiccup.
So I'm cool, I feel prettyconfident in it.
And then, um so, uh, they weresupposed to start shooting on a
monday.
The monday before was supposedto be his try on for those suits

(54:54):
, to make sure it was good.
And um, I, he couldn't makemonday, couldn't make tuesday,
schedule was crazy.
So Schedule was crazy.
So Wednesday morning he waslike hey, this is the only time
I could try it on.
So I'm anxiously just sittingthere having my coffee and I get
a text from John expecting hey,thanks so much, suits are
perfect.
Well, so the text comes in andessentially it's John trying on

(55:17):
the suit and he tells me he'slike you can see that the suit's
a little short.

Speaker 1 (55:21):
It's like a video.
Yeah, he sent me a video.
Yeah, a minute 30 video,because we got a chance to see
it and, honest to God, until youtold the story, I thought it
was like a joke.

Speaker 2 (55:34):
I thought he was kidding with you.

Speaker 3 (55:35):
Yeah, but he really wasn't.
He was not kidding, and that'sthe one thing he appreciates
working with me is.
He made me feel like the jokingmanner, but I also knew how
serious it was for him.
My reputation was completely onthe line for a lot of reasons
moving forward, but I did notwant to let him down after all
the business he had given me andall the support that he had

(55:55):
given me.
So it was a very ultra powerfulexperience and feeling to go
through.
So as he sends me this videoand I'm watching it, he starts
lifting his arms up and he'slike already you could tell the
jacket's too short, the sleevesare super tight, you could pull
this, the left sleeve in.
And then he just crunches hisarms forward and turns to the
side and the jacket just bustsopen.
Oh, it's like a Pringles can.

Speaker 2 (56:16):
Yeah, and just completely splits open, just
pops it, yeah, and justcompletely splits open, just
pops.
It was my heart sank.
Yeah, what did you think when?

Speaker 3 (56:25):
you're watching this.
I'm sure I bet you turned whiteas well.
I cried oh my gosh.
I cried For 10 minutes.
I was just like holy hell, I'min some serious trouble, because
the big issue we run into nowis there's no time.

Speaker 1 (56:35):
So literally how much time now when you get this text
and this video time now, whenyou get this text and this video
by the time I got it andeverything was about 10 30 on a
wednesday morning, okay, theythey needed to wear it on for on
monday.

Speaker 3 (56:46):
So five, six days, right.
The problem was we the.
The good thing was we still hadsome garments that were
supposed to ship that night.
So basically I put a kibosh onthat, stopped that right out of
the gate and just said whateverwe do, just stop making these
suits, uh, pants, v vests,whatever, so just hold off
production.
Then at this point, um, to getthe garments from our facility

(57:07):
in Thailand to the States takesabout five days.
So there was no remakes.
Making it and then getting on aplane and shipping it through
DHL to land on the doorstep byMonday, that was out of the
question.
So at that point I didn't havea solution.
I just had a first priority isfigure this out, figure out how
we can rectify this and make itwork.
So we basically had our teamdeconstruct everything that was

(57:31):
made and reconstruct it.
What happened was, for thefirst time ever, we had a
software glitch where they madehis suit jackets out of my size.
I was the sales rep quote thatdesigned the order so that for
some reason, when I put it in,it transferred it over to my
profile, sized my garments andmade it for him and obviously I

(57:52):
don't have the body of John Cena, so it made it very, very
challenging.
Um, so you know, I talked to ourmanufacturing partner about
everything and we jumped on anhour call and then we had to get
on the phone with the costumedepartment, which was very
intimidating.
Um, you have the head of thesemovie studios and the costume
department head, that's uh, andall the seamstress and tailors
all in one room on a videoconference and I have to be

(58:15):
composed and, um, you know, thereputation was on the line again
and, um, so we kind of came upwith a plan and then at that
point the only way to get ithere was jump on a plane.
So my two options were optionone which I was going to do was
I buy a flight to Thailand, Ifly there, pick up the package
and get on a plane and fly rightback, which all in all is 30

(58:37):
some hours to get there.
And so then the coordination ofcan that even happen?

Speaker 2 (58:41):
It's like the movie Transporter.
Yeah right, it's crazy.

Speaker 3 (58:44):
Yeah and then?
So what we kind of?
The conclusion we ended upcoming to was we hired a
gentleman from Thailand to jumpon an airplane and smuggle
30-some suits in the suitcase,hoping that customs would not
stop him and say what are these?

Speaker 2 (58:56):
for and ask him to try it on.
Yeah, yeah, that's a problem.

Speaker 3 (58:58):
Yeah, he was not going to fit those ones either.

Speaker 2 (59:00):
He looked like a little boy yeah.

Speaker 3 (59:02):
So I remember me and I can't remember if it was
Krista, chris, derek or whoeverwere watching the flight
trackers, the gentlemen leavingThailand and delays and a
million other things that couldpotentially happen that could
throw a wrench in it.
And so when he landed stateside, I could breathe a little bit.
But then that whole having toget through customs costume uh,

(59:23):
the lead costume department ladywas at the atlanta airport,
which is where he had to fly toto drop everything off.
Um, that's where they shot themovie.
And um, he it was just he'stexting as he's getting through
the airport, made it throughcustoms, made it through this,
made it through that.
And then, once he said he madeit through costumes, I was like
holy crap, we pulled this offand it was the most surreal,

(59:44):
incredible, um, but still I feltlike my reputation was was
damaged a little bit, but itwent really well and it ended up
being a home run and couldn'tbe more happy with the uh
execution of everything how muchsleep did you get from
wednesday to monday?

Speaker 2 (59:58):
I was terrible.
It was so, so bad, did you?

Speaker 3 (01:00:00):
get any, very little, because at that time there's
other stuff we're doingbusiness-wise.

Speaker 2 (01:00:04):
Yeah, everything else doesn't stop.
A lot of times we think about astory and we just think we're
in golf, like a movie, but it'snot.

Speaker 3 (01:00:09):
Everything else in life is still going For sure,
and we were growing so muchstill at that time, and so it's
and trying to figure out andmake happen.
So for us it was a millionthings.
And then I have to with my team.
I have to keep my positivityand stay focused and be there
and help them and all ourclients that we're dealing with

(01:00:30):
at the same time being able toservice them properly.
Where in the back of my mind,I'm like man, what is going on?
This is awful.

Speaker 1 (01:00:38):
What a great story, though.
Again, just add it to the listof stories.

Speaker 3 (01:00:42):
Yeah, it's been.
I mean I had an issue with wedid the Colonel Sanders project
I talked to you about withturning Ric Flair into Colonel
Sanders and Woo.

Speaker 1 (01:00:53):
There you go, waiting for it.

Speaker 3 (01:00:56):
That was a nightmare.
I'll give you the brief storyon that.
That was 2017.
And broke throw broke into themix too, so that didn't help at
all.
Well, wrestlemania it was oneof the WWE events for KFC, for
WWE Can't remember what it was.
It was in Brooklyn, new York,and I had to deliver the suit on

(01:01:20):
a Friday, so suit arrivesThursday.
I fly to deliver the suit on aFriday, so suit arrives.

Speaker 2 (01:01:25):
Thursday I fly to.

Speaker 3 (01:01:25):
Brooklyn Friday Pristine white.
It was a white vest.
Well, in my mind it wassupposed to be pristine white.

Speaker 2 (01:01:30):
Okay, so I thought it was.
So I get the garment I grew upin the.

Speaker 3 (01:01:36):
South.
So I know Colonel Sanders, so Iget everything.
Get to Brooklyn, talk to thewardrobe department and I go to
the arena the Barclays Center inBrooklyn, and it was for the
try on and they're like thisisn't the right color.
We can't use you, and I waslike it's white-ish, because I
didn't know, what they wantedand it was like an eggshell

(01:01:57):
off-white a little bit.

Speaker 2 (01:02:00):
And they wanted true colonel sanders chicken grease.

Speaker 3 (01:02:02):
Yeah, right, right yeah, so um, yeah, this was,
this was a nightmare.
So no, this is friday night atsix o'clock.
By the time I got back to myhotel, they're like, hey, we're
just gonna go somewhere else.
I was like, no, I was likeyou're not I was like I promise
you I can make this work.

Speaker 2 (01:02:17):
It's all always gonna be good, so and you really had
no idea what I was going to do?

Speaker 3 (01:02:21):
we'll figure it out I start the uh journey and I go
to target right across from thebarclay center and I buy a
bucket, rubber gloves and bleachand I'm like I feel like if I
bleach the suit it's going towork perfectly, because that
makes sense.
And so I basically went to myhotel room.
For some reason I said just trya small piece of the suit
before you do anything.
So I dipped about four inchesof the, the the left leg, into

(01:02:43):
the bucket and let it sit there,went downstairs, came back and
I was like well, this started todeteriorate and and nothing
changed with the color.
So I'm like, okay, this reallysucks.
So now you're pushing six, 37o'clock in Manhattan on a Friday
and a lot of stores closeearlier on Friday.
So, um, I called a craft store,michael's, or one of those

(01:03:04):
craft stores in Manhattan, andum, I was like, hey guys, like
here's my story, here's mysituation, I'm not sure if you
could help.
And somebody suggested to methere's a fabric dye called RIT
fabric dye.
Um, so I was like, all right,cool, you guys have any of this?
Like no, so call anotherMichaels.

Speaker 2 (01:03:19):
No, call another Michaels.

Speaker 3 (01:03:26):
None of them had the fabric dye so, okay, my other
option was completely gone.
Um, so then I was just like,let me at least go to a craft
store and be there and bepresent, versus trying to talk
again.
Financially, an Uber tripthere's 70 to $80 running around
having to buy all this money.
I didn't have any of that atthat time.
So I get to this, uh, to oneMichaels in Manhattan and, uh,
the one lady that was therethere was a spray can of like a
shimmery, shine white, and she'slike she was an eight, 17, 16

(01:03:49):
year old high school studentjust working there and I was
just talking.
She was such a sweetheart,helped me and she's like this is
probably what I recommend.
It's probably the only thingthat's going to work.
Well, they only had one can, soI needed probably 12 or 15 cans
of that.
So she went back, looked at thecomputer.
There's three cans here, atthis Michael's.
There's two cans at thisMichael's.

Speaker 2 (01:04:07):
Oh, so here you are just Ubering everywhere.
Yes, no way.
So now?

Speaker 3 (01:04:10):
I had to go on this hunt of trying to find this.

Speaker 1 (01:04:20):
Well now it's'd called no Right, it was a
completely different.
This is a true paint,unbelievable.
This is paint.

Speaker 3 (01:04:25):
Yeah, wow.
So then it's now approaching7.30, 8 o'clock, 8.30, and I
think a lot of the stores closeat 9, 9.30 on a Friday.
So now my back's up against thewall, timing-wise.
So I think I ended up gettingabout eight cans or so.
So, all right, cool, let's goback to the hotel room.
So I go back to the hotel roomand now I have rubber gloves in
there, I have bleach, I have ared bucket there for the bleach

(01:04:48):
that I was using, and now I havea bunch of spray cans.
So I go in the bathroom and I'mjust spray painting.

Speaker 2 (01:04:53):
Then the FBI shows up .
Yeah, right, right, is that the?

Speaker 3 (01:04:55):
truth.
So I'm just in the hotel roomspraying this.
Meanwhile on social media I'mposting that I'm in Brooklyn WWE
event.
So people think I'm just goingpartying hanging out drinking
and I don't drink or anything.
So it was like I'm there workingevery time I go and so I'm
spray painting this.
I'm like, oh man, there's somesparkles on this, there's some
shine, and then it starts to drya little bit, so it gets super

(01:05:17):
thick.
I eye a little bit, so it getssuper thick.
I'm like, oh, this is bad.
So I just paint the rest of itand I go to sleep in the hotel
room, wake up and as high as akite from glue and Clorox.

Speaker 1 (01:05:28):
Yeah really.

Speaker 2 (01:05:28):
Did you float while you're sleeping?
That was awful.

Speaker 3 (01:05:31):
And then I got super sick that morning and so I
grabbed, I hung the garment inthe bathroom over the in the
shower area, just so it was kindof private, took it out and
then there was a ray of suncoming in from the window and I
held it up against this, againstit.
I'm like I think this is good,I think we're going to be able
to pull this off, and I, Ibasically would take the garment
.
I would just like kind of likea pillow, I'd smash it off the

(01:05:53):
bed to try to soften it as muchas I could from the spray paint
that kind of molded on there andgot a little bit too firm, so
that broke it up enough where itwas a little bit nimble.
But then I was kind of like.
It kind of looked good becauseit had more of a thicker look to
it, so it had more of a qualitystructure.
So it actually made it enhanceit a little bit as well.
So now it's like okay, calltime's at 1 o'clock, so I go

(01:06:14):
there and I'm supposed to meethim at this time frame.
And I was supposed to meet himat this time frame and then this
was actually excuse me, thiswas supposed to be for Ric Flair
for the first one.
That was when he got really illand almost passed away.
So we had to make it for ShawnMichaels on the first one,
that's who this was for.
So I go and I'm texting withthem like, hey, shawn will be at
the arena at 1 o'clock, 2o'clock, they needed to start

(01:06:35):
filming at 6.
For the event.
Well, for the event.
Well, I go there to show up.
He was a little bit late, triesit on.
And then it was too big.
So not only did we not try iton the night before, it's now
too big.
So the lady's like you know,hey, did you bring your sewing
machine out there?
And I'm like, yeah, I broughtit out.
Just telling them that Ibrought it out.

Speaker 1 (01:06:52):
Sure.

Speaker 3 (01:06:53):
So I'm like, don't worry, I'll figure this out, let
me go back to my hotel room andwe'll be good.
So I go back to my hotel room,which was like two, three blocks
away, and I'm Googling everytailor I possibly can find in
Brooklyn.
Nobody wanted to work on itbecause it wasn't their product
and everybody was closed.
And a lot of people were closedin Brooklyn Sunday, you know
one, two o'clock of just theculture of Brooklyn, and so I

(01:07:15):
was just like I just have to goto Manhattan and try to figure
this out.
So there's another hundred $150Uber ride.
So I go to Manhattan and rightacross the bridge there's one
gentleman open and I just said,hey, I have this project, I need
this done as fast as you can.
He's like no problem, I'll helpyou out.
I'm like great, he goes, how'sTuesday?
And I said you don't understandand he was foreign hell now oh

(01:07:40):
my gosh.
He didn't understand thesignificance of wwe or what he
was doing.
So I was just like, look, Ireally, really need this as soon
as I possibly can.
Is there any way you could dothis within the next hour?
And um, I, I, he said, justhang out outside for a little
bit.
And I went and got food nextdoor and I came back and garment
was done.
Take it to the event and a homerun.

Speaker 1 (01:08:02):
A home run.

Speaker 3 (01:08:03):
It looked great, looked great, fit perfectly.

Speaker 2 (01:08:04):
How'd you get the smell to go?

Speaker 3 (01:08:06):
away.
It had a little bit of an odorbut it wasn't terrible, you
could tell that there was somepaint or something on it.

Speaker 2 (01:08:11):
They probably just thought, man, what a creative
way to go.

Speaker 3 (01:08:14):
For sure, and I used the whole pizzazz of the lights,
the cameras, the lights, thecameras, the little bit of
sparkle to it that I knew thecameras would pick up on.

Speaker 2 (01:08:23):
And it really changed the integrity of it.
So the sales background reallyplayed out big time right there
For sure.

Speaker 1 (01:08:27):
You told them hey look, how nice that is, the
sparkle and stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:08:30):
It's kind of like the chicken and the material.

Speaker 1 (01:08:32):
The light hits that chicken, it sparkles.

Speaker 3 (01:08:34):
That's right, Unbelievable.
That was super challengingbecause at that time I had
nothing, was broke, didn't haveresources, didn't have any
knowledge to do anything.

Speaker 2 (01:08:42):
You probably spent $1,000 plus on Ubers.
For sure, probably an Uber onenow.
Yeah, it just killed you rightaway.

Speaker 1 (01:08:49):
David Alan, thank you so much for joining us on Hold
my Cut, actually letting us joinyou here.

Speaker 2 (01:08:55):
We didn't even get into his marketing.
Yeah, it blew your mind, it didblow my.
Yeah, it blew your mind, it didit absolutely blew my mind.

Speaker 1 (01:09:03):
I told you, brownie, it is deep and thanks, by the
way, thanks for letting us smokehere we didn't do that, but we
will.
This summer, though, we'll beback.

Speaker 3 (01:09:12):
Thanks a million.
Thank you, guys, for everythingI appreciate what you do.

Speaker 2 (01:09:14):
Yeah, I look up to you a lot so keep it up.

Speaker 1 (01:09:16):
Awesome stuff.
I'm going to have to get one ofthose jackets.
All right, that's fine, we'llbe doing that.

Speaker 2 (01:09:20):
Chris, he's ready now .
Oh, john's seen it, yeah,that's right.

Speaker 1 (01:09:23):
He will Home by Cutter.

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David Alan's Fashion Journey and the Resilience Behind It

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