February 3, 2024 • 23 mins
Runway international Founded byJunda Morris over 16 years ago, the events were toopen the doors for fashion designers, models and artists while giving back to local & international charities. The events are held in various states around the U.S and countries. The creates an opportunity for models, designers and artists to expand their talents internationally.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:01):
Hello everyone, and welcome to Ladythe El Podcast. Yes, this is
Jade, by the way, Ijust have to say it because obviously I
haven't been here for a while.Oh wow, so we're not doing live
today that stuff I know we'll do. We'll figure out how heard out later
anyway. Oh yeah, whoa ja, I forgot you were here. Hello.
Hi, Hello, yeah, HiHi. Okay, and you can
(00:25):
introduce yourself. Yes, five guys, I'm Anona. Well that's that felt
really weird because I am the narcissist. I should have went first, should
she? I should have? Butthat's okay. I'll let you have it
today. You'll let me have it. I'll be humble for a moment.
You'll be humble. It hurts onthe inside, it's gonna hurt on the
(00:46):
outside in a minute too. You'reridiculous, all right. So we wrote
bok y'all, which is amazing andweird, literaly life guys with pop poetry.
And I thought the wood was badwith other life lessons, and I
thought being going up was easy.Only I with me a meanoir first Widdles
web and that and coffee for andcoffee, all of those where you get
(01:06):
your audio books. You can findout the rest of our eighteen books.
And because you recognized that that waslike six books that are audiobooks the other
twelve if you want to like actuallydo readings at www dot n I thought
ladies dot com. But y'all wantto hear to hear about us, go
on and on about how I'm hearingfabulous you hit it with my wonderful books,
wonderful guys. Would you like tointroduce yourself? Yes, yes,
(01:26):
yes, hey ladies, I'm excitedto be here. I'm John de Morris,
Simple, John de Morrish, retiremilitary spouse US Air Force. Hey,
hey, hey air Force to amazingboys. And I am a traveler
and a businesswoman. Okay. Myfirst question is how do you get everything
(01:47):
done? Yes? How do youschedule all of that? In? Hey,
I'll leave it up to that manupstairs. He helps me get it
together. Oh okay, because thatseems like a lot. I'm just like
you were saying that, and Iwas like, I need a cup of
coffee and I don't even drink cofee. I helped. I'm like, I
don't drink coffee and I need acup of coffee. Oh my goodness.
(02:12):
Yeah, go ahead, go ahead. So I mean, so now you're
starting a new venture. Tell usa little bit about your new venture that
you're starting. Well, I mean, let me just kind of prelude to
the new venture right on the show, y'all. We just you know,
we just jump in. We've beenlike, let's do it, you know,
(02:34):
prior to doing this new venture,I've been in the fashion industry for
oh my god, let me notage myself, twenty something years. I
produce Runway International shows and under thatwe have shows Runway Ghana, Runway Nigeria,
we do Runway Liberia. We doRunway Runway shows in the Baltimore Ere
We've been doing for the last fiveyears. And the goal of the event
is usually to bring international designers localdesigners under one roof to help to promote
(03:00):
fashion. So we've been doing thatfor a while. We've scouted quite a
few models in the DMV area thathave walked for us, and you know,
our goal is to still expand.I don't know how I do all
of this stuff, but I do, you know. And you know,
besides that, my where we're segueinginto is I I work with the strong
(03:22):
Man Corporation and I produce Liberia's StrongmanCompetition, which is a bodybuilding like Arnest
was an agger. We do strongman events and the goal is to be
able to push strong Man events acrossAfrica. So we have been working on
that event, working along with GhanaMuscle Show, which I just got back
(03:43):
from from Ghana for that. Andthere's a lot on my plate, but
I try to juggle it a littleby little. I don't even know how
I do it, but I dowell. I have to ask what goes
into producing a show? Right,because we all like producing movies and producing
this that sounds the wonderful, butlike, how do you produce like a
show? Like what goes into producinga fashion show? I'm in the stages
(04:08):
right now because I'm doing a showin Tampa. As a matter fac I'm
gonna be in Tampa in a coupleof weeks. So we're doing Runaway International
Tampa. The goal we're taking thetour the show all across and we're kind
of doing like a business in abox model. So for instance, like
you say, how do you producea show? If somebody is in maybe
Louisiana and they said, you knowwhat, I've always wanted to produce a
show. How do I do it? We're kind of doing this to be
(04:28):
able to say, hey, listenthis step A to step B bus business
in a box. You can dothis show, run it under our brand,
and be able to host a showevery year. But to answer your
question, you know, the firstthing you start, you know, I
tell about the venue is important.You you get your venue and work your
way back, and then you know, from there you go on and you
you know, you get your flyers. You start scouting off for your models.
(04:51):
You start scotting not for your helpthat you need for the show.
If you're gonna have vendors, youput your things out for vendors. You
know, you start scotting off foryour d designers. Who's going to be
your show? Because the designers makethe show. So who's going to be
a part of your show? Whatincentives are you giving them? Why they're
coming in? Are they going tobe paying? Are they just going to
be selling tickets? Then you goahead and host your casting call. You
(05:13):
know, from there is all ofour promotions. You start promoting the show.
Have the models, get the modelsand stuff involved. The designers you
know needs to be involved. Andwhat I realized with a lot of the
people in this area, because youknow, I've worked Couture Fashion Week in
New York and some other big fashionweeks around the world, but people in
(05:35):
smallest cities don't really understand how theindustry works. So everybody has the perception
of what they think is supposed tobe. I said, but the reason
why you have the big shows inNew York, those designers are paying ten
thousand dollars just for their own show, so the production can give them everything
that they need for their show.They can hire, you know, your
(05:56):
front office, you know, yourfront staff, your backstaff, your life,
all your vendors that you need foryour show. You're just coming in
and bringing it and they're taking careof the entire production for you. But
when you do a show like whatI do, which it's a running show,
the designers have to pay because you'renow giving them publicity. You know.
Sometimes they're like, well, wellI'm not. You're you're promoting your
(06:16):
business. So this person is comingin, They're bringing in all of this
stuff for you. All you're doingis showing up with your garment, so
yes, you do have to pay. Some of the models are like,
well you know in New York,those models pay. They pay those models.
That's because the designers pay ten thousand, fifteen thousand for the production and
out of that production money, theyknow they're only going to have ten models,
and we're paying these models one thousanddollars for the show per model.
(06:40):
That's where it comes from because theyknow that when they do the show,
they're gonna have buyers in the audience. They're gonna because they're inviting all the
big buyers coming in. So let'ssay Macy's come in and say, hey,
I see this garment that you have, and I want twenty thousand pieces.
You know, macy has stores allover the country, so that's a
big order that they have coming.So they take the risk so spending that
(07:00):
money. That's marketing and branding themselvesto be able to get into the big
stores. You know. So whatwe do is on a you know,
we're helping you to market it,but basically we're coming in as some marketing
and promotions company to promote your show. So it's starting to let people understand
how it works. And I'm tellingthe models, if you don't promote the
(07:21):
show, how do you expect peopleto be here? You know. So
I'm one of the things that I'myou know, looking at that we're looking
at. Do what the models isthat I'm saying, Hey, we want
you to sell if you decide.And I hate to ask models to do
this, but I said, that'sthe way that we can get you to
make sure that you bring people tothe show if you sell this amount of
ticket. If we're selling ticket fortwenty five dollars, I don't mind giving
(07:42):
you ten dollars on the ticket,but sell twenty tickets that way, you
know, that's money that you're makingthat's coming out of the show. Then
we're sharing profit. Then you're vestedin the event. You're going to make
sure that you have other people comingto the event. Then we have a
good show. But you can't justcome. I give you all the publicity,
it's free for blesity. You're thenyou want me to pay. I'm
not in business to not make money. So that's a very interesting concept that
(08:07):
you had. And in the profitsharing that you're offering, which a lot
of people, I guess they don'tsee it like that. But if you're
you're saying, sell these tickets andI will shave a profit sharing, which
is a good thing that person intodoing a great job for the show,
because I mean, not only didthey like are they just walking, they're
also like part of the reason theshow is working. Absolutely, once you
(08:30):
become part of the reason it's goingto work, and you're like, yes,
I need to do as they say, you have some skin in the
game. Yeah, you're like,so you're you're all asking people to put
a little bit of skin in thegame so we can all have agreed showing,
which is very amazing. And Wow, I'm just gonna say I'm thrilled
to have you here today. Ido have another question. I had to
(08:54):
stop and say thrilled to have you. Oh, now that I stopped and
now it felt right out got ahead. I'm gonna go with my third
question down because I still remember thatone. Okay, So you were saying,
it's kind of like a fashion showin a box. So where what
city do you think you're gonna likehead to next? Like, well,
we're in Tampa. We're in Tampa. In Tampa. After Tampa, I'm
(09:16):
obviously we're going to do a showbecause we're doing a tour to Ghana.
I'm in October. So we're lookingat the show, another show in Ghana.
There's still other cities that I'm lookingat, and if people are interested,
then you know, well, becauseI have to make because if I'm
not in the city, I can'tnecessarily go in a city and do a
show. So I have to havesomebody who's from the city that can partner
(09:37):
and say, hey, you know, listen, I want to do this.
We'll put a contract together and thenI'm there kind of walking them throughout
the process to you know, getthem to build their business and do their
events. So how do you selectdesigners? And of course all the models
out they are going to know howyou select models, But let's go with
the designers. How do you likethis? Now I'm one of the pickiest
show producer and working in this area. Some of the people they consider me.
(10:03):
You know, when you don't getalong with people, then they say
you're mean. But I'm not meanbecause for me, I don't like the
stereotype of because you're black, justbecause you're black, that means it needs
to be ghetto. I am allabout we have quality designers out here.
I don't want a hoodie. Anybodycan get a hoodie and put a logo
on it. No, that's notwhat I want. But if you give
me a hoodie, then do atwist to it that makes it look nice
(10:26):
on the runway. Yeah. Sofor me, I look for designers that
are high fashion couture, that havesomething that when it comes to the show,
it it wows the audience is different. You know, it's something that
you know because me being a buyerand working in a fashion industry for a
while. As a buyer, whenyou go in to look at it,
you want to see what's the newtrends, what's out there, what's different?
(10:48):
Okay, this is man. Wow, this designer has something like I
have a designer that usually come fromBolcino fossil and he mixed stuff. What
he's saying, he picks stuff fromthe trash and he transforms them into using
and making different materials. So forhim, I love his collection. Every
time he comes up with something issomething that is just remarkable. So that's
(11:09):
the stubbing. I'm not looking forjust the every day I mean, yes,
I might get those every day nowand then I might put one of
the Onesie and Tuesdays in the show. But I want people that really can
show their creativity. And what theycan do that that that those are the
designers that that I'm drown to andit doesn't matter. And it's not only
black designers. I'm I'm I'm acrossthe board because I'm about diversity in fashion.
So I have designers that come fromVietnam. I have designers that come
(11:31):
from all over in the Vietnamese communityon my community. So I have people
coming from all over. Okay,first of all, you just said the
Vietnamese community is my community. Howgood is that food? I love you,
I love I loved Okay, overday outside, I wanted to play
some order for some fold right now. Okay, yes, I'm thinking about
it right now. You said thebroken rise. Oh god, I was
(11:54):
about to be on it, likeokay, but anyway, yeah, I
have a Philly question. Oh Idon't know. I'm sorry, I'm the
Narsers. Okay, never mind.How in the world it's early, y'all
and she looks so fat? Howdo you do this with two boys and
running the whole business? Oh well, obviously this was planned, right,
So I did this in like twentyminutes. I'm like, this is no
(12:18):
way, y'all. So I mean, I'm just saying my other question was
was a narcissist question, and Iapologize, but I am the narsis.
Oh my goodness, here we go. So you know, you say you
have those every regular, everyday kindof designs. I'm just wondering, did
you have spot for two adorable AfricanAmerican writers that had their own big I
had their own clothing line, theri poetrid Let Let's do it absolutely,
(12:48):
absolutely absolutely, And you know she'sa stylis, so sometimes it doesn't have
to Like I said, you canhave a hoodie, but you can style
it in a way that it comesdown the one way and it looks like
like for instance, I give anZeppa. I was there's an African store
in Buuie and they were one ofthe people that were in my show the
other day and they had these bellbottom pants and the thing, and then
(13:11):
they had a cult that didn't gowith it at all. But I saw
they had this hat that's usually wornby men and I was like, okay,
that hat, it goes on.And then the jacket. I was
like, no, don't wear itbecause I want to get Paris. Just
put it, you know, putit in and in it. I need
you to hold it under you asyou come, and it looks so chic
and Paris couture. I can seeit like I saw it in my mind
(13:33):
when she said, you know thishat that yes, yes, that's a
yes and looks chic and Paris.So it's all about putting things together.
It doesn't have to but have acreative you know, because you might be
a designers. I have this,but then hire a stylist that can maybe
put that together for your show andmake it look like it's a million bucks
coming out of somewhere, and thensomebody somewhere can be like, hey,
(13:56):
you know what, I like whatthey had. Because what people don't understand
what FA shows, it's not justfashion show. As a designer, you're
selling yourself. That's a way tomarket yourself. So you never know who's
going to be in the audience thatsay, you know what, I have
a boutique and I want to orderthat from you. You know. So
designers now have to think that way. Hey, I'm building, I'm promoting
my business, so I need toput my best foot forward when I do
(14:18):
a show. I had one Ione design that came and she was pinning
everything and I told her said,I'm sorry, you can't be a part
of the show. I said,because you told me you had a full
collection. I kept asking you,I need to see yourself before the show,
and you're coming here and you're pinningI'm sorry, you can't be on
my show. Okay, so youare. You're living up to what you
said. I love it. Ilove it doing right now. So my
(14:45):
other question was like, because yousaid you have been part of New York
shows and international shows, I'm assumingParis at some point or Italy. Yes,
what is it like going from Whatis it like behind the scenes of
those shows? Crazy? Yep.All you see in the front is the
perfection in the front. You don'thear the screaming. You don't hear the
(15:05):
cursing, you don't hear your youdon't hear all of those things. But
at the end of the day,as a show producer, when it goes
out on the runway and it hitsthat run where issue look fabulous, forget
about what happened in the back.And that's why I tell people, I
say, when I'm doing the show, I'm like, yell, I might
do this, that's nothing personal.We just want to make sure that the
show goes right. You know,after the show, I'll come and hug
you. I love you. Oh, but when that is going on,
(15:26):
you're inner heated things. Yes,you're gonna be yelling, you're gonna be
doing this. And I try notto be as rude sometimes as they are
in New York because they don't care, you know, now, don't be
any kind of way. But forme, I still like to treat people
like I want to be treated,you know, But you know, sometimes
it gets a little heated. Butthe show must go on. Absolutely,
and I absolutely thank you for explaininghow it's not perfection behind the scenes,
(15:50):
because a lot of times we justsee the perfection and we don't understand the
mess, and then you get stressedout as a person trying to live up
to this perfection. But you didn'tsee the mess behind it. And most
people don't know. Most people don'tknow. They see somebody doing a show
and they see the front end.I can do it, and they go
to do it. And then thensometimes they don't realize that you do these
(16:12):
shows and you don't make money.They see the front end and they just
be like, oh, if theycan do it, I can do it.
Too, I'm about to do myown show and blah blah blah,
and then you sit back and thenwhen they lose money after a couple of
years, they're not doing it anymorebecause they don't have a passion. I
believe all. I mean, allright, written film, just painted,
(16:34):
life, designing, just I thinkit's actually an art to be able to
put together an event in any way, shape or For me, the reason
I think it's an art is becauseso how much goes wrong and the way
that you can hobble together everything tomake it go right and you can see
that perfection. That is a freakingart and art I like to play it
(16:56):
this way. You see how ifyou've ever been in a wedding party,
you see the craziness that go Butwhen people walk down there out looks fabulous.
Just times that by like one hundredpeople. That's it and that's right,
that's it right there. And yougot some models that are talking,
I'm never gonna do it. Showwe gain and you hear them talking.
At the end of the day,pictures come out, they look beautiful.
(17:18):
Oh my god, when it's yournext show, So where can people buy
out? Before we got the onequestion that we need for our vice sction
because we do. We do havea lot of people who write that listen
to this. So how important isit to have a fashion or style to
your brand? So like when yougo out into the public, how important
is it to be like, no, this is my brand, this is
how I want to present myself.What I was a first first impression is
(17:45):
a lasting impression. Yes, soyou always have to like, I'm coming
on here this morning. I hadyou go, but I knew that coming
on here my presentation meant, Imean, it's fine. But for me,
how I look, how I presentmyself speaks volume because I don't know
who's gonna watch this video. SoI tell everybody when you come out and
growing up, that's what my momwas like. The things that you needed
(18:08):
to do. Make sure you haveno holes in your underwears when you're going
out of your house. At alltimes, you have clean up, make
sure you're presentable because you never knowwhere you are at what time, who
you're gonna meet, you know,and just how you carry yourself when you
go out there, because it speaksvolume for you because people can be watching
(18:29):
and at all times. I gottacall when I was in Gane and somebody
said, he said, in ourWhatspop group, somebody took your video and
they saw you walking and exulted onyou. But you were on your best
behavior, you know. So soyou just and especially with the age of
cell phones and things like that,now you never know who's where at what
(18:52):
time and what they're doing. Soit's always important to present yourself in a
way that your mama would be.I like it. I like that is
That is some of the best advicethat I have heard in a lot in
a long time. Thank you.So where can people find out more about
you? Support your shows, tryto try out y'all designers out there,
(19:15):
you know. And I really wantedto. I really didn't touch on it,
but I really really wanted to talkabout bodies a little bit. Pa.
Okay, so back to the firstquestion. Yeah, new new venture
that you're doing now, because Iwork with you know, and and I've
been from from from age I don'tknow how old. I battle with weight.
(19:37):
That's always been an issue, butI don't let that be a stepping
stone in my way and in mylife. I have kids that are athletes,
you know, so I had anathletic family, and I have to
be in the gym. But youknow, you still struggle with that.
But just because you do that doesn'tmean that you live that lifestyle. You
still have to continue to in meetI'm forty eight. What nobody believe that.
(20:00):
No one believes that, No onelike I used to learn from y'all
because I know they say black don'tcrack, but black don't crack a different
way for people who are well fabulous, who or who were in their forties.
I'm like, I've got to learnthat, because you know mine is
cracking right up in there. No, no, no, So I have
a twenty eight year old and atwenty two year old. Oh god,
(20:21):
yes, okay, so so Bodiesthough, we got to bed. When
you go back to Bodies Well BodiesMagazine is a magazine that focuses on the
it's bodybuilding, muscles, health,fit, fitness, health and wellness.
And we're going to be launching BodiesMagazine is going to be distributed here in
the US and across Africa on flightsgoing to Africa, and we really want
(20:44):
to want to talk about this.We're looking for contributors, people that can
contribute to the magazine and talk aboutthe issues that we as African Americans deal
with in our communities, you know, getting out all of those those on
healthy foods that are on the onthe roadside and the healthy things that would
actually help us to live a healthylife. Tackling diabetes that so many African
Americans are getting at astounding rates.Why are they getting these diseases at this
(21:08):
time they ever happened before. Sowhile we get you know, so just
tackling those things and talking about theissues that really really affect us. So
Body Magazine will be launching yes,yes, yes, yes, yes,
yes, and we're gonna be lookingfor writers, contributors, all of that,
you know, to go in themagazine. We will love the support.
But for me, where you findme. You can find me on
Runway Internationalshows dot com. On Instagramit's Runway International Shows you can find you
(21:33):
can find me. Bodies Magazine isalso on Instagram. You can find us
on Bodies Magazines, b O,d I Ees Magazine. We're still building
and we're looking to build a teamaround this magazine with distribution all over.
So if you're interested, you're intohealth and fitness, health awareness and just
want to be healthy and decide Hey, you know what, I'm tired of
this lifestyle even though I'm just asJunda is, but I still want to
(21:57):
be healthy and live a healthy lifestyle. I at least try to do it.
So that is fabulous, fabulous,Thank you. I am so glad
you made us go back. Yeah. I was trying, and I was
trying to put it in the smoothly. I tried, but on this show,
let's let's not try. Thank youso much for coming on the show
(22:18):
and taking time out of your busy, busy schedule because we know you're busy.
Yes, yes, yes, Thankyou so much, guys, and
I truly appreciate you ladies. Youguys are beautiful. Thank you so much
for the support, and we youknow, I hope more of us support
each other. So God, canwe find out more information about you,
because we like to say it twiceso people can remember run on IG Runway
(22:40):
International Shows. You can find mein Bodies magazines. You can find me
in www. Dot Runway International Showsdot org. You can find me.
Thank you, Thank you so much. Would you like to have supper?
Hasn't been too long? No,no, I can do it for Thank
you so much for our guest todayand you can find everything that your ladies
are doing on www Dot and Ithought ladies come while you're there, take
a moment or to the middle ofthe page to the charites that we probably
(23:03):
support. We hope you can supportthem too. We thank you in advance
for that, and just remember,y'all, wisdom is all around you if
you're it and accepting it. Sopeace of love you guys from Wont Known
It. And then nice bye byebye. Yeah, thanks for listening.
Hello everyone, and welcome to Ladythe El Podcast. Yes, this is
Jade, by the way, Ijust have to say it because obviously I
haven't been here for a while.Oh wow, so we're not doing live
today that stuff I know we'll do. We'll figure out how heard out later
anyway. Oh yeah, whoa ja, I forgot you were here. Hello.
Hi, Hello, yeah, HiHi. Okay, and you can
(00:25):
introduce yourself. Yes, five guys, I'm Anona. Well that's that felt
really weird because I am the narcissist. I should have went first, should
she? I should have? Butthat's okay. I'll let you have it
today. You'll let me have it. I'll be humble for a moment.
You'll be humble. It hurts onthe inside, it's gonna hurt on the
(00:46):
outside in a minute too. You'reridiculous, all right. So we wrote
bok y'all, which is amazing andweird, literaly life guys with pop poetry.
And I thought the wood was badwith other life lessons, and I
thought being going up was easy.Only I with me a meanoir first Widdles
web and that and coffee for andcoffee, all of those where you get
(01:06):
your audio books. You can findout the rest of our eighteen books.
And because you recognized that that waslike six books that are audiobooks the other
twelve if you want to like actuallydo readings at www dot n I thought
ladies dot com. But y'all wantto hear to hear about us, go
on and on about how I'm hearingfabulous you hit it with my wonderful books,
wonderful guys. Would you like tointroduce yourself? Yes, yes,
(01:26):
yes, hey ladies, I'm excitedto be here. I'm John de Morris,
Simple, John de Morrish, retiremilitary spouse US Air Force. Hey,
hey, hey air Force to amazingboys. And I am a traveler
and a businesswoman. Okay. Myfirst question is how do you get everything
(01:47):
done? Yes? How do youschedule all of that? In? Hey,
I'll leave it up to that manupstairs. He helps me get it
together. Oh okay, because thatseems like a lot. I'm just like
you were saying that, and Iwas like, I need a cup of
coffee and I don't even drink cofee. I helped. I'm like, I
don't drink coffee and I need acup of coffee. Oh my goodness.
(02:12):
Yeah, go ahead, go ahead. So I mean, so now you're
starting a new venture. Tell usa little bit about your new venture that
you're starting. Well, I mean, let me just kind of prelude to
the new venture right on the show, y'all. We just you know,
we just jump in. We've beenlike, let's do it, you know,
(02:34):
prior to doing this new venture,I've been in the fashion industry for
oh my god, let me notage myself, twenty something years. I
produce Runway International shows and under thatwe have shows Runway Ghana, Runway Nigeria,
we do Runway Liberia. We doRunway Runway shows in the Baltimore Ere
We've been doing for the last fiveyears. And the goal of the event
is usually to bring international designers localdesigners under one roof to help to promote
(03:00):
fashion. So we've been doing thatfor a while. We've scouted quite a
few models in the DMV area thathave walked for us, and you know,
our goal is to still expand.I don't know how I do all
of this stuff, but I do, you know. And you know,
besides that, my where we're segueinginto is I I work with the strong
(03:22):
Man Corporation and I produce Liberia's StrongmanCompetition, which is a bodybuilding like Arnest
was an agger. We do strongman events and the goal is to be
able to push strong Man events acrossAfrica. So we have been working on
that event, working along with GhanaMuscle Show, which I just got back
(03:43):
from from Ghana for that. Andthere's a lot on my plate, but
I try to juggle it a littleby little. I don't even know how
I do it, but I dowell. I have to ask what goes
into producing a show? Right,because we all like producing movies and producing
this that sounds the wonderful, butlike, how do you produce like a
show? Like what goes into producinga fashion show? I'm in the stages
(04:08):
right now because I'm doing a showin Tampa. As a matter fac I'm
gonna be in Tampa in a coupleof weeks. So we're doing Runaway International
Tampa. The goal we're taking thetour the show all across and we're kind
of doing like a business in abox model. So for instance, like
you say, how do you producea show? If somebody is in maybe
Louisiana and they said, you knowwhat, I've always wanted to produce a
show. How do I do it? We're kind of doing this to be
(04:28):
able to say, hey, listenthis step A to step B bus business
in a box. You can dothis show, run it under our brand,
and be able to host a showevery year. But to answer your
question, you know, the firstthing you start, you know, I
tell about the venue is important.You you get your venue and work your
way back, and then you know, from there you go on and you
you know, you get your flyers. You start scouting off for your models.
(04:51):
You start scotting not for your helpthat you need for the show.
If you're gonna have vendors, youput your things out for vendors. You
know, you start scotting off foryour d designers. Who's going to be
your show? Because the designers makethe show. So who's going to be
a part of your show? Whatincentives are you giving them? Why they're
coming in? Are they going tobe paying? Are they just going to
be selling tickets? Then you goahead and host your casting call. You
(05:13):
know, from there is all ofour promotions. You start promoting the show.
Have the models, get the modelsand stuff involved. The designers you
know needs to be involved. Andwhat I realized with a lot of the
people in this area, because youknow, I've worked Couture Fashion Week in
New York and some other big fashionweeks around the world, but people in
(05:35):
smallest cities don't really understand how theindustry works. So everybody has the perception
of what they think is supposed tobe. I said, but the reason
why you have the big shows inNew York, those designers are paying ten
thousand dollars just for their own show, so the production can give them everything
that they need for their show.They can hire, you know, your
(05:56):
front office, you know, yourfront staff, your backstaff, your life,
all your vendors that you need foryour show. You're just coming in
and bringing it and they're taking careof the entire production for you. But
when you do a show like whatI do, which it's a running show,
the designers have to pay because you'renow giving them publicity. You know.
Sometimes they're like, well, wellI'm not. You're you're promoting your
(06:16):
business. So this person is comingin, They're bringing in all of this
stuff for you. All you're doingis showing up with your garment, so
yes, you do have to pay. Some of the models are like,
well you know in New York,those models pay. They pay those models.
That's because the designers pay ten thousand, fifteen thousand for the production and
out of that production money, theyknow they're only going to have ten models,
and we're paying these models one thousanddollars for the show per model.
(06:40):
That's where it comes from because theyknow that when they do the show,
they're gonna have buyers in the audience. They're gonna because they're inviting all the
big buyers coming in. So let'ssay Macy's come in and say, hey,
I see this garment that you have, and I want twenty thousand pieces.
You know, macy has stores allover the country, so that's a
big order that they have coming.So they take the risk so spending that
(07:00):
money. That's marketing and branding themselvesto be able to get into the big
stores. You know. So whatwe do is on a you know,
we're helping you to market it,but basically we're coming in as some marketing
and promotions company to promote your show. So it's starting to let people understand
how it works. And I'm tellingthe models, if you don't promote the
(07:21):
show, how do you expect peopleto be here? You know. So
I'm one of the things that I'myou know, looking at that we're looking
at. Do what the models isthat I'm saying, Hey, we want
you to sell if you decide.And I hate to ask models to do
this, but I said, that'sthe way that we can get you to
make sure that you bring people tothe show if you sell this amount of
ticket. If we're selling ticket fortwenty five dollars, I don't mind giving
(07:42):
you ten dollars on the ticket,but sell twenty tickets that way, you
know, that's money that you're makingthat's coming out of the show. Then
we're sharing profit. Then you're vestedin the event. You're going to make
sure that you have other people comingto the event. Then we have a
good show. But you can't justcome. I give you all the publicity,
it's free for blesity. You're thenyou want me to pay. I'm
not in business to not make money. So that's a very interesting concept that
(08:07):
you had. And in the profitsharing that you're offering, which a lot
of people, I guess they don'tsee it like that. But if you're
you're saying, sell these tickets andI will shave a profit sharing, which
is a good thing that person intodoing a great job for the show,
because I mean, not only didthey like are they just walking, they're
also like part of the reason theshow is working. Absolutely, once you
(08:30):
become part of the reason it's goingto work, and you're like, yes,
I need to do as they say, you have some skin in the
game. Yeah, you're like,so you're you're all asking people to put
a little bit of skin in thegame so we can all have agreed showing,
which is very amazing. And Wow, I'm just gonna say I'm thrilled
to have you here today. Ido have another question. I had to
(08:54):
stop and say thrilled to have you. Oh, now that I stopped and
now it felt right out got ahead. I'm gonna go with my third
question down because I still remember thatone. Okay, So you were saying,
it's kind of like a fashion showin a box. So where what
city do you think you're gonna likehead to next? Like, well,
we're in Tampa. We're in Tampa. In Tampa. After Tampa, I'm
(09:16):
obviously we're going to do a showbecause we're doing a tour to Ghana.
I'm in October. So we're lookingat the show, another show in Ghana.
There's still other cities that I'm lookingat, and if people are interested,
then you know, well, becauseI have to make because if I'm
not in the city, I can'tnecessarily go in a city and do a
show. So I have to havesomebody who's from the city that can partner
(09:37):
and say, hey, you know, listen, I want to do this.
We'll put a contract together and thenI'm there kind of walking them throughout
the process to you know, getthem to build their business and do their
events. So how do you selectdesigners? And of course all the models
out they are going to know howyou select models, But let's go with
the designers. How do you likethis? Now I'm one of the pickiest
show producer and working in this area. Some of the people they consider me.
(10:03):
You know, when you don't getalong with people, then they say
you're mean. But I'm not meanbecause for me, I don't like the
stereotype of because you're black, justbecause you're black, that means it needs
to be ghetto. I am allabout we have quality designers out here.
I don't want a hoodie. Anybodycan get a hoodie and put a logo
on it. No, that's notwhat I want. But if you give
me a hoodie, then do atwist to it that makes it look nice
(10:26):
on the runway. Yeah. Sofor me, I look for designers that
are high fashion couture, that havesomething that when it comes to the show,
it it wows the audience is different. You know, it's something that
you know because me being a buyerand working in a fashion industry for a
while. As a buyer, whenyou go in to look at it,
you want to see what's the newtrends, what's out there, what's different?
(10:48):
Okay, this is man. Wow, this designer has something like I
have a designer that usually come fromBolcino fossil and he mixed stuff. What
he's saying, he picks stuff fromthe trash and he transforms them into using
and making different materials. So forhim, I love his collection. Every
time he comes up with something issomething that is just remarkable. So that's
(11:09):
the stubbing. I'm not looking forjust the every day I mean, yes,
I might get those every day nowand then I might put one of
the Onesie and Tuesdays in the show. But I want people that really can
show their creativity. And what theycan do that that that those are the
designers that that I'm drown to andit doesn't matter. And it's not only
black designers. I'm I'm I'm acrossthe board because I'm about diversity in fashion.
So I have designers that come fromVietnam. I have designers that come
(11:31):
from all over in the Vietnamese communityon my community. So I have people
coming from all over. Okay,first of all, you just said the
Vietnamese community is my community. Howgood is that food? I love you,
I love I loved Okay, overday outside, I wanted to play
some order for some fold right now. Okay, yes, I'm thinking about
it right now. You said thebroken rise. Oh god, I was
(11:54):
about to be on it, likeokay, but anyway, yeah, I
have a Philly question. Oh Idon't know. I'm sorry, I'm the
Narsers. Okay, never mind.How in the world it's early, y'all
and she looks so fat? Howdo you do this with two boys and
running the whole business? Oh well, obviously this was planned, right,
So I did this in like twentyminutes. I'm like, this is no
(12:18):
way, y'all. So I mean, I'm just saying my other question was
was a narcissist question, and Iapologize, but I am the narsis.
Oh my goodness, here we go. So you know, you say you
have those every regular, everyday kindof designs. I'm just wondering, did
you have spot for two adorable AfricanAmerican writers that had their own big I
had their own clothing line, theri poetrid Let Let's do it absolutely,
(12:48):
absolutely absolutely, And you know she'sa stylis, so sometimes it doesn't have
to Like I said, you canhave a hoodie, but you can style
it in a way that it comesdown the one way and it looks like
like for instance, I give anZeppa. I was there's an African store
in Buuie and they were one ofthe people that were in my show the
other day and they had these bellbottom pants and the thing, and then
(13:11):
they had a cult that didn't gowith it at all. But I saw
they had this hat that's usually wornby men and I was like, okay,
that hat, it goes on.And then the jacket. I was
like, no, don't wear itbecause I want to get Paris. Just
put it, you know, putit in and in it. I need
you to hold it under you asyou come, and it looks so chic
and Paris couture. I can seeit like I saw it in my mind
(13:33):
when she said, you know thishat that yes, yes, that's a
yes and looks chic and Paris.So it's all about putting things together.
It doesn't have to but have acreative you know, because you might be
a designers. I have this,but then hire a stylist that can maybe
put that together for your show andmake it look like it's a million bucks
coming out of somewhere, and thensomebody somewhere can be like, hey,
(13:56):
you know what, I like whatthey had. Because what people don't understand
what FA shows, it's not justfashion show. As a designer, you're
selling yourself. That's a way tomarket yourself. So you never know who's
going to be in the audience thatsay, you know what, I have
a boutique and I want to orderthat from you. You know. So
designers now have to think that way. Hey, I'm building, I'm promoting
my business, so I need toput my best foot forward when I do
(14:18):
a show. I had one Ione design that came and she was pinning
everything and I told her said,I'm sorry, you can't be a part
of the show. I said,because you told me you had a full
collection. I kept asking you,I need to see yourself before the show,
and you're coming here and you're pinningI'm sorry, you can't be on
my show. Okay, so youare. You're living up to what you
said. I love it. Ilove it doing right now. So my
(14:45):
other question was like, because yousaid you have been part of New York
shows and international shows, I'm assumingParis at some point or Italy. Yes,
what is it like going from Whatis it like behind the scenes of
those shows? Crazy? Yep.All you see in the front is the
perfection in the front. You don'thear the screaming. You don't hear the
(15:05):
cursing, you don't hear your youdon't hear all of those things. But
at the end of the day,as a show producer, when it goes
out on the runway and it hitsthat run where issue look fabulous, forget
about what happened in the back.And that's why I tell people, I
say, when I'm doing the show, I'm like, yell, I might
do this, that's nothing personal.We just want to make sure that the
show goes right. You know,after the show, I'll come and hug
you. I love you. Oh, but when that is going on,
(15:26):
you're inner heated things. Yes,you're gonna be yelling, you're gonna be
doing this. And I try notto be as rude sometimes as they are
in New York because they don't care, you know, now, don't be
any kind of way. But forme, I still like to treat people
like I want to be treated,you know, But you know, sometimes
it gets a little heated. Butthe show must go on. Absolutely,
and I absolutely thank you for explaininghow it's not perfection behind the scenes,
(15:50):
because a lot of times we justsee the perfection and we don't understand the
mess, and then you get stressedout as a person trying to live up
to this perfection. But you didn'tsee the mess behind it. And most
people don't know. Most people don'tknow. They see somebody doing a show
and they see the front end.I can do it, and they go
to do it. And then thensometimes they don't realize that you do these
(16:12):
shows and you don't make money.They see the front end and they just
be like, oh, if theycan do it, I can do it.
Too, I'm about to do myown show and blah blah blah,
and then you sit back and thenwhen they lose money after a couple of
years, they're not doing it anymorebecause they don't have a passion. I
believe all. I mean, allright, written film, just painted,
(16:34):
life, designing, just I thinkit's actually an art to be able to
put together an event in any way, shape or For me, the reason
I think it's an art is becauseso how much goes wrong and the way
that you can hobble together everything tomake it go right and you can see
that perfection. That is a freakingart and art I like to play it
(16:56):
this way. You see how ifyou've ever been in a wedding party,
you see the craziness that go Butwhen people walk down there out looks fabulous.
Just times that by like one hundredpeople. That's it and that's right,
that's it right there. And yougot some models that are talking,
I'm never gonna do it. Showwe gain and you hear them talking.
At the end of the day,pictures come out, they look beautiful.
(17:18):
Oh my god, when it's yournext show, So where can people buy
out? Before we got the onequestion that we need for our vice sction
because we do. We do havea lot of people who write that listen
to this. So how important isit to have a fashion or style to
your brand? So like when yougo out into the public, how important
is it to be like, no, this is my brand, this is
how I want to present myself.What I was a first first impression is
(17:45):
a lasting impression. Yes, soyou always have to like, I'm coming
on here this morning. I hadyou go, but I knew that coming
on here my presentation meant, Imean, it's fine. But for me,
how I look, how I presentmyself speaks volume because I don't know
who's gonna watch this video. SoI tell everybody when you come out and
growing up, that's what my momwas like. The things that you needed
(18:08):
to do. Make sure you haveno holes in your underwears when you're going
out of your house. At alltimes, you have clean up, make
sure you're presentable because you never knowwhere you are at what time, who
you're gonna meet, you know,and just how you carry yourself when you
go out there, because it speaksvolume for you because people can be watching
(18:29):
and at all times. I gottacall when I was in Gane and somebody
said, he said, in ourWhatspop group, somebody took your video and
they saw you walking and exulted onyou. But you were on your best
behavior, you know. So soyou just and especially with the age of
cell phones and things like that,now you never know who's where at what
(18:52):
time and what they're doing. Soit's always important to present yourself in a
way that your mama would be.I like it. I like that is
That is some of the best advicethat I have heard in a lot in
a long time. Thank you.So where can people find out more about
you? Support your shows, tryto try out y'all designers out there,
(19:15):
you know. And I really wantedto. I really didn't touch on it,
but I really really wanted to talkabout bodies a little bit. Pa.
Okay, so back to the firstquestion. Yeah, new new venture
that you're doing now, because Iwork with you know, and and I've
been from from from age I don'tknow how old. I battle with weight.
(19:37):
That's always been an issue, butI don't let that be a stepping
stone in my way and in mylife. I have kids that are athletes,
you know, so I had anathletic family, and I have to
be in the gym. But youknow, you still struggle with that.
But just because you do that doesn'tmean that you live that lifestyle. You
still have to continue to in meetI'm forty eight. What nobody believe that.
(20:00):
No one believes that, No onelike I used to learn from y'all
because I know they say black don'tcrack, but black don't crack a different
way for people who are well fabulous, who or who were in their forties.
I'm like, I've got to learnthat, because you know mine is
cracking right up in there. No, no, no, So I have
a twenty eight year old and atwenty two year old. Oh god,
(20:21):
yes, okay, so so Bodiesthough, we got to bed. When
you go back to Bodies Well BodiesMagazine is a magazine that focuses on the
it's bodybuilding, muscles, health,fit, fitness, health and wellness.
And we're going to be launching BodiesMagazine is going to be distributed here in
the US and across Africa on flightsgoing to Africa, and we really want
(20:44):
to want to talk about this.We're looking for contributors, people that can
contribute to the magazine and talk aboutthe issues that we as African Americans deal
with in our communities, you know, getting out all of those those on
healthy foods that are on the onthe roadside and the healthy things that would
actually help us to live a healthylife. Tackling diabetes that so many African
Americans are getting at astounding rates.Why are they getting these diseases at this
(21:08):
time they ever happened before. Sowhile we get you know, so just
tackling those things and talking about theissues that really really affect us. So
Body Magazine will be launching yes,yes, yes, yes, yes,
yes, and we're gonna be lookingfor writers, contributors, all of that,
you know, to go in themagazine. We will love the support.
But for me, where you findme. You can find me on
Runway Internationalshows dot com. On Instagramit's Runway International Shows you can find you
(21:33):
can find me. Bodies Magazine isalso on Instagram. You can find us
on Bodies Magazines, b O,d I Ees Magazine. We're still building
and we're looking to build a teamaround this magazine with distribution all over.
So if you're interested, you're intohealth and fitness, health awareness and just
want to be healthy and decide Hey, you know what, I'm tired of
this lifestyle even though I'm just asJunda is, but I still want to
(21:57):
be healthy and live a healthy lifestyle. I at least try to do it.
So that is fabulous, fabulous,Thank you. I am so glad
you made us go back. Yeah. I was trying, and I was
trying to put it in the smoothly. I tried, but on this show,
let's let's not try. Thank youso much for coming on the show
(22:18):
and taking time out of your busy, busy schedule because we know you're busy.
Yes, yes, yes, Thankyou so much, guys, and
I truly appreciate you ladies. Youguys are beautiful. Thank you so much
for the support, and we youknow, I hope more of us support
each other. So God, canwe find out more information about you,
because we like to say it twiceso people can remember run on IG Runway
(22:40):
International Shows. You can find mein Bodies magazines. You can find me
in www. Dot Runway International Showsdot org. You can find me.
Thank you, Thank you so much. Would you like to have supper?
Hasn't been too long? No,no, I can do it for Thank
you so much for our guest todayand you can find everything that your ladies
are doing on www Dot and Ithought ladies come while you're there, take
a moment or to the middle ofthe page to the charites that we probably
(23:03):
support. We hope you can supportthem too. We thank you in advance
for that, and just remember,y'all, wisdom is all around you if
you're it and accepting it. Sopeace of love you guys from Wont Known
It. And then nice bye byebye. Yeah, thanks for listening.
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