Pod Insights On Purpose with Jay Shetty Kenneth Cole: ON How To Creatively Break Into The Career Of Your Choice About this episode On this episode of On Purpose, I sat down with Kenneth Cole. Kenneth is a designer, activist, and married father of three. He speaks on the importance of resourcefulness for finding solutions to a closed door.
How do we get from here to where we need to? Kenneth reminds us there’s an infinite amount of alternatives, and it’s up to us to refocus the lens on which we see obstacles. This episode will inspire creative insights to help get you to your desires.
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Transcript 11,796 words · 8 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
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1:30 Jay Shetty? Choose a cellar or North East Regional and get there without the stress of getting there. Visit amtrak.com to plan your next trip. This episode is brought to you by AG1. Are you feeling September reset too? Shorter days, longer to-do lists, earlier alarms, all those routines you promised yourself you'd pick back up. It can feel like your whole life is recalibrating. And when everything around you is changing, it helps to have a few things you can rely on.
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2:41 Jay Shetty? That's drinkag1.com/onpurpose.
2:47 Speaker 02 How do we make an impact in the world? How do we make a meaningful impact in people's lives? How do we make what we do worthwhile and purposeful? It's a question I asked 30 years ago, 30 plus years ago, but it's a question I still ask today. The answer's different and the mechanism to realise it is different still.
3:09 Jay Shetty? I believe the world needs a new set of real models, people with deep intentions behind their actions, and this is where you meet them. Today's guest is Kenneth Cole, and I'm so grateful because we all know he's a designer, he's an activist, he's a married father of three, who believes that he thrives at work, the home, and his community because he merges the three worlds. Kenneth, I'm so grateful, honoured, and happy to have you here. Thank you so much for coming.
3:40 Speaker 02 Thank you, Jay. That's very kind of you. I don't know that I thrive in each of those areas. I aspire to thrive in all three of those areas.
3:47 Jay Shetty? Absolutely. And last time we were together, you were so gracious and patiently sat and listened to me tell my story. I'm glad that I get to reciprocate today and listen to your incredible journey, your brand which is 35 years bold, which I love. But I want to start off by asking you that question because I think my audience will love it. How do you merge those three worlds? Because I feel that today we live in a world that's so disconnected. People see their work. Their family, their friends, as these three separate parts. But you've somehow aspired to merge them. How does that work? Let's unpack that.
4:25 Speaker 02 Well, I think they are separate parts. And I, but I think that being successful at anything that we set out to do is all-consuming and it requires making significant life compromises, which is not an, not easy for anybody in and of itself. So, and so one can be successful professionally invariably they're taking away from their personal needs. And because they're working extra hours and they're giving of themselves physically as well as emotionally and mentally, they're not present to the degree they need to be. And, um, and then if they're successful personally and their personal lives are coming together
5:07 Speaker 02 and then very often they're struggling, the professional quotient of component doesn't always fall in line. And then if you layer on top of that, you know, the community outreach or engagement slash friends, then it complicates it even further. So I, I came to realize, absent of a good therapist, that, um, that if I could somehow marry them and by my, what I did from nine or whenever it was I, that I show up in the office was addressing multiple agendas simultaneously, then I was more likely to find fulfillment in that process.
5:48 Speaker 02 So I brought social engagement into my business model very early on in the process. And I'm not sure it was intentional or it just happened and then by, um, by nature of it, of being able to bring all these incremental resources to it, it became successful in that regard. And, um, and then, and also familial at the same time as well, personal and professional and social engagement at every intersection. And, um, And I encourage people to do it, but it's hard. It's hard to be successful at anything.
6:26 Jay Shetty? Let's rewind a little because you talk about how, of course, you were going to law school. And then you switch into fashion because you have this rebellious nature and you thought that fashion didn't have any rules as opposed to law. Tell us about that transition.
6:44 Speaker 02 So I was gonna go to law school because I didn't know what I wanted to do. And I think I'm all about creating alternative paths. And so if I, with a legal education, I could now have one more set of opportunities, hopefully, to look forward to. But in that process, my father has a small shoe factory at the time in this very depressed area of New York called Williamsburg.
7:11 Jay Shetty? I love how it's changed.
7:12 Speaker 02 And it's always a change. So then, so I worked with him one summer and I kept navigating to the pattern room, to the design room. Because I was fascinated because that's where it all happened or didn't happen. And if the product was distinctive and specifically appropriate, business would reflect it. And if it wasn't, it wasn't. So that's where I kept finding myself. And I learned how to make shoes, I learned how to make patterns, I learned how to, taught myself how to draw technically, which I hadn't up until that point. And I realized quickly that law is about, it's a book and he who learns it the best
7:54 Speaker 02 goes the furthest. And he who can interpret it the most successfully realizes the greatest rewards. Whereas in business, you pretty much write your own book every day. You write your rules. And in the fashion business specifically, the further those rules are from anything written before you, the more likely it is that you'll be successful. So there's, essentially, there's no boundaries. So, you know, we're taught as children to draw within the lines, but you realize in my business that the more successfully, the success usually is outside those lines. So, and I was fascinated with it and, and success was relatively reasonably
8:34 Speaker 02 short in coming, or rewards from that, success is a difficult word for me to, but.
8:42 Jay Shetty? Why is it difficult?
8:43 Speaker 02 Well, only because it's, it's so subjective and success in what was successful yesterday only defines new boundaries for tomorrow. So, and we can't kind of cite, we can't harbor over what happened yesterday because then we fail in our ability to do what we need to do tomorrow. So, but we can get to that.
9:03 Jay Shetty? Yeah, yeah, let's get to that.
9:05 Speaker 02 So, I realized that, that the, this business, this shoe business at the time specifically was, was fascinating to me and there was essentially no, no boundaries. And, and you take this, this shoe, this object, and you can transform it in so many different subtle ways and, and sometimes even the most subtle ways make the greatest change and impact it the greatest. So, and I stayed on that path and I kept deferring, going to law school and I eventually never went.
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11:56 Jay Shetty? What's your advice for people who are listening who feel like you did? They chose to do something because they don't know what to do. And I find so many people find that they end up in college degrees, or jobs, or positions in companies because they just didn't know what to do. How did you kind of break away from that and start using that as a launchpad to explore?
12:18 Speaker 02 Well, I don't know that I broke away from it. I still sometimes wonder if I know what to do. But I knew that what I was doing felt good, and I knew that I could do this in a way that could be meaningful in some way. And I knew I needed to explore it further. And the last thing I could probably always do, and my interest in law really was just...
12:49 Speaker 02 To create more opportunities for myself. And I found that I was on a path that
12:55 Speaker 02 that was fulfilling just to a degree. So I just stayed on that path.
13:02 Jay Shetty? Right. And you ended up posing as a filmmaker to be able to sell shoes at the beginning. Tell us about that. Introduce us that story, because I love it.
13:11 Speaker 02 So I left that work with my father after a couple of years. And I wanted to do my own thing. And it was a hard decision. But I knew if I didn't do it then, my life would only get more complicated as I got older.
13:27 Speaker 02 And I was still single and I had no real obligations in the world. And I, so I had a little bit of money, but not enough to start a business. And a very little bit of money. So, and I, there wasn't these mechanisms in place like tech world has today where you can raise, you can do a raise and you can outsource and you can crowdsource and you can find all these resources. I didn't have that. So I
13:55 Jay Shetty? GoFundMe, yeah.
13:56 Speaker 02 Right. So I wanted to start a business. It was more personal. And I, so I left what I was doing. And I needed to, and I, I named the company, I set up a company, I named it Kenneth Cole because there weren't these search engines then where you could make up a name and find out if it was ownable. Because you would, the process invariably took 18 months before you knew if there were objections. And then you had to address those objections. And then maybe you had to, you'd win or you'd lose and you'd have to rename your business. So I, you could almost always get your name, your own name registered.
14:39 Speaker 02 So I named the company Kenneth Cole. And I ran to Italy.
14:46 Speaker 02 Knowing I had a better chance of getting credit from an Italian shoe factory that needed business than from an American bank that didn't. And so I found a couple of factories and I found some people over there that were wanted to help me. And I designed a line of cool lady shoes. And then I came back and had to sell them. And there was a trade show at the time, New York Shoe Show is what it was called. And then at the time, and in that process, you had two choices. You could take a room at the Hilton Hotel and there were about eleven hundred other shoe companies. And there was thirty floors, thirty somewhat companies per floor. And the buyers would would come and they'd walk all the floors.
15:27 Speaker 02 Not very distinctive, not very differentiated, and not without cost. So, and then the other option was to take a big fancy showroom within a two-block radius of the Hilton Hotel. Clearly, I didn't have the money or the time for that either. So on a whim, I called a friend who was in the trucking business and I said, "If I could figure out how to park one of your forty-foot trailers across the street from the Hilton Hotel, would you lend it to me?" And he said, "Sure, jerk. This is New York. You can't park a bicycle for ten minutes, let alone a truck for four days." I said, "If I could figure it out, will you lend it to me?" He says, "If you could figure it out, I'll help you decorate it." So I called the mayor's office, it was Mayor Koch at the time.
16:10 Speaker 02 I said, "Excuse me, Mr. Mayor, how does one get permission to park a forty-foot trailer on the corner of Sixth, Seventh and Fifty-Sixth Streets in December, first week of December?" "Sorry, son, they don't. This is New York. We give permission only under two circumstances. If you are a utility company servicing the streets, AT&T or Con Ed, or if you are a production company shooting a full-length motion picture, because we were going through an Isle of New York campaign in the early eighties and we probably still are today." So I said, "Thank you." Mr. Mayor hung up the phone. That afternoon, I went to Stationery Store, changed the letterhead from Kenneth Cole, Inc. to Kenneth Cole Productions, Inc., filed for a permit the following morning with the mayor's office for permission to shoot a full-length motion picture called "The Birth of a Shoe Company."
16:51 Speaker 02 I opened for business on December 2nd, a week later, ten days later. And I had two New York policemen as my doormen, compliments of our fine mayor. And I had creak light stanchions. And I had a director, and sometimes it was filming his camera, sometimes it wasn't. And We saw every important buyer in New York. The more important they were, the longer we made them wait. And we sold forty thousand pair of shoes in two and a half days.
17:22 Speaker 02 There was a phone booth on the corner. That was my line of connection to the source, the factories. And I was changing the orders from high heels to low heels, to red to blue. And delivered the shoes in six weeks.
17:40 Speaker 02 And I tell that story still because it speaks to the importance of resourcefulness and problem solving. The best solution is rarely the most creative. It's rarely the most expensive. It's almost always the most creative. And the company, by the way, went public ten years later, traded on the New York Stock Exchange. It was KCP, Chemical Production. And we stayed public for twenty years. We just recently went private.
18:04 Jay Shetty? I love that story. I mean, what you just said there, the amount of people that only see the blocks. I mean, the fact that you called the mayor up in the first place, and the mayor actually picked up?
18:15 Speaker 02 No. Somebody in his office. And but the nuance there, by the way, is not can I park the truck there? Because the answer would have been no. The question is, how can I park the truck there?
18:27 Jay Shetty? Yes.
18:28 Speaker 02 Under what scenario? And in that, in that question was the answer I needed. So and I figured out what I needed to be in order to be able to do what I needed, what I hoped to accomplish. So and if he had said no, if that wasn't, we would have probably found another path.
18:45 Jay Shetty? No, definitely. And that's what I love, that today I feel there's, especially for everyone watching, and I hear this so often, that there's just, oh, this doesn't work. Or I tried this, but that path had a block. Or we went down this road and then it got cut off. And I feel like a lot of us are constantly finding excuses or finding blocks more often than what you just said. It was just about asking the right question.
19:08 Speaker 02 Right, ask the right question to the right person in the right way. And call a restaurant. Do you have availability? No, but under what scenario could you have?
19:20 Jay Shetty? Do you still practice that today? Do you have to still practice that? Has that energy stayed?
19:24 Speaker 02 I do that in the ordinary course. But because there are inherent obstacles in everything we do. So the question is, how do we get from here to where we need to in the most efficient and productive way? And in an appropriate way, by the way, I don't, I don't. Seek to do anything that's inappropriate.
19:38 Jay Shetty? Sure.
19:39 Speaker 02 Nor was what I did that day inappropriate. But although I do know that today the mayor's office is much more careful.
19:46 Jay Shetty? Because of you.
19:46 Speaker 02 In how they issue permits, because I've told this story so many times. But based upon the rules as they existed, I wasn't inappropriate. In fact, that story never got, that movie never got, I'm told unfortunately, but in this world of content creation.
20:00 Jay Shetty? Do you have any of the footage?
20:02 Speaker 02 Well, Pete, some of that footage actually is on our company website.
20:05 Jay Shetty? Yes.
20:06 Speaker 02 Also, I think on our company's Instagram. Some of the original trailer footage.
20:12 Jay Shetty? That's brilliant. If anyone listening right now or watching does not get inspired by that, to figure out a way to their goal, you know, I don't know what will. That's, it's, there's so many elements in there where you had to just make it work, call a different person. The fact that you're ordering, you know, like you said, now we have technology, now we have social media. You were standing next to a payphone to make your orders.
20:34 Speaker 02 Right.
20:34 Jay Shetty? Like that.
20:35 Speaker 02 A lot of quarters.
20:36 Jay Shetty? Yeah, exactly, yes, stacked on top, exactly. Just keep going there and I just feel like that resourcefulness is something that's so useful today as a skill. And we have more resources to be resourceful with.
20:47 Speaker 02 Right.
20:48 Jay Shetty? But it's the mindset.
20:49 Speaker 02 It's such a, it's a totally different world today. And the obstacles, the objectives, the challenges are just different.
20:56 Jay Shetty? What are the challenges today?
20:58 Speaker 02 You know, I mean, I used to speak to people in my business today and they say, you know, everybody everywhere is a competitor. It's too hard. And because everybody who offers product, product is available to everybody everywhere. There's literally an infinite amount of alternatives. Because by the time you get halfway through that list, there's twice as many that have since been created.
21:17 Jay Shetty? Yes.
21:18 Speaker 02 And so, but I argue, make the case that there's also twice as many, infinite amount of opportunities as a result. So you can look at the obstacles, you can look at, look at it from another context. And everybody who makes shoes or fashion everywhere is a competitor. But everybody who consumes fashion or product everywhere is a customer.
21:41 Jay Shetty? Absolutely.
21:42 Speaker 02 So, you know, it's a different time, but we just changed and kind of refocused the lens through which we see it. And then it's something that we do every day. How do we make an impact in the world? How do we make a meaningful impact in people's lives? And how do we make what we do worthwhile and purposeful? And it's not, it's a question I asked thirty years ago, thirty plus years ago, but it's a question I still ask today. The answer is different. And the mechanism to realize it is different still. But the questions aren't.
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24:49 Jay Shetty? Definitely, and that leads us on nicely because in 1985, when you launched the AIDS campaign, you say that shifted the brand forever. It was such a huge moment for the brand. What were your answers to that question 30 years ago?
25:04 Speaker 02 Yeah, because, well, you need to create the context, what was happening in 1985. So I'd been in business now a couple of years, and my goal was always to figure out how to speak to people about what was not just on their body, but was on their mind, and knowing that I'd have a much more meaningful connection, relationship, and much more sustainable than any heel height or any hem length. So I would periodically reflect on what we were all consumed with. And at that point, there was this pervasive consciousness that we hadn't seen since the 60s.
25:47 Speaker 02 And it was about hunger, and it was to a large degree in Ethiopia. And there were these initiatives that were happening constantly. There was We Are The World with Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones, and it was Live Aid, and it was World Aid, and it was Hands Across America. And everybody wanted to be part of something bigger than they were, something I hadn't really experienced in my somewhat adult life. And so, but it was odd because nobody was talking about what was really this looming dark cloud called HIV/AIDS.
26:32 Speaker 02 Because, actually, it wasn't even called AIDS yet. It was just HIV.
26:37 Speaker 02 If you did, you would be, um, because, well, A, the stigma attached to people who had HIV was so severe and so significant, and if you addressed it publicly, you were perceived to be at risk. And that meant you were either intravenous drug user, you were maybe Haitian, or you were gay. And the stigma against each of those groups was, was overwhelming. So I saw this rare opportunity to talk about something that was really important that nobody was talking about. And, and I only had a little bit of money at the time. We were a very small company. So we did a, I did a campaign.
27:21 Speaker 02 I reached out to Annie Leibowitz, who was, and then she still is, an important social photographer. And, and Annie agreed to help me. I don't think she knew who I was at the time, and she loved the message and she loved the idea. And we reached out to all these models, the biggest models in the industry, and they all wanted to do it. So we did a campaign that spoke about the fact that nobody was speaking about this ominous, ominous dark cloud called AIDS, HIV/AIDS. And it changed me, changed the man, changed the brand and the company in a very profound way.
28:02 Speaker 02 And, you know, I had, what I was doing was fulfilling, but it wasn't meaningful. And, and I had a hard time asking my associates to put in the hours and do what they, do what I needed them to do, do, to be successful. Because I don't believe anybody can really be successful doing anything today, nine to five. And between your physical engagement, your emotional involvement, your resources, you need to bring to bear it, anything you want to do requires, you know, making a commitment. So I needed to make what I was doing more important than it was in the ordinary course.
28:46 Speaker 02 And, and this did it. It just made it important. And we, and we stayed on this path, and I was asked To do, we did this campaign and I did it in conjunction with AMPFAR, who was the, one of the only AIDS research organizations at the time. So, we did it, bringing shining light on their work. And, and I believe that a cure for AIDS would only come from research and that's what AMPFAR did. And then a year or so later, a year and a half later, they asked me to join the board. And, and I did. And then they asked me to become chairman in 2004. And I did. And in the 14 years from that point forward,
29:30 Speaker 02 and, and in the many years throughout, AMPFAR had a very profound impact on millions of people's lives. And, millions of people were alive, I believe, not because of AMPFAR alone, but because of a lot of AMPFAR's important work. And I continued to do personal efforts to engage a global HIV community. And, and in 2004, at the same simultaneously, I did a campaign that, a global campaign that we all have AIDS. If we don't have it meant physically, we have it socially or spiritually. And we're all infect, if we're not infected, regardless we're infected. If we're not infected, we're affected.
30:11 Speaker 02 And, and I had got a different photographer at the time, Mark Seliger. And he and I flew to South Africa and we photographed Elsie Mandela and Desmond Tutu and Zaki Ahmed. And we photographed Dr. Solomon in India and Elizabeth Tel and Elton John in Los Angeles. So, and the bringing together of the community had not been done before. And that was, you know, a level of engagement and fulfillment that I had never experienced in. But again, still, it was then set a new standard from which I now had to go further. And, you know, I've continued to do that. And it continues to be, make everything more meaningful.
30:56 Jay Shetty? It's beautiful hearing about it for someone like me in my generation, looking back. Because often we think that all of these challenges are new. Because we're experiencing them for the first time. And so when you're hearing it back from someone who's a change maker, who's actually been working on meaningful things for such a long period of time, two questions come to mind. The first one is, I feel like from a personal level, everyone has to get to that point in life where they may be doing something that's fulfilling, like you said, but it's not deeply meaningful. I feel like everyone has to or will get to that stage in their life where they have to ask that question.
31:34 Speaker 02 I also don't know at the end if those two expressions are mutually exclusive. I don't know if anything could be fulfilling if it isn't at some level meaningful.
31:43 Jay Shetty? Sure.
31:44 Speaker 02 Just to you or to people that are in your life, people that inspire you or are inspired by what you do. So I think we're always searching for that. And that's a moving target. I don't think it doesn't change. I think every day we come to work and we, you know, we look at it. And people, you know, people at the time, I'll go back a little bit to when I started the business, and they said to me, were you nervous? Because you put a lot at stake. You know, you left where you were and you really made it hard to ever go back. And you made a commitment to do this without really knowing where this was going to take you. And, you know, was it hard? Were you nervous? And I said, you know what?
32:28 Speaker 02 I never really thought about that scenario. I never thought about it in that regard, about failing. And then I wanted to say, but I knew somehow I'd make it work. But what I didn't explain to people, because I didn't know how to, was I never, that the it was very undefined and continues to be.
32:54 Jay Shetty? Yeah.
32:54 Speaker 02 So because the factors and influences continue to change every day. So, and I knew I'd figure out how to stay relevant and how to have a reason to exist. And that, the need to do that, you know, is, still exists today, 35 years later.
33:11 Jay Shetty? And that was my second question, that seeing as you were asking these questions 30 years ago, you were thinking about this stuff 30 years ago, do you think that we've gotten closer to a more evolved world where people are asking these questions more often? Or are we going backwards? Are we still in the same place? Or is it always the same cycle? There's a beautiful quote by Mark Twain where he says, "History doesn't repeat itself, but it always rhymes." And so I wonder, how does that fit into this? Where does that thought process fit into this?
33:41 Speaker 02 So, you know, I think that we need to learn, you know, we need to know the past so that we know how to contextualize the present and the future. So, and in fashion, I was always obsessed with the universal alternatives. And not so that I knew what to make, but often so I knew what not to make. And nobody needs what's there. So, but absent of knowing what the current existing alternatives are, you don't know how to create a creative, innovative alternative. So, you need to know the history. You need to know the present.
34:24 Speaker 02 And I love Mark Twain's.
34:28 Jay Shetty? Yeah.
34:29 Speaker 02 So.
34:29 Jay Shetty? Yeah, me too.
34:30 Speaker 02 Right. So, you know, and I think it's, you know, we reflect on it often. At the time, when I started doing my work with AMPHOR, it was, there wasn't this collective, I forget what they called it at the time, corporate social responsibility. I mean, this wasn't, it just was something that seemed right to do. There wasn't a name for it. And there wasn't a classification, a characterization of it per se. Maybe it was philanthropy at some level. But, and then, you know, interestingly, I learned over the years, and partially from my daughter,
35:13 Speaker 02 my middle daughter Amanda, who was obsessed with not that we do a philanthropy, because philanthropy is something that, or community engagement is something that you should do, and everybody did. But it became about not just what you did, but how you did it and the impact that you made. And the transparency within which you communicated that. And so.
35:36 Speaker 02 So the process of our community outreach has changed profoundly over the years. And how we engage with communities and how we do it in a way that ensures results with absolute transparency and accountability is really important today, which in the past wasn't so.
35:57 Jay Shetty? Absolutely.
35:58 Speaker 02 I don't know if that...
35:59 Jay Shetty? Yeah, it does. Yeah, no, absolutely. It does answer my question, yeah. One of the things I love about you, Kenneth, from our couple of meetings that we've had, is that you're extremely humble. And in a positive way, you're confident, but you're humble in the sense that you always consider yourself a learner. You always consider you're growing. And you feel that... There's this beautiful quote that I picked out of yours, actually. So now I get to quote you, as well as quote Mark Twain in the same podcast. So we have, I wanted... Here we go. It's, "If you stand on what you've accomplished, it gets in the way of what you still need to do." And when I read that, it reminded me of Steve Jobs. And I was sharing with you earlier that Steve Jobs, when he came back to Apple, he saw that in the entrance, they had this Apple museum.
36:44 Jay Shetty? And he asked for it to be destroyed because he didn't want to live and work for a company that was still living and operating in the past. How do you practically apply that mindset every day at work? And how do you get the people that you work with to apply that mindset as well? Because actually, majority of us are quite happy to just celebrate the past and live on the glories and the success of the past and nostalgia. We always think about the good old days. It's part of our human psychology. How have you shifted that? How do you get other people to shift as well?
37:14 Speaker 02 So I didn't know that story of Steve Jobs. But one of my biggest regrets, but maybe it's a conscious process, so it shouldn't be, is that I don't have an archive of my past products over the 30 years. And people have always said, asked me that.
37:30 Jay Shetty? Wow.
37:31 Speaker 02 And I never saved it because I always felt maybe because we need to stay focused on going forward. And at these various milestones in my career, people have encouraged me to write books and tell these stories. And I resisted it. And I've still never really told the whole story. I've told it anecdotally in a book called Footnotes 15 years ago. And then recently in a book.
37:57 Speaker 02 A Kenneth Cole production or something. But it was episodic and it wasn't really about, it wasn't the story. Because I'm, I'm, I believe that if we allow ourselves to, it's like driving a car. If you're gonna look in the rearview mirror, you're gonna, you're gonna miss that next bump in the road. So if you don't stay focused on where we have to, you need to go. You significantly encumber your likelihood of getting there. And, and I do believe that what we've done over these years is we've built a great foundation from which to do what we first now need to do. And, and you can't stay idle in, in the business, which is why it's a great business, a fashion
38:40 Speaker 02 business, but, but it's also why it's so difficult. So, and I think it's an indulgence that I've avoided, you know, reflecting too much on, on, on the past. But it's, it is true. I do think we need to stay focused on, on the future. And, and, and I, and I don't want to celebrate the past anymore, except to the degree that now this is what defines our platform. And I say to people that there is a, literally an infinite, as I said, amount of alternatives today to what we bring to market. Nobody needs what we sell, which is very humbling.
39:23 Speaker 02 There's not an American that needs another pair of shoes. Even most people, you know, without means have shoes today and maybe not the shoes they want and maybe not, but in the condition that they should have. But, and if, as I've said, if we closed our stores tomorrow at noon, it's hardly an American would go barefoot for, for 14 years. So.
39:50 Speaker 02 We need to make them think they want it, glad they thought it and think it again. But at the end of the days, we can't delude ourselves. And we need to be realistic and understand that we create something that people need to want, they don't need. But if we attach it to something that connects with them in a meaningful way, then what we do becomes more meaningful. But I didn't answer your question.
40:18 Jay Shetty? That's okay. I love the tangent you went on. It was a great tangent. And that comes back to your whole principle of it's not just what people stand in, it's what they stand for. And that reminds me, everything you do just echoes in timelessness for me. And that's what I love. Like it literally echoes because there's a beautiful statement by Martin Luther King around, you know, someone who stands for nothing will fall for anything. And then there's another beautiful statement that says, someone who has nothing to die for has nothing to live for. And then when I hear your statement around people who have, it's not just about what they stand in, it's what they stand for. And I truly agree with you. I believe with you that fashion without meaning or clothes without meaning,
41:03 Jay Shetty? don't make us happy. They don't stand for anything beyond. And actually, that's where we become consumers. As opposed to conscious creators or expressives.
41:13 Speaker 02 Right. I know where I was going.
41:14 Jay Shetty? Oh, yeah, go on, tell me.
41:16 Speaker 02 You just promptly reminded me. So people have infinite choices today.
41:23 Speaker 02 I believe after all these years, I've earned the right only to be considered. And every day I have to earn the right to be chosen. And I can't become complacent and lax and rest on what we've done in the past. Because I need to be relevant.
41:42 Speaker 02 And a relevant, a competitive and relevant alternative today and then even more so tomorrow.
41:48 Jay Shetty? Yeah, absolutely. I feel like that old cliche of curiosity killed the cat needs to change to complacency killed the cat. Because curiosity should be encouraged. Curiosity should be the future. That's how we explore. It's complacency that actually makes you fall back and fall behind and lose. Right?
42:08 Speaker 02 Right.
42:08 Jay Shetty? Yeah.
42:09 Speaker 02 I agree. But it's not, I mean, I just think you. You need to every day contextualize what you're doing. And because it's moving so fast. And today, in my world, everything is global. Everything is interconnected. You know, the notion of building a physical wall separating two countries is so silly to me because at the end of the day, we are so connected everywhere today. Virtually and electronically.
42:46 Speaker 02 And we have the ability to speak to and inspire and move people wherever they are all the time. And I think today, everybody is in the media business.
43:03 Jay Shetty? Yes.
43:03 Speaker 02 We were talking about that briefly before. And we don't need the media to help amplify and tell our stories because we can all find audiences. And there are social platforms today we can connect with audiences effortlessly. And we all have the ability to amplify ours and each other's stories. And we can align and build an even bigger platform. And people can get together and we can retweet and repost. And there's no end to how far we can effectively proceed in that regard.
43:43 Jay Shetty? Yeah. And I love that about you. And anyone who's listening or watching right now, you should definitely follow Kenneth on Instagram because I find that you're extremely witty. It's extremely relevant. It's beautiful to watch because I find so many executives, CEOs, founders don't necessarily manage their own accounts. And there's like a million layers between the individual and then what actually gets posted. Whereas with you, it's very close. It's very authentic. It's stuff you're thinking about. It's things that are fresh off your mind. And I found that refreshing when we met because I know that as someone who's extremely busy, involved in so many different things, for you to even find time to post on Instagram. But you do, and it's meaningful and it's witty.
44:25 Jay Shetty? It's not just putting out a corporate stamp. And that's what I love. You've been able to differentiate the man and the brand, as you said.
44:33 Speaker 02 Yeah, and that's partially how I was able to do it because we've gone back and forth. And so the brand... Tells the business story and I tell my story and I don't take what I do seriously. I take the world seriously, but I don't take what I do seriously.
44:50 Jay Shetty? What do you mean by that?
44:52 Speaker 02 Well, I think that nobody needs what I sell. So, and I don't, I don't present it in a way that's any, that's any bigger than that. I have to make you want it and want it again, and I know that. And I do think it makes us feel great about ourselves. And I do think that wardrobe being one is an extraordinary privilege. And I don't want this to be misinterpreted because I think when we wake up in the morning, we have a clean slate, we have the ability to represent ourselves to the world every day on our own terms, unedited. Because most of the people you encounter in a given day don't get to know any more about you than how you present yourself.
45:32 Speaker 02 And so you can send a very powerful message to the world independently, individually, every day. And to be part of that is an extraordinary privilege. If I can be part of that expression, that self-expression that you choose to make. And, and I don't take that seriously, but at the end of the day, as I, you know, you wake up in the morning, it's not usually the first thing on your mind. Especially if someone in your world isn't well, or if you're hungry. And so I need to somehow keep it in context. So, and you know, and as I've often said, I can't change the world alone, but I can be an accessory.
46:13 Jay Shetty? I love that.
46:14 Speaker 02 So, and hopefully I'm enabled and allowed to do that and empowered to do that.
46:21 Jay Shetty? In your, in your spirit of always being a learner, you told me a beautiful story about how you've been learning even from your daughter. And, and I wanted to just share that with context of just how you've recognized this ability to learn from everything and everyone around you. When we met, you not only mentor, but you're willing to learn from those that you mentor. Like there's this beautiful reciprocal exchange in your life that exists. And, and the spirit and the energy you've built around yourself of always learning from everything around you.
46:53 Speaker 02 Yeah, I think I love the access we're all provided through social media and just and the likes to be enlightened and inspired by so much from so many. The story that I was telling you before was the one I was trying to write this book. I guess, I think it was the first one was Footnotes. My daughter Katie was eight at the time, so I can probably figure out when this was. But I would come home from work and I'd have to edit these work because I was on a deadline. And she's asked if I could help her with her homework and I'd say, Katie, I need just a few more, I need a half an hour.
47:34 Speaker 02 I have to work on this project and then I'll be there, I promise. And then she'd ask me this question, I remember it vividly, and it was, who gives you the work? Which I found interesting because she's at school and at school you don't have work unless somebody gives you the work. And then she says to me, and I said, well, I give it to myself because I need to do it. And then she says, well, aren't you the boss? And I says, I am, and that's why I give it to myself because then if I don't, no one's going to do it. So I'm thinking to myself, I just, you know, it was an opportunity to share an important lesson with my daughter. And then the next day, the same time, right after dinner, Katie says to me, so can you help me with this other project?
48:17 Speaker 02 And I said, well, I can, but just like yesterday, I need a little bit of time and then I will be there, I promise. And then so she, this time she changed the question. She says, aren't you the boss? And I'm saying to myself, I just answered this question. And then she's, and I said, yes, but I have to do it. And then she says, well, who gives you the work? And this went on for three or four days and then I was, and it was the same questions each time. And I saw this spiritual advisor of mine shortly after that. And he says to me, how is Katie? And I said, you know, it's funny because... We went through this process and she asked me to help her and I was working on something I had to get done.
49:01 Speaker 02 And she says, "Are you the boss and who gives you the work?" And then after several days, she kept asking the same questions. And I said to him, "It's amazing. She just doesn't get it." And he said to me, "Or you don't. She spent a week trying to teach you a lesson and you clearly still didn't learn it." And the lesson is that we make these choices. And I was choosing to prioritize them over her. And I had the ability to change that and I was choosing not to. But we are empowered to do most of what we do.
49:43 Speaker 02 We are empowered to change it. We're empowered to affect it. And we're very comfortable sometimes attributing that to other forces.
49:52 Jay Shetty? Absolutely. Always removing our own accountability somehow. And thank you for sharing that. I know it's definitely an open and vulnerable share. But it's so important for us to recognize that, that we are accountable, we are responsible, especially those of us who have created lives where you are working for yourself. And I find myself in that trap all the time. That I love what I do. I'm blessed to do what I do. I feel very fortunate to do it. That means I do it all the time because you feel so fortunate and blessed to be able to have that privilege.
50:24 Speaker 02 Yeah, and then you do it in a way, you know, your beautiful wife works with you and it's part of what you do at home. It's part of what you do in your career. You're emotionally vested in it and you're professionally committed to it. And which is why you're so inspiring to so many of us. Because you offer us so much in that process.
50:48 Jay Shetty? You're very kind. No, that's beautiful. I wanted to ask you, what have you done as a, has there been a Kenneth called daily ritual, a daily aspect of your life that has been there throughout? Or is there a new one? Does it change every few months a year? Has there been something that you've done, asked yourself, practiced on a regular basis, even if it's not daily, weekly, that you feel has been a cornerstone for your success, both internally and externally? When I sit with you, I feel I'm with someone who's both internally and externally successful, however you define that word, but someone who's accomplished on both levels. So what has been, has there been a cornerstone practice that's always been there?
51:33 Speaker 02 You know, I don't know how to answer that question. What I've often said to people is that the best part of what I do is that over all those many years, there's been no two days I've done the same thing. Because, you know, I'm touching so many aspects of the business and I'm touching the customer in so many different ways. You know, I've often said that I need to put myself in the customer's shoes in the hope that they'll put themselves in mine. But I'm not, and I don't have a ritual. I don't, and probably I should, and most successful people I know do.
52:11 Speaker 02 And, but I do have a sense of, I do, I do have visualized where I want to be and what is the best way to get there. And an example that I have often been using these days is if we all agree that we want to be in California by Sunday, then let's also know we have to be in St. Louis by Wednesday, and Denver by Thursday. Not Chicago, not Florida, and not Texas. So, and I always kind of check myself. Am I on a path that kind of takes me somewhat in the direction I want to go?
52:47 Jay Shetty? I love that. And I think you do. I think you have them, whether they're conscious or subconscious, your ability to question, your comfort with change, like to even say that you don't do the same thing every day. Most people think that they aspire for that, but most people don't really want that, because that's not easy to be able to deal with new situations, new scenarios on a daily basis.
53:07 Speaker 02 At work, I say to my associates often, are we going to do what we're going to do on Monday just because it's what we did last Monday?
53:15 Speaker 02 Because next Monday is a different world than it was last Monday.
53:17 Jay Shetty? There you go.
53:19 Speaker 02 And just make sure you're asked, we're taking our pulse and we're taking that to consideration. And if it is the same, then so be it.
53:27 Jay Shetty? Yeah. Love it. Is there anything we haven't covered? Anything in your mind that you wanted to share? Maybe, I don't know if you wanted to talk about UN and Sundance. Depending on your involvement more specifically.
53:37 Speaker 02 So I accepted a UN appointment about a year ago. Because they had just put forth a declaration to end AIDS by 2030. But I did it conditionally, and that is that they agree that, A, to accept cure as a component, because if we don't have a cure by 2020, we're close to that, you're not going to end AIDS by 2030. And that was kind of the ANFA agenda. So I was trying to marry my agendas so I could then accept, you know, that generous gesture that was put forth. And so then, and then how do we bring other resources?
54:22 Speaker 02 And how do we all, how do we get the community aligned with a clear sense of deliverables and focused on very real, precise outcomes? And how do we articulate what St. Louis looks like? And how do we know when we're in L.A.? So, but, so I accepted that. And that's, and so, and I try to marry that to what I, to my professional agenda. And I'm on my way to Mexico soon for business because we're launching the brand. And I'm going to wear my UN hat for two days. And then there's also, I'm also on the board of Sundance, which is an extraordinary initiative
55:06 Speaker 02 that I accepted and then I... Totally enjoy about ten, fifteen years ago. So, and that's all about effective independent storytelling. And that's what Sundance does, started by Robert Redford. So, and I've, you know, it has motivated and inspired me in many ways because, you know, that today, the world is about effective storytelling, independent storytelling, and how do we do it with the means we have, the resources we have to work with. And so I marry that as well to what I do. And there was one initiative, actually, I wanted to tell you if I Yeah, please. Oh, of course.
55:49 Speaker 02 There was another, so we launched AMFA, we launched the AIDS campaign in eighty-five. I joined board in eighty-seven. About a year or two later, I had a business dilemma that there was, we needed to be able to sell shoes in our stores without selling them off price. And we came up with this great strategy, which, this great plan. And, and that was to do a campaign to encourage people, to give people a discount off of the shoes based upon them doing something socially important and meaningful.
56:27 Speaker 02 And I looked around and there was a, an unsettling amount of homelessness that was overwhelming New York City at about that time. And first of all, people think homelessness is embedded in our, in our economy and in our infrastructure. It's not. And homelessness, to a very large degree, didn't exist in this country until the Reagan-Bush years, when the social safety net was withdrawn. And, but now you have this population that was growing. And it was overwhelming many of us in these urban cities, centers. So
57:08 Speaker 02 Politicians didn't want to address them because they didn't vote usually. And businesses didn't address them because they didn't consume. So we did a campaign which said, "Bring in a pair of shoes you don't wear for someone that will." And we had a picture of a homeless person. And we'll give you a 20% discount on a new pair. So we've said now to people.
57:26 Jay Shetty? That's beautiful.
57:27 Speaker 02 We motivated them to do what was in their heart. They would feel good about doing at a time when they would not ordinarily do it. And it was the month of February when our stores now were, had all summer product. And it was still 10 degrees outside because the weather hadn't changed even though we had changed our inventories. So, and we started what became known as a shoe drive. And later on, there were coat drives and there were clothing drives. None of that had existed at the time.
57:55 Jay Shetty? Wow.
57:56 Speaker 02 And over the years, we collected several million pairs of shoes. And then we'd find populations. My wife was running a homeless organization in New York. And she kind of always kind of encouraged and inspired me, and still does. Called Help USA, which was originally founded by New York's governor and my brother-in-law, Andrew Cuomo. So we would collect these shoes. We'd give them to home, at Help residents. And then we'd find other residents, other individuals that could benefit from the product, from these shoes. And then it became, over time, it was from a couple of days in February to the entire, to a week or then two weeks. And it wasn't just New York. It was all of our stores around the country. And it wasn't just shoes. And it was clothes and accessories.
58:41 Speaker 02 So we collected several million pairs of shoes over a period of time. Then all of a sudden, Haiti earthquake comes. And everybody is emotionally overcome and distraught and agonized. How can people so close to us? Be so devastated and how in fact we come to realize had they been so devastated even before the earthquake, living in such poverty and be so undeserved and in such need. So we changed the initiative immediately to a campaign to collect shoes and also funds
59:26 Speaker 02 for people affected by the earthquake in Haiti. We ended up raising maybe a hundred and something thousand dollars, which is a lot, but not in that world. And I mean, you're talking about, you know, a couple million people. And we then, I took a bunch of associates and we went to Haiti. We figured out how can we somehow make as meaningful, a meaningful impact as we can with the limited resources that were available to us to do it. And then we ended up needing to take a couple of trips because we couldn't figure it out. And eventually, we invested in a healthcare center with an organization called St. Luke's in C D Soleil, which is the most overwhelmed and undeserved and poorest population arguably
1:00:11 Speaker 02 in the northern hemisphere. And to this day, it exists and to this day, we, every year, we raise funds to bring medical equipment or other things to that facility. And it's this other dimension to what we do, it's we solved a business problem, but in a way, we created a, an opportunity to engage in a community in such a meaningful way. And associates come with us. We didn't go this past year, but we have, we've gone every other year. And it's, I find that maybe the greatest gift I've had after 35 years is I've been
1:00:55 Speaker 02 able to use, I've been able to do what I love as a platform for which to do something that is, adds so much more meaning to what I love. And
1:01:08 Speaker 02 And we, those opportunities continue to grow not and get bigger and more meaningful not less.
1:01:15 Jay Shetty? That's what I love, your commitment to service and your commitment to impact is absolutely incredible. I've got my five quickfire questions with you to finish off with. So here we go, these are quick answers, so you can give me one word, one line, one sentence. If you could walk a mile in anyone's shoes, who would it be?
1:01:33 Speaker 02 Oh man, there's so many people who have inspired me along the way, but I will say Nelson Mandela.
1:01:37 Jay Shetty? Okay, amazing. Your favorite guest that you could have over for dinner?
1:01:43 Jay Shetty? I know there's a lot of people that you've probably already had over.
1:01:46 Speaker 02 And assuming that Nelson is busy?
1:01:48 Jay Shetty? Yes, yes, assuming Nelson is busy.
1:01:53 Speaker 02 I maybe Martin Luther King.
1:01:55 Jay Shetty? Okay, amazing. Biggest lesson you've learned in the last thirty-five years?
1:02:02 Speaker 02 That what I do is not who I am.
1:02:05 Jay Shetty? What?
1:02:06 Speaker 02 That's a little more.
1:02:07 Jay Shetty? Yeah.
1:02:08 Speaker 02 Very different answer than the first two. I was thinking, that is something I often try to share with people because I think we often are blindsided by by what we do as in the bigger context, it's not.
1:02:21 Jay Shetty? Favorite city in the world?
1:02:24 Speaker 02 New York.
1:02:26 Jay Shetty? And your best piece of advice you've ever been given?
1:02:35 Speaker 02 Is.
1:02:37 Jay Shetty? Or given?
1:02:37 Speaker 02 Or what is the impact that you want to make?
1:02:42 Speaker 02 And apply it to everything you can, as often as you can.
1:02:48 Jay Shetty? I love it. Thank you so much Kenneth, I'm so grateful that you made the time to be here.
1:02:52 Speaker 02 Jay, thank you, thank you for what you do. I'm so happy that you now have this new platform for which to do it.
1:02:59 Speaker 02 And I love your story and it inspires me.
1:03:04 Speaker 02 And I hope you can continue to inspire so many more people.
1:03:07 Jay Shetty? Thank you so much, and I hope that we continue to be friends and I hope that I can continue to learn from you and be mentored by you. I feel your message is just, I can relate to so much of it, and I hope that I can follow in your footsteps in my own small way. That will be special for me. Yeah, thank you so much. Amazing.
1:03:25 Jay Shetty? And this was something that Kenneth sent to me when he knew we were about to share this episode. He's been working on something really meaningful and really impactful, and he wanted you all to hear it. Here goes.
1:03:36 Speaker 04 So here I am today. I sit and I reflect back on that thirty-plus-year journey of advocating on behalf of people living with HIV and working on behalf of those who have significantly, severely suffered from the wrath of AIDS. And knowing, as I said, and as you know, Jay, that more people arguably died of the stigma from HIV than from the virus itself. It's
1:04:19 Speaker 04 very unsettling, clearly. And today, we hear so many people talk about this pervasive crises that is chronic and that is overwhelming, and in numbers and statistics that are even, that are so much greater even still than HIV, and that's about mental health, about our collective mental health, our individual circumstances. And this is something you've spoken about a lot, clearly, more than I have. And...
1:05:00 Speaker 04 And the statistics aren't one in two hundred, they're one in four. And I even make the case that it's so personal in all our lives that everybody is living arguably with mental health crises and related crises. And if it isn't affecting them individually, it's affecting somebody that they love, somebody in their family, or somebody in their community, if not, somebody in their workplace. But we are all living with mental health crises, mental health issues. So, and part of that is because stigma, from what I've been told and what I hear now
1:05:40 Speaker 04 all the time, is as bad in that world, in this world, than it was in HIV twenty years ago, and way more pervasive. So I naively thought to myself upon working with a bunch of these very established organizations that so effectively and in such a dedicated manner, commits so many extraordinary resources to this fight and to support these individuals who are living with this. So I sit and I reflect back on that thirty-plus-year journey of advocating on behalf of
1:06:20 Speaker 04 and working in support of all those people who have either died from the devastating virus, the HIV virus, and/or, and/or living today still with AIDS. So I reflect back, Jay, at this thirty-plus-year commitment that I've made on behalf of people living with HIV/AIDS and advocating on behalf of and/or in support of those and living with and/or who have died from, and the commitment to the advocacy and also to research and
1:07:03 Speaker 04 to finding, finding ultimately a cure, knowing ultimately that is the only thing that is going to solve this problem and help all those people still living with the virus. And, but, and the most unsettling part of it remains that
1:07:24 Speaker 04 So many of these people, I strongly believe, and I've said this before, not have died from the stigma of AIDS, even more so arguably than the virus itself. So, and I struggle with that. And then I look around and I hear from all these people that as bad as HIV it was and still is, there are, there are so many more people today that are living with mental health issues. And instead, not one in 200, but one in four. And I arguably make the case that it's not really one in four, it's actually everybody. Because if it isn't the individual, it's somebody that in his family, from what I hear.
1:08:07 Speaker 04 And if not in their family, it's somebody in their community and/or in the workplace. But we are all living with mental health issues. And so it's not one in four, it's four in four is often what I'd say. And the stigma is so overwhelming and so devastating. And people say it's as bad as it was with HIV 20-plus years ago. So then I naturally say to myself in my ambitious naive way, well then, why don't we see if we can work with some of these extraordinary organizations, who I've had the privilege to meet along the way in this process, and see if we can rebrand mental illness.
1:08:48 Speaker 04 Give people the ability to define the world in their terms and not allow the world to define them. And in a way that's not overwhelming, but in fact empowering.
1:09:02 Speaker 04 Is there a way to do that? And so we sit at Down This Road,
1:09:07 Speaker 04 work with the best, biggest, most important organizations, NGOs today in the country. And
1:09:16 Speaker 04 Collaborate, cooperate, communicate. Everyone's on board. Everyone is absolutely dedicating, is committed to addressing the pervasive stigma that is overwhelming so many people in our lives. So, and the notion of rebranding is very powerful. So, we come up with, and we're working on this, this new vocabulary. The plan is to launch it and release it through social media platforms later on at the beginning of this next year. But the, the first step needed to be the formation of this coalition of these organizations and hopefully bringing together most, if not all, of the important organizations across the country.
1:09:58 Speaker 04 And at the end of the day, create a hub, a platform where they, anybody, anywhere marrying resources to needs can log on, identify their specific needs, and relationship their specific geography, and figure out how to bring resources to them and make it easy to navigate, easy to articulate, and, and access. So, these are critical, these critical resources, and there are extraordinary needs as you, Jay, have spoken about so well, so often.
1:10:39 Speaker 04 So, this is a path that we've set out upon, and we've now have just launched the, the Mental Health Coalition, which is a gathering of all these committed, dedicated resources, organizations that are committed to see this through. And I'm privileged to be able to work with them, and I'm, I've taken on this new challenge, which I, I commit will not, I will not allow it to consume my next 30 years, but it will consume an important part of what I have to give for, for, for, for a period of time because it is a, because it's important, as everybody knows.
1:11:22 Speaker 04 So, that's the road I'm on, the road I'm excited to be on, and, and we'll see where it takes us.
1:11:40 Speaker 05 Now, more than ever, we need someone on our side. But Rob Whitman? Whitman's votes drove up costs, cut Medicaid, and risked 350,000 Virginians' health care to pay for tax breaks for himself and his donors. He's not on our side. Shannon Taylor will fight corruption, cut taxes, and bring down costs. This November, vote for Shannon Taylor. She's for us. Paid for by HMP, theHouseMajorityPact.com. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
1:12:09 Speaker 06 Ally here with cash when you need it. You know, for the taxi that saved you, the guy who helped you move. Wait, are you supposed to tip at the car wash? Don't be in... Ally's 75,000 fee-free ATMs mean you always have cash when you need it. Ally Bank Member, FDIC.
1:12:26 Speaker 07 Bolder taste. Stronger flavors. Serious refreshment.
1:12:34 Speaker 07 White Claw Hard Seltzer Surge. Unleash the flavor of blood orange, green apple, and blueberry. White Claw Hard Seltzer Surge. Click or tap the banner to learn more. Please drink responsibly. Hard seltzer with flavors. 8% alcohol by volume. All registered trademarks used under license by White Claw Seltzer Works, Chicago, Illinois.
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