A founder watched his skincare startup collapse during the 2008 recession, liquidating $400,000 in inventory. He cried in his driveway as the truck left while his wife celebrated. He says shutting down a business hurt more than starting one.
One of my biggest business failures I ever had had me crying in the driveway. And I can tell you it impacted me so much because I had this skincare company that was doing really, really well. We were doing extremely well. I was shipping like $1 million a month out of my basement. But the piece for me that then all of a sudden 2008 happened and it was a colossal disaster. The entire market didn't really dry up, but it became, it really hurt us. And I'll never forget, we used to have $400,000 worth of skincare in our garage is I decided I'm just gonna shut that company down. It's just so hard. So I sold the skincare off to a liquidator. I never forget standing in the driveway. My wife was jumping for joy as if she'd won the lottery. And when this truck drove away, I stood there crying like a baby. I can tell you one thing, shutting a business down is a lot more complicated than starting a business. And when I watched my baby virtually taken away, never to be seen again, I was like, This is hard. It was one of my failures, but I think your failures are like university fees. If you learn enough from them, you'll come back even stronger.
