I interviewed 100+ dog parents before launching my product. The #1 pain point led to VIRAL TikTok videos with 500k+ views

If you're going to start something that you've never done before, you're going to run out of cash. You never know when the taxman is going to come.

With product businesses, you definitely want to have like good margins. You get a lot of cash tied up too. So if I put in a new product order, several months that my cash is out and I'm not making revenue. A big challenge for us is figuring out how can we get to a better cash conversion cycle. I know founders who are importing from China and have to deal with tariffs can go up to like 150%, just like something outrageous.

Welcome to Driving Impact. Hello Ivana, I'm so, so, so, so, so, so excited to have you at the pod. So welcome to Driving Impact, the top 5% method.

I'm excited to be here and so excited to catch up. It's It's been like a year since it— no, 2 years, maybe more.

So last time we saw each other, it was in Toronto. I was visiting my team, which was in at LinkedIn in Toronto, like downtown Toronto. And we were just doing Connect and we did a selfie in front of the LinkedIn sign. Funny. And it was so funny because like we used to be together in the Bay Area and then you're Canadian, I'm Canadian. And then I had a Canadian team as well. So it was so funny. You were in Toronto for a quick stint, I believe, right?

Exactly. I think only 3 years and we just moved out to Vancouver now. So we're back on the West Coast.

I'm back to the best coast.

Yes. West Coast, best coast.

So I'm super excited to have you because, uh, at the pod, we talk a lot about what are the different hacks or career strategies of the top 5%ers. So people who go above and beyond in their field. And what I find extremely exciting about your journey, Ivana, is that you, like, I met you when we were working in sales in the trenches at the Google in the Bay Area, selling advertising to all of those amazing customers and agencies. And I remember something about you is that you were extremely fierce, extremely courageous. And now from all of your dreams, you are the CEO of Playfield, and I want to hear all about Playfield because I remember you spent a lot of time at Google and then suddenly you created your own company. So tell us a little bit more about you, your dreams as a child. What were you ever like? What were your dreams? What did you want to be like when you were growing up?

I think I always knew I wanted to be— I think I don't know, I didn't know what the term was back then, right, when you're a kid, but I think I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur, or I, I at least like always had that spirit. So I distinctly remember when I was in 5th grade, um, my dad had these old ties that he didn't wear, and so I upcycled them. Like, I would cut them up at home and turn them into little coin bags because all the students in my class were carrying quarters to buy candy at school, and they were using like Ziploc bags that fell apart. So I was like, I'm gonna make something with like materials that I have, and I sold them at school.

Wow.

Like, yeah, so that was like the first kind of, um, I don't know, call it like iteration, I guess, of being an entrepreneur.

And you were very passionate as well about everything that was retail or e-commerce clients. Yes. In our sales team. And one vivid memory I have is you were part of this leadership program that back then in 2015, I don't remember the years where we were working together, which was the leadership program at the time. It was called the Coffee Club. That you had an executive presence goal and you did something extraordinary.

Yeah. I, yeah, I remember that. I think it was like 20— I want to say 2016, 2017. Yep. And then with the coffee club, it was all about lifting up other women within the organization. And at the time, you know, I was still pretty early. I would say like, even now I'm pretty early in my career, but at the time I was like a 20, 20-some-year-old, first time working in a corporate environment where you're interfacing with C-suite-level representatives. And one thing I really wanted to work on was just executive presence, right? Like, how do I carry myself differently? How do I think about presenting things to key stakeholders in a way that they would take me seriously despite having, you know, maybe fewer years of experience or just being on the younger end or even looking on the younger end, right? You want people to take you very seriously. Definitely.

I always thought, outside looking in, I'm way older, I'm in my 40s, I always thought you were— I don't know about that. I'll take it. I'll take it. I'll own it. Outside looking in, I always thought, like, my perception of you is that you were very polished. Did you face any challenges in your career as a woman?

Definitely. I think there were multiple things. I'm the first of my family to even graduate from high school, graduate from university, get a corporate job. And my family being, you know, I'm the child of immigrants. I think the way we were raised also, which I found really at odds with how corporate America works, being a Chinese-Peruvian child of immigrants, you don't really, you want to respect other people at the table. You don't want to dominate the conversation. You don't want to interject yourself where it doesn't make sense. And I found that especially in a sales culture in corporate America, it is a lot about being loud and being heard. I still think there's ways to do it tact— with tact, but I often felt like I just, you know, would kind of reserve my thoughts or wait until it was like the exact opportune moment. But sometimes you need to create those opportunities for yourself, right? So it's a little bit about finding balance. Yeah, finding ways in which I could make it make sense for me from a cultural perspective to then carry myself, kind of talk about my accomplishments without being too self-promotional.

This is so important, Ivana, what you're saying, because I hear it a lot from, from women. And that's one of the— so Harvard has spent 146 years studying what holds women back, and one of the factors is waiting for the perfect moment or waiting for the opportunity, and also maybe not being self-promotional enough. And I think that's important because when you think about women like Sarah Blakely, who was always on— yeah, and what I like about her, she was like us, was a salesperson, and she was very, very bold and very resourceful, and she was selling like copy machines and door-to-door, and she would just leverage that opportunity, which is not a glamorous job, It's a job. And she would leverage that. And you make me think of her because like from this job that's unglamorous, she, she took that opportunity and she built the muscle to be able to go for what she wants. And she found a problem and, and she reached out to one of the biggest brands and she sold a product. And what I remember from the leadership program, when we were one of the participants, one of the stories that really impressed me and that would always, because I— we put on the website internally, was that you reached out to this one of your heroes. This— and I remember you were obsessed with e-commerce and retail, you and Michelle both. And I was leading retail and I was like, these two, thank you. And, and I liked retail and I always thought I was going to launch a retail brand as well. And you reached out to the CEO of MM La Fleur. Can you tell me a little bit more about this this outreach, where did it come from and inspiration? Why her?

So it's so funny. I actually— it was at Google. Someone walked out of the women's bathroom wearing a trench coat that I was like, oh, that's stunning. I'm going to ask her where she got it from. And the lady told me she bought it from MM LaFleur. I looked it up online. I'd never heard of the brand. I looked up the, the company online, was going through their website, went to their About Me section, and then I read about the founders. Sarah LaFleur and how she had started the company with her own capital, how she had no prior experience in the fashion world, but just, you know, hustled, right? Like found a designer that she partnered with, gave her equity because she didn't have cash to pay her, and launched this incredible brand and business. And I was just so impressed because she's also an Asian American woman. I saw some similarities there, and I know that people get so many emails, right? Like, you're flooded now as a founder. It's like, I get so many emails every single day. And so I was like, okay, if I'm gonna reach out to her, I need to stand out in a way, right? I didn't know her email, so I guessed it. I was like, most likely it's first name at domain.com, right? And then I really tailored the email because it also came from a place of passion. Like, I genuinely wanted to hear about her story and, um, have like a quick conversation with her. So that's how I wrote the email. I told her how I discovered the brand, how I discovered recorded it at the Google office and then just sent it off to her. And, and she replied so quickly. And yeah, we set up a call, and then I've kind of seen her since then, you know, at her office in New York when I was traveling there for work, and then kind of just like kept that thread alive. But it genuinely just came from a place of passion and a desire to connect, and I think people can sense that, right? Authenticity that comes in the communication. And yeah, I remember at the time I was just absolutely obsessed with all things e-commerce and retail, and especially in the pandemic, that's when I really dug my heels in. I was listening to every single NPR's How I Built This podcast. Um, I binge-watched the entire Sarah Blakely masterclass. And how, by the way, I love it.

Great. Yeah, I, I, yeah. Yes, it's an amazing masterclass. I binge-watched it too, and I love Sarah.

I think one of the things I really love about her is she's also very— her values are very clear, right? And she's learned how to operate in a space that is predominantly male. Like, she's talked about how a lot of, um, she's joined entrepreneurial groups and it's usually all men. She's the only woman. And I remember one of the quotes, actually, there was a conversation. I think she was a guest judge on Shark Tank and someone else had said, business is war. And she spoke up and she was like, I totally disagree. Like, I don't think business needs to be war. I think it could be very collaborative. I forget her exact words, but it's very much like, I think this idea that like a rising tide lifts all boats and she communicates that really well. And so I, I absolutely adore her.

I think this is amazing. First, Ivana, and I like, I don't want to be cliché, but I see you in, um, M.M. LaFleur and how the connection is. Because now you've launched Playfield, you made your own bold move. And I was in preparing for this interview, I listened to your interviews and I was like, like, you created the— and the brand is just like, you created the mashup. It's like, you can do that? How did you do that? So the brand is impeccable. Like, when you talked about, like, we don't have the visuals, but just go and Google Playfield and you're gonna see when you launched online the different brand elements. And you were like, this pink first. Everybody knows I'm obsessed with pink. If you don't know, now you know.

Power color.

Yeah, power color. Like pink, fuchsia. So when you launched it, I was like, wow. It was like you could see the models, and Ivana is there, and then you have the suit, and then you created the flowers yourself.

Yes. I don't recommend doing that ever again. I was like, I gotta stay lean. Like, this is the most budget-friendly thing. And I think when I started Playfield, I don't know what it was. I definitely adopted a very much like can-do attitude, right? Of just— so I guess something I haven't— I don't share too often because I don't, I don't think I know how to tell the story. But basically, long story short, there was like we dealt with a family emergency and there was a lot of stuff that happened to us when we were in Toronto, like hard stuff. Life stuff, right? That's like you don't go through at work, or just, um, really, really difficult things. Um, and then when all this was happening, there was something else that happened, which was someone broke into our condo and stole my husband's road bike. It's like a $6,000 road bike.

Hi.

And you feel like— when you feel like all the world is against you, and, um, you know when they say like when it rains and we're like, really? Like this too? It just feels like insult to injury. Um, and for some reason, something really switched in me where I was like, I'm not gonna stand for this. Like, I'm not gonna allow this to happen. I'm gonna figure out who stole the bike and I'm gonna get it back. And all my friends were like, it's impossible. It's gone. Like, forget about it. It's Toronto. Bikes get stolen all the time. Cops don't take these issues very seriously. And I ended up through the power of community, cuz I was posting on every single Facebook group. I was like, I need to figure out like, joined all the stolen bike groups. I was posting, I was just like sharing, you know, the news out there. And then through the power of community, other cyclists were like, I think I actually saw who stole your bike. Or like, I think we saw it at this time at this intersection. And so I was tracking it and somebody else sent me a message. It was like, I was just at this park with my son. I think we just saw your bike there. Um, at 6 o'clock or 6 PM or so. I was like, okay, no hesitation. Took my friends and we just drove there. And started circling the area. I tried to get the help of cops, but they just were like, mm, call us when you actually apprehend the guy. I was like, when I apprehend the guy?

Oh, wow. Yeah. And then what if he hits me? Right?

I know. I was like, this is quite dangerous, but I honestly wasn't even thinking about that. There was just like a deeper internal motivation. My friends are very much like, she's, you know, Ivana's kind of gone off the rails. Like she thinks she's gonna find Mike, but we're her friends. We'll support her. and I found the guy by sheer circumstance. He happened to walk by riding the bike, and I confronted him straight away, kicked him off the bike, and took it back.

And it was just like, how did you— I want to hear. Okay, you're tall. First thing, Ivana is tall. You're taller than me. You're taller than me. And just tell me if you're doing like kickboxing or something. No, freehand the person.

You're just like, what, you're just Yeah, I was like, I, I mean, I probably said a couple things that cannot be said like on, on air.

We're just gonna keep it PG for now.

PG. But it was so, I was just like, so, uh, inner drive, inner desire. It was like, hey, that's our bike, you stole our bike, and distracted him, pushed him off. He had like a, a burrito in one hand and just like knocked him off the bike. And that's how we got it back. And honestly, if it weren't for my friends, I think he felt outnumbered because there were a number of us Right? So he's like, you know what? I don't want any smoke. I'm gonna go. But that, that instance, honestly, where I was like, nobody believed I was gonna get this bike. Like people thought long gone, forget about it. And there's this idea of like, I wasn't gonna be able to do it alone. Right? My friends came and supported me, even if it was like moral support and posting on Facebook through that cyclist community was how we found the bike. Right? So it was this life experience where, wow, we actually did something that I thought was— the odds were not there. And it's crazy, but honestly, when that happened, I was like, I feel like surviving this and dealing with other things, it really feels like nothing is impossible.

Yeah.

And if there's a will, there's a way, and you're going to find a way to make it work. And that was sort of, you know, things kind of build upon each other, but that was like pretty pivotal point at that point where I was like, I really think I can start a company. I have no idea how to do it. I've never incorporated anything before. I don't know the first stage of finding a product, like how do you even get something made, but I'm going to figure it out. And honestly, that was the starting point of, of starting, like having the courage to start my own company.

That's incredible. I know it's, I love it. I feel like what I'm hearing and I'm doing my own parallel is like, You have this, this strength, you have this rage. And some of the things that you described that happened to you, it's, uh, my little sister who lives in Montreal, she calls it a lifequake. And I believe it's coming from the term, it's coming from the book called Life is in the Transitions, that sometimes life is going to send you like an earthquake, but it's a lifequake, like where everything crumbles down.

Yeah, right.

Like if like people have cancer, um, you break a leg, I don't know, you have a divorce, you have like all the things happen at the same time.

Yeah.

And you're like, I think I'm gonna die. And so like you got like some issues when you moved to Toronto and the bike was stolen. And then how you deal with that lifequake, if you decide to rise and you become like, it happened to me and I, I went to Africa and I found a tiger painting and then I mean, I'm gonna make that not too long. I found a tiger painting and then my girlfriend told me to go do some, um, how do you call it, the frog. The frog is, um, a plant medicine journey.

Um, it's kind of like ayahuasca.

It's a different version of ayahuasca and it was so good because I was going through a life quake and in January I wanted to start the year afresh. And then I did the plant journey and I was like screaming and I was screaming and I told my therapist or the person, that guy, the guy, the shaman, and I said, there was somebody angry in me screaming and I think it was a bad spirit. She's like, no girl, it was you. And then I realized I had so much anger, right? And so I think, and whether it's pent-up anger or you have this energy, you have this energy that you can leverage to do things, to start a company, to exercise, to, or whatever. But I think—

Take control of your life.

To do this very hard thing, you have this— oh, my headphones are not even plugged in. You have this energy, you have this energy in you, and you— it's just a question of channeling this energy and a planned journey of whatever you do with it.

It's, it's—

and that what I'm hearing from your story is you had this, this rage that sometimes the universe pushes you through. Yes, an event, and it's not fun, but then you found the courage to launch Playfield. And we're going to talk a bit more about Playfield because I find it super interesting. And it's funny you say that because then I left my job, my very comfortable 19+0.5 corporate career in March. But like, it's like if you went back to 2017 when we were working together and you could have fast forward, I would have launched my podcast in 2017. You should have told me, Vanna, you should have told me. You should have launched Playfield like slowly, like from the quad. Seriously, we'll be in different places. But, um, what I— where I'm trying to go— come on, girl, let's go, short sentences, we can do this. So what I'm trying to, to say, and, and it's basically that we have this energy, we're capable of doing impossible or big, like take big leaps to get to this impossible dream. And sometimes we go through an exercise, a very hardship That shows us who we really are. That's all I wanted to say.

Yes. I think it's like two parts of it, right? Cause like the reality was I always had the know-how. You do too, right? Like, you know how to do this, whether you're aware of it or not. Um, for me, I'd spent so much of my time at Google helping other e-commerce brands grow. So I saw it at the forefront, but I think what I was lacking was a belief in myself that I I'd be able to do it. And if should I encounter any challenge that I'd be able to overcome them. So, and I've also found when you're soliciting advice from other people, it's all very well-meaning, but sometimes people project their own insecurities or self-doubt onto you.

Yeah.

So when you tell, like, for example, when I started Playfield, um, we are a bigger pet gear company, but we're starting off with a dog walking bag and a treat pouch. So When I told people I was making a dog walking bag, people were like, really? Like, who's gonna buy that?

You know? Can you tell my neighbors to please buy it because they're like lazy? Yeah.

Get your life together, you know? Stay organized.

Stay organized. No, I think, listen, couple of things. So Playfield, you had the Bailey Keep that went viral. Right. Can you tell me a little bit more about the suite of products? So now you're already in the six figures after one year. How did you do it? How did you do it? And how did you disregard the competition? Because it's not like you're not the first brand that creates dog products. There's multiple big competitors in the field.

This is going to sound so cliché, but it did start with a personal pain point. So I was using the Lululemon bag before. If you have it, it's just I found that it was a little floppy. It didn't have all the compartments that I ideally wanted in something where I take Bailey out, my dog, every single day, and I'm taking her out 3 times a day. That's a lot of time.

A lot of time.

Yeah, it's a lot of friction. So you're like constantly in and out of the house, and I'm like, I don't really want to be swapping things in and out of bags. So it was a personal pain point that I had. I looked at other options. I either didn't like how they looked, I didn't like how they feel— felt, or I didn't love just the functionality of it. It was like missing things that I wish it had. I wanted something that was really modular, like you could kind of customize it in a way, you could build upon it, you could shrink it down. And that's exactly what we've done with the Bailey Kit. So right now we have, we launched with essentially two, two products in three colors. So our hero product is a multifunctional dog walking bag. It's patent pending and I can talk all about that too, but it's got like a water bottle that pulls out in a unique way. It's got a poo bag dispenser. It's just got really smart organization and it looks really nice and it allows you to go hands-free with your dog as well.

I'm not a dog person, but I want— I like to understand. So first things first, Lululemon, there's like a whole section about how the downfall of Lululemon and how everybody attacked, how they became less relevant, how, you know, yoga and all those other brands took market share. So that's good move, Ivana. Secondly, like the modules, talk about the water bottle, that's for you, not for the dog, right?

It could be for the dog too, but it's just this idea that like sometimes you bring water with you, sometimes you don't. You don't always want a bigger bag. Like I don't always wanna carry a backpack, but in the off chance that I'm bringing water with me, either for myself or for my dog, I want another way to carry it. So we built in a, a retractable water bottle pocket that's made of mesh. It has a drawstring closure so you can pull it out of the bag and put water into it. And that's actually a feature that allowed us to go viral, um, several times. Like, we've had some videos like get over half a million views, um, on just one platform alone, which is insane. And, uh, YouTube, um, Instagram, and then, uh, TikTok as well.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

Yeah.

TikTok. TikTok. Okay.

Okay.

Okay. So why people are obsessed with like walking their dog and drinking water?

Yeah. Or some, it's just like, it's simplifying a problem that people have that it's an annoyance, right? When you're done with your water, you're done with your coffee, you don't have anywhere to put it.

Mm-hmm.

You don't always wanna hold it, so you wanna put it away in the bag. And I have, I can show you, like, where's my, my sample. Okay, so here's the bag in the red color, right? It's— it looks simple, but it has this D-ring that allows you to go hands-free with your dog. There's a poo bag dispenser built in through the back, and then this is our discreet water bottle pocket. You unzip it and then you whip this guy out, and you can carry— you can use it for water. People use it for tennis balls. So if you own a dog, your ball gets really slobbery or muddy and you don't want to shove that in with all of your essentials. So you put that in a separate storage that you can clean. And, and then there's just a bunch of other compartments in here too, like credit card slots and a key leash. So we really focus on human-centric design for pet lovers.

And then you can put your phone because like we know the phone addiction is real.

Yeah, you gotta fit your phone in here, you know.

Okay, and that's it. And that's the Bailey kit.

That's the Bailey sling bag. And then the Treat pouch is another component that we have. So this idea of modularity is you can build this on top of the— you can actually attach it to the strap of the Bailey sling bag, and it's for treats. It's also for a tennis ball. So again, same idea, got a dirty tennis ball, you can actually shove it in here. We have a magnetic flap closure and a zipper that goes around so things don't fall off. And then there's a belt clip, so you can actually hook this on to the strap of your sling bag or to your pants or to something else. 'Cause some people when they're actively training, they wanna clip this to their pants and they wanna be able to get treats pretty easily. So yeah, I mean, I must have interviewed over 100 pet parents before I launched the company when we were still going through design and iteration. So I definitely did not build this in a vacuum, but I did ask like, what are your common pain points? Or, you know, talk me through your day, talk me about how you, walk your dog out, what do you bring with you? Where do you put everything? And people are like, oh, I put treats in my pocket. Yeah, that actually gets kind of gross because there's crumbs everywhere.

Yeah, that's gross.

Yeah, you pull out kind of, um, just tidbits from people to help inform your design decision.

So what was the biggest pain point from dog parents when they go on a walk? Like, it takes me— like, I have a son, yeah, 5 and a half year old. It takes me ages to get ready just to go out.

Yeah.

Mommy, I want my water bottle. Mommy, you should, you should. He tells me what I should and shouldn't have. You should bring snacks. So this is like the fanny pack for dog, dog moms and dads. So like what was the number one pain point? I'm just curious. Yeah.

I mean, the reality is it's just everyone brings their dog everywhere now, right? And you don't want to be constantly swapping your, your For Dog things with your other bag that you take when you go to the grocery store, or if you're going to brunch with the girlfriends, you wanna be able to consolidate everything. Without looking like, oh, this is my dog walking bag. So we wanted something that served the purpose of just carrying your essentials, um, without looking like, you know, it's like—

like a bag lady, a bag person.

Yeah, exactly. So we're kind of intertwining pet and lifestyle and building within that intersection.

It's amazing. So how— for all the entrepreneurs, because like, this is like a big— we talk about Lifequake, there's a Careerquake. Happening right now where we talk about, it's like the great renegotiation or everybody's trying to figure themselves out. I talked to a lot of different Googlers who are like, I'm kind of happy, but I also have the golden handcuffs. I'm kind of like, that was exactly me.

Yeah.

That was you too?

100%. I thought I was going to be at Google for 5 years. And then when I looked up, it was 8 years. And it was, I'm telling you during the pandemic, when you have a lot of time to yourself to think, cause you're, you're sheltering in place. And outside of work hours, like I'd wake up early in the morning. First thing I did was meditate. And the next thing I did was just listen to NPR's How I Built This and watch. I would Google different founders and I'd read up on their stories. And I started reaching out to a lot of founders as well, because I just thought their stories were so inspiring. Really, really loved the idea of building from zero to one. And I just, I could see myself in their shoes, but I just didn't know how to get there, you know? And, and then you're, um, Google was a great company, but it's just, again, like in the pandemic when you're working from home, you're like, it's just me and the work. Like, I'm not seeing my coworkers in the office.

Yeah.

Um, I'm not enjoying the perks of the building. I'm just doing the work and I realize I don't really love this work. You know, I'd rather, I'd rather build something for myself where I have creative control. And I get to work on things that are different every single day. And that's what I wanted for myself.

So how did you make the jump? Because that's the big— people are in this weird in-between. And some people like— and I was talking to somebody last week and I'm like, you're about to get married, which means kids are coming. And I'm like, do it before you have kids or like figure out what— how did you transition from full-time corporate worker to full-time entrepreneur? Did you moonlight? Like, what was your strategy?

I think I, so I tried, I tried, I didn't, uh, this is before we had Bailey, so I didn't have a dog before. Um, so before I left Google, I tried brainstorming other ideas. I wanted to do like a clean, um, like eco-friendly cleaning supplies, similar to Blueland. Um, I looked at a lot of other things. But honestly, just for myself, I found it really hard to switch my, like, Google brain off to then work on the side project. And it just, on it, I was just exhausted. Like, I was just tired. I was burnt out. Um, so I don't think I was able to really think creatively in that way. And then we had an interesting life transition where we ended up moving up to Canada. So for me, that was just the perfect time for me. To be like, okay, you know what, I'm going to leave Google and I'm going to take some time off. Um, I explored different things. I looked at the seaweed industry. I, um, I got my Pilates certification as a Pilates instructor. I was like, I just do something that does not involve screens for a while. Um, I did a little bit of angel investing too, so I looked at a lot of different startups, which was also actually quite helpful. I looked at a lot of pitch decks, talked to a lot of founders. And again, just like exposed myself to more and more builders within the space. And so all to say, I think with my journey, it was a little bit of a slower build. I will say though, I think I always, I always knew I wanted to do something of my own. So when I was at Google, I was quite, I saved my money. I saved my money. I invested it. I made sure I had like a decent, kind of, um, fund I could fall back on when I, if I wasn't working. And then I did take on some consulting projects as well when I was up in Canada, helping other businesses. So helped me kind of just like fund my life as I slowly then got the inspiration. Then we, you know, brought Bailey into our lives. And then all of a sudden I had like a light bulb moment. I was like, I'm going to do this. I'm going to set aside X amount of money to invest in the company and build it from the ground up.

I think one of the questions that many people ask is like, and I talked to a lot of ex-Googlers. It's how much do you have to save? How many years? How, how much runway do you need? I have my own answer, but I hear yours of like how many years of life do you need to save if you're gonna become an entrepreneur?

Yeah. I mean, it depends on, it depends on your circumstance for sure. I know a lot of founders who, um, let's say if they, you know, are starting a company, like some people do move back home with their family to save on costs. That's not an op— that wasn't an option for me.

Yeah.

Um, but for myself. I think I would feel most comfortable with like, like a year to 2 years. Some people do 6 months to a year. It really depends. Yeah. I don't think that's enough time. I think you need at least a year of saving.

The people I know that even have saved 2 years, it's not enough.

Yeah.

It's not like, I would say like 3 years unless you have a rich partner. I would, I would go, I would steer towards 3 years because it might take time until Yeah.

Yeah.

3+ years, unless you have, unless you buy a business that's already running and profitable.

That's another option too. Yep. You could become an entrepreneur by acquisition. Um, a lot more people doing that. There's just like a bigger thesis of a lot of businesses coming up for sale that don't have succession plans. And they kind of are too small for traditional private equity, probably too small for a strategic acquisition. And these are great positive cash flow businesses. So that's another way for people to become entrepreneurs.

Yeah. And I like your idea also of having like consulting, like starting consulting right away. So one of my friends ran out of cash and was like, I'm starting an agency. It was 2 years outside of like a corporation. It was like, I'm going to go back to selling. And then it was like, oh no, I'm just starting an agency. So like thinking about how can you get like cash flow quickly, even as you So it's not ideal, but if you're going to start something that you've never done before, like you could have like a service component and then a pure, maybe if it's a product type of component, because you're going to run out of cash very quickly and you never know what the taxman is going to come. There's always something, right?

And you never know when tariffs are going to hit you either.

Oh yeah. So how did that change? Because how, like, because you're in a six-figure portion and how is your profitability with uh, playfield right now?

It's pretty good. Like our, our, so we're starting off with really strong, um, margins with our product. It's like high 70s, like low 80s.

That's, that's a, that's like retail is normally like 40%. Yeah.

Apparel and like, it's bad. So yeah, you definitely wanna have like good margins to support the business. Um, Yeah, we— so when I first launched it, we were— we actually— so we get our products made in Vietnam and then we import them into Canada initially when we were— when I first launched the business and they had a free trade agreement. So you're actually not paying tariffs. So it's always important when you're like finding suppliers, knowing where you're sourcing from, what the tariff agreement looks like. And so when we first launched, that was actually quite nice. Now I would say like 90% of our customers are in the US. So I didn't really want to continue fulfilling from Canada to the US. I wanted to cut down on shipping times, and I also just wanted to find someone who could take that off of my plate so I could focus on more strategic initiatives. So now we have a 3PL in Arizona. Um, and yeah.

So US to US, so you don't have to deal with tariffs. Smart.

No, we do have to deal with tariffs, unfortunately. So now that we're importing directly from Vietnam to the US, we are getting hit with tariffs. Yeah, but I think it's like 17%, which is still pretty high.

It's not, it's not that bad. Yeah.

Some people, I mean, I know founders who were importing from China and they had product on the way and they got hit. I think it was like 150%, right? It's just like something outrageous.

So they're gonna get out, go out of business.

I know you can't, like a lot of them turned down. I found friends who turned down really large retail orders. Because they're like, we cannot, we just can't do this.

You're going to lose money.

Yeah. Yeah, I know. So it can be very painful. So with product businesses, something I've had to learn and I'm still learning, it's just so different from tech, right? Where you can make a change overnight and it goes live. But with product, you're forecasting months in advance and you get a lot of cash tied up too, right? So if I put in a new product order or production order, like that's several months that my cash is out and I'm not making revenue. So a big challenge for us is figuring out how can we get to a better cash conversion cycle? You know, maybe it's like, how can we cut down on production times? How can we maybe get pre-orders from people? Which was nice. We did do pre-orders this time around. When we launched the new collection, we were, we announced pre-orders. So you're getting a lot of upfront cash as you're waiting for your product to arrive to help bridge those months.

How long do people wait for their pre-orders?

I don't think people wait that long. I think for us, I was going to say like we're not going to do a wait longer than a month.

Okay.

So I had customers expect to wait like 3, 3 weeks or so, 3 to 4 weeks. But we ended up getting our product a little bit earlier. I air freighted some product over so that we could quickly fulfill the orders.

And then how many product lines are you planning to have in the next like year or so?

Yeah, again, it depends on cash flow. We are working on more colors. We have a trade show coming up in like 3 weeks in Vegas. So that's when we're going to— hoping to meet with a lot of major retailers. Um, we actually just— we're going live on a national retailer now, but I'm announcing it next week.

Okay, but this is not gonna be like— I'm not releasing— I'm, I'm gonna release it in a couple weeks.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, so it's like there's always like 2-3 weeks 4 weeks even before.

Oh, that's right. Okay, so then you're getting the first news here, which is that we're going live on chewy.com, which is the biggest— yes, yes, in the US.

Yeah, my friend was a managing director there.

Oh, really? Cool.

Yeah, yeah. Oh, that's so— congrats! It's such a big brand.

Yeah, it's huge. They have so many customers, and they're just— they're known for really good customer service, and they've been trying to uplevel their inventory selection. So we're really, really excited to be part of that.

So it's going to scale.

I hope so.

That's, that's— so, okay, how many products are going to be distributed on Chewy.com?

So right now we have, let's see, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 SKUs on Chewy.com. And then we're working on some smaller things as well that will hopefully— we'll test it out on our website, see how it does, and we might—

you're going to go big.

You're gonna go big. That's the goal. Yeah.

What are you gonna do with all that money? I'm just kidding.

Oh man, it goes fast. You're like, where'd all that money go?

I'm gonna go to Vegas. From Google to scaling on Chewy.com, being acquired to Chewy.com. I'm just kidding. I did not say that. She didn't say that.

Well, you never know what could happen. You know what actually would be a really cool full circle moment though? If I could go back to the Google stage and talk about career journey, talk about my days on agency and helping e-commerce brands and then becoming a speaker or something.

Like, um, honestly, Ivana, when, when you told, like, when you said that you were developing your executive presence, I was like, what?

Really?

Because like, when we asked you at the coffee club, for your testimonial, you said that you had a goal of improving your executive presence. And then you said that you gave— you signed up to do a Google Hangout on Air.

Yes.

And then because you wanted to go and branch out in bigger and broader places. And then after that, you had the courage to reach out to the CEO of M.M. LaFleur. The reaching out to the CEO of M.M. LaFleur, I think, is extraordinary. Oh, okay. For me to hang out on there, I'm like, she's so real. What are we talking about?

Yeah.

That's why, that's why I'm like surprised.

Several years after that, I ended up hosting a Talks at Google, um, with Sarah LaFleur. So I invited her to speak at the Google like Talks on Air. It's on YouTube and it's on the whatever platforms it's streamed on, but it was kind of like, again, like full circle moment. Wow. It's—

for me, it's incredible because I think some of the impacts of, of the program is just the confidence.

Yeah.

Because outside looking in, like, everybody's— every, like, woman, everybody's working on a skill set, but it's all, it's all in our head, like, what our goals are, or we're trying to overcome something, we're trying to— or somebody, somehow, somewhere 'Give us some feedback,' and we internalize the feedback. But the perception from— I mean, it's my perception, maybe somebody else would say something else. I always thought you were very polished because I spent a lot of time coaching some account strategists, for example, who needed more presence.

And, you know, I don't think you were one of them. Well, thank you, Katheline Jean-Pierre. I, you know, there was actually something I do want to touch on. So do you remember at Google we did Insights, True Colors or something like that.

Discovery. Yes. That was so good.

Where you do the, you get like a color for your, I don't know, your personality or certain traits and things like that. So red was a very like bold, assertive, commanding color. And I remember one of the leaders like really wanted more people with the red color across the sales teams, right? They're like, we need people who are assertive, da da da da. And my color was green. Green is like about community building. It's about people. I think they perceived it as like a softer color, you know? And I remember actually when I was younger and very, you know, you're easily influenced. You're like, oh no, like I'm soft. How am I going to thrive in the sales world? Now that I'm older though, and more experienced, I see how having a unique You need diversity always.

Yeah.

So, like, the most effective teams had a blend of colors, not like stark red across the board. And then I also found out over time that it was actually not a weakness, but a superpower. So, the ability to be able to connect with a lot of different people, to collaborate effectively and build these networks. I have a massive network. This sounds so braggy, but like, I have a really big network of founders and people I've met over time and Um, I'm often told like one of my superpowers is being able to bring the right people together. And, but I didn't know that back then, right? Like I perceived it as a weakness and I internalized it as such and didn't actually see it for the superpower that it is.

Yeah, no, I think that's a beautiful reflection because like some of the insight discovery, so I was a facilitator of the insight discovery. And what is important to know is that it's— there's a color, the color evolves over time. That's number one. Secondly is there's some people who are very balanced across the colors, and there's nothing wrong with having more or less, but the more balanced you are, it's kind of— I don't want to say you're a people pleaser because that's not good either, but the more digestible you are to a bigger group of people. Yeah, I think you want to also look at organizations and parts of an organization where there might be hiring certain trends or colors. For example, Google was very blue, which is analytical, and red. So they like people who are very analytical with the red drive to action. You don't want to be just blue because you don't want to be coming with dead data and like buying like No, we want to use the data and then what are we going to do with it? Um, yellow at Google is not super well perceived.

That's interesting.

Because yellow is like, it's like social butterfly. I'm like, so you just want to have a little bit of it, not too much. And then red is like bold, but you need the blue. Right. And then green is great because Rishi was a green, right? So he was a uni, he was blue and green. So it was data, data, and then unify. But Michelin is very popular because everybody would feel comfortable in its presence, right? And then things evolved. When I started at Google, I was very yellow, and then all the other colors, but it was yellow, red, and then at the end I was very red.

Red like Louboutin heels?

It's more like too many targets. It's like 10 years of target can do something to you.

Oh, I know.

And it's kind of like you're as good as the last quarter's target. It's, it's literally like, if you finish at 120% and next quarter you start at 35%, nobody cares about finishing. So it's like, that's going to bring the red.

Absolutely.

And what I liked about the Inside Discovery in the end is the recommendation of what you need to find balance. I think it's. And that's, people should, and I think we just, it was expensive, right? It's $1,500 to run this thing, but I think people should revisit it every quarter and have it as, we're going to do inside discovery, we're going to create a plan, and once we have this plan, we're going to see, check in with you. So that it's holistically, and then you're going to run it again next year and stuff. But nobody looks at, just, you have one conversation, you're going to busy, you're busy that day. Or you're going to be like, you're going to think about your target and then Ivana is going to leave thinking that green is bad and then that's it. And then she's going to go take an executive presence. It's fine. You ended up doing extremely well. So, but it's all good. It's great.

Yeah. Hindsight's 20/20. You definitely, you definitely grow and change over time.

I still remember my, um, cause I was very red at the end and my recommendation was to do more yoga and meditation and I still. I still meditate to Joe Dispenza because he's the best. So I want to do rapid fire questions because it's a career podcast and for the top performers and achievers. What are your top 3 career advice for people who want to be able to reinvent themselves and be very courageous, uh, in their career to achieve their dreams, just like you're doing right now?

So top 3 things, get to know yourself really well, like do the work to figure out who you are, where you excel. What you enjoy and how you operate. Second thing I would say is, um, it's a marathon, not a sprint. I think often you feel this pressure to be like, oh my gosh, I'm so behind. I need to do all these things, but break it down. Like 3 tasks most, maybe focus on 1 project a day. Progress, like focus on progress. If you make like 1% progress a day, it compounds seriously. And then the third thing I would say is Um, try not to operate in a bubble, like talk to people. If you're starting something, if you're thinking about starting something, set aside time every week and reach out to people you don't know and just build out that network, like cold email, um, tap friends of friends, ask for introductions, but you'd be surprised. I think a lot of doors open that way when you're really just very real about what you want or what you're trying to learn.

That's amazing. Thank you so much. Okay. We're not done with the hot seat, girl. Okay. What is one very, very radical career advice that you would give people? Something that you didn't know, like, 10 years ago that you would like, if you had to do it again, 10, 15 years, that's what you would do instead of what you did.

Yeah, I think when you're young, sometimes when you're in a role that you maybe don't love, just know that nothing is permanent. Right. And I think sometimes when I was younger, it definitely felt like there were, there were times where I'm like, oh man, like I'm stuck doing this forever. Or the commute down to Mountain View. That was like an hour and a half each way, 3 hours a day. I was like, I'm going to die on this Google bus.

Um, but that was 5 years of my life.

It was painful.

Oh my gosh.

It's, um, there's an impermanence that exists. That is beautiful in its own way as well. So just know that things can change overnight for better or for worse, and just try to get as much as you can when you're in that position.

Meditate on the Google bus.

Yeah. Try not to throw up on the Google bus.

How did you find your voice? And that's gonna close our interview today. How do you find your authentic voice? From what you shared, being the first one to graduate college, being a Chinese-Canadian daughter, and being told to follow the rules and wait your turn and be silent?

Yeah. Try new things and work on sharing your voice often. So I think I found my voice by just throwing myself into unique opportunities. So whether it was hosting Google Hangout on Air Or after I left Google, we did a van life across the country, like something I never thought I would do, right? But you just put yourself in unique situations where you get to learn and experience something totally different and then practice sharing your voice, whether you're journaling, right? Like writing, just go through your thoughts, process them, understand them, or talk to people or, you know, do podcasts like this is a great opportunity to share and just kind of perfected. And then over time, you just, you have real assurance as to who you are and what your voice is.

Yeah, podcast lets you let the crazy out every day.

Yeah, exactly. You gotta just, you gotta get it out there.

No, but thank you so much, Ivana, for taking the time. I'm so, so, so glad we could reconnect. And I'm so excited about your big news. We promise we're not going to release anything. We're not that fast. We're not that fast anyway. We're taking our time. We're not on the productivity target anymore. But so excited. Don't have a dog, otherwise I would be asking for a pouch, but for a kit actually. But so excited. Keep us posted on everything that comes out and then I'll be in touch as well.

Yeah. Thank you so much for having me today. It was so fun to chat.