Part 1 - How Soapbox Is Changing The Personal Care Game

Welcome to this edition of the million Dollar Mastermind podcast. This is where we pick the brains of high achievers from all walks of life and get their hard earned real world insights on winning. I'm your host, Larry Wydell.

Hello, everybody. And we're talking with David Simic. He's a return guest. We only bring back our most popular guests. I'm just kidding. But you know, it's hard when you get the response that David got the first time. That hard not to bring him back. And we should have brought him back a long time ago and I guess 2021, we're looking up, looking back and seeing when that was. So your company has been on the move, David.

Congratulations, Larry. Look, I'm as shocked as you. No, but I, we all, humility aside, I get to work with an amazing team and we've, and we've hired professionals from Nestle and Unilever and l' Oreal and all these just amazing companies that we have the privilege to work with and talk about.

So let's get people who are not familiar with the first episode, let's get them up the scale about your company, Soapbox, and just some of the basics so they, they can kind of follow the bouncing ball here. Yeah.

So it's, it's great to be back. We have grown. We've tripled since 2021. And Soapbox is a mission driven personal care company. We thoughtfully make each one of our shampoos, conditioners, deep conditioners, body washes, liquid hand soaps, lotions, potions right here in the United States with natural ingredients. And then every time someone buys one of our products, we donate a bar of soap to someone. We are approaching our milestone of 40 million bars that we've donated to local homeless shelters and food pantries. And if you're listening, you may know this, you may not, but food stamps in the United States don't cover hygiene products. So one of the most requested items within food pantries are actually hygiene items. And then especially with the homeless shelters that we have the privilege of working with, if they have a shower program for their clients, the usage rate of soap is so much higher than like a winter coat because you're just taking care of clients on a daily, a weekly basis of where you're helping them achieve that level of health.

Yeah. So if you have a bad attitude towards a homeless person that has a little bit of a body odor around you, there's a reason for that.

Yes, there is.

No one's giving them any soap. It's not that they're enjoying that. And so you're plugging a tremendous gap and we're going to hit, let's hit a bunch of these things right off the bat. You were the largest producer of wooden American flags in the United States here on the board of directors of Flags of Valor. Where did that come from?

It's one of those interesting things where like I just wanted to give back and I also wanted to help out other companies that I thought had a great cause. And this is a veteran owned company that employs veterans that basically creates shadow boxes as well as, as other types of wooden products that celebrate, you know, how amazing this country is. So absolutely love working with them. Also have the privilege of being on Orchestra of the Americas, which is this beautiful tapestry of inviting artists that often get overlooked in places all over the world to be a part of some of the best symphonies and artistic talents all over the world. It really is, it's, it's an amazing organization. So I'm moving all up in the world, Larry. I'm getting invited to boards.

Wow, amazing. Now you've employed more than 70 veterans, raised over a hundred and over a million dollars for veteran charities.

Larry. I don't, I don't, I, I don't get to take any of that credit. That's totally Flags of Valor and, and the amazing leadership team there. I just get to help them navigate Amazon and how to grow their retail sales. And I'm just a, I'm a humble board member.

With the shadow box thing. For people who don't know if you have a family member who died in service and they have a military funeral, they have you get a flag folded up in like a triangle and then like what am I going to do with this? You put it in a, one of those shadow boxes and I have one of those for my father, a Vietnam veteran and there's a lot of those around the country and a lot of them on display, I'm sure. So it gives you some pride, I'm sure to be involved in that. Now talk about how you grow up and get yourself involved in a company that is oriented with a mission like this.

Well, I think first off, I don't want to let this pass by. Thank you so much for your father's service. And to answer your question, I think I like to be a part of mission driven organizations. Whether at a board level, whether at an advisory level, whether I'm a small time investor, emphasis on small, and especially here at soapbox like each. I think business can do good. I don't think business can necessarily replace the social fabric or safety net that government and or other organizations provide. But I do believe that better business can make a better world. And I think business can be great and I think business can do good.

David the thing that about business is it's touchy feely, is good, but you got to be able to produce, you got to be able to, you got to be able to do things, sell products, make. People are not going to keep buying it. And that's growth comes because you do a good job and you have a great product and you stay on the attack, you stay on mission and you continue to compound and you guys show it's one thing to have a success. We used to talk about in our company, people who came in and came out of nowhere and they shot right up the leaders bulletins and they were, they were doing incredible things no one had ever seen before. And then two months later no one ever heard of them again. So we used to, we used to call it the Disneyland of shooting stars. So you guys are, according to what we have now 16 times larger than you were in 2017 when you had to lay off half of your staff. And you have done a bounce back that's like epic and become one of the fastest growing, I guess seven, it says the seventh fastest growing company in the D.C. area, which is a big tens and tens of millions of people and companies. And so it's a big, big darn deal to be that much of a, in a growth business which is a staple. You're not, you didn't come up with a new radio or iPhone or something. I mean you, it's in a staple but still you're the fastest growing in the seven, the top 10 anyway. And that doesn't happen by accident. When you say you're up three times that's we had the last podcast. What does that mean? What is your. How do you keep up with volume?

Well, I think, I think there's a lot of really great, a lot of really great questions in there. Soapbox has been able to outpace competitors because of one, one big reason and that's because the team here has refused to give up. We've just decided to that we're gluttons for punishment. And no matter how many times we get punched in the face, we're going to keep on going after this and taking on the L' Oreals and the Unilevers and the PNGs and the Colgate Pomolos of the world. I very much believe, and I know our team believes that you can do well by doing good. And I think that great businesses have a mission to them and that their consumers know that there's a purpose to that. I don't think that, that. Now what I mean by that is I don't think every business needs to have a charity, but I do think that people when they're buying, especially consumer, when they're buying a consumer brand, they have to realize that this product is authentically of its brand. And, and what I mean by that is we, we have focused so much on like time and money and effort in making sure that we make phenomenal products. And I really genuinely mean this. Like, phenomenal products that don't have parabens and don't have phylates or silicones or harsh sulfates or EDTA or dyes or any of this type of junk. And then we get. And we test again and again and again and again. I mean, like I have about 200 of these little testing vials of everything in my shower at any time, much to my like, wife's chagrin, because we just test and we test and we test again and then we take it to a broader audience. And, and I think for us it's, we believe that if we can make a phenomenal natural product at an affordable price, that the product itself is going to do with a lot, a lot of the heavy lifting. And then it is our role being a conduit of that consumer choosing to buy our product and then us upholding that consumer's choice to then donate that bar of soap. So we really just view ourselves as we're the in between of a consumer making a decision to help someone else. But in order to do that, we need to make a great product that that consumer falls in love with.

The thing about great companies, it's kind of like bodybuilding. The heavier the weights you lift, the stronger you get. The more the muscles grow, the bigger the challenges, the more your team develops. And you like a lead, you like to follow, a leader that has a background of facing, standing up to some really strong headwinds and not getting blown over. And you talked about, you and your team have made decisions that you're just not going to get knocked down. What comes along. Now you're in the darn soap business. You're doing good for mankind. You're employing veterans. Who are these people coming out of the woodwork. They're trying to, to create problems for you and make your life miserable.

How does that happen, Larry? I think it's great. I want that competition as a Consumer. Right. I want to have as much choice and I want there to be a very, a very intense battle for my dollar on a daily basis. I think that's wonderful and I absolutely want that to continue in our free market system. Specifically, like who's coming for us? Like, yeah, we're taking market share. Like we're at, at some retailers we're a top 10 brand and we're the only privately held brand within that top 10. And like these are, these are not. Like we have the bestselling biotin shampoo in the world's largest retailer. Like of course that's pissing off l'. Oreal. Right.

And, right.

And, and they're paying way more people than we are to try to like squash us.

So yeah.

So I look at this and I go, I want to be David versus Goliath. And not just because my name's David, but I, but I want to take this on and really try to disrupt an industry and prove that mission based businesses aren't just a fad, but it's the future of business and it's better business.

Yeah.

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Now tell, tell people who are coming up the ladder and wanting to have the initial splash of success that you had. The kinds of challenges you get, where does the competition. Because the competition gets pissed when you take market share. And they, you know, we did it at financial services and they, I remember I went to North, I won't, you know, they ran headline stories and without making a phone call to check anything. And the attorney general of the state ran five year investigations and everybody said you guys run investigation and they weren't investigating anything. But it was enough to stop us, you know, give people the jitters, you know, to deal with. So I'm kind of familiar with it. But how do they come at you in that? How can people expect challenges? If you got a product, you're feeling good about it and where do they come in? They try and brand it the same way. They come up with a cut job price, they come up with something that make it seem like it's a better deal or what. All the above. Yeah.

Alan, I think as you said earlier, like it's shampoo, it's soap, it's math. We didn't create this super amazing new AI tool. We, we, we basically reinvented possibly one of the oldest products of mankind. And essentially competition in CPG or consumer product goods is going to come down to them boxing you out with major retailers because they're going to go to that retailer, they're going to put their money on the table, they're going to say instead of allowing this upstart brand to get this shelf space, we'll pay 200, you know, per SKU or we'll guarantee the sale or like if this doesn't work, we'll pay for 100% of the markdowns or whatever it might be. And when you have that type of balance sheet of these multi conglomerates, international companies, you could do that. Like you can absolutely force out young startup competition that is really taking off. I think that the way that, the way that we viewed this and what I would say to any listener who's starting any type of company is there's, there's a quote that leaves that lives rent free in my head that I think about a lot and that is most people overestimate what they can do in one year and they underestimate what they can accomplish in 10 years. And that's not me, that's, that's Bill Gates. And I think about that often because when we're creating strategy and when we're laying out our goals, consumer takes time. Like I think of Richelieu and Shea Moisture and how they sold their brand for almost a billion dollars to Unilever and that was a 30 year journey for them. And I think of Ryan at Method and that was a 20 plus journey for them. And I think of various different CPG founders and how long it takes in order for a brand really take off. And like you have this like 10 year overnight success, you get better at it, right? Like you get like. I feel like there's a lot of muscle memory that I have in terms of decisions that we make now that it's just like, oh, this feels really comfortable. Whereas like 10 years ago this would have been crippling in terms of the amount of stress that certain decisions would bring. But to anyone who's starting out, I would. I think you're absolutely going to be blindsided by the things that you don't expect within a year. But I think if you set ambitious goals and you surround yourself with people who are smarter than you, and then I think the most important ingredient is having the self awareness to realize the areas that you're weak in, in order to surround yourself with people who are stronger in those areas that you can achieve amazing things with a longer term perspective.

So I'm going to say a couple of things and get you to respond to it. First of all, what I hear you're saying, which is what a lot of us have to tell ourselves when we start, is like, this is not a sprint, it's a marathon. And you got to be ready for the long haul. Now that's a lie too. Okay, that's a lie too. Because the thing is in the beginning, it is a sprint because you better, you better be working around the clock to get something put together in a short period of time. But you better be ready to keep compounding. Once you get your toehold on the mountain and you get those first sales and the first product and you start to figure out what you're doing, you gotta be ready to shift gears, you know, second gear, third. You know that you don't have 20 gears on a little Fiat. You don't want to be, but you do have on an 18 wheeler, a cab of an 18 wheeler, where they're pulling these, these big trailers and sometimes two or three of them hooked together. You need a lot of gears if you want to get up to unilever size. They've, they've gone through a lot of things. But talk about this, it's a big breakthrough when you realize that. So I want you to speak about this, but I'm gonna tell you, I'm gonna do the team side too. There's a big breakthrough for us when we realize we got to make it happen. If we're the leader, we ask to be the leader. We work to be the leader. Now get off your butt and lead and stop running and whining. And I tell people all the time, this idea that billionaires don't pitch or the winners always are positive is the biggest lie in the world. But the thing is that winners get depressed, complain, whine, they just don't do it that long. And while they're whining and complaining, they're thinking about, how can I get out of this? And their bounce back is just amazing. So don't ever believe a successful person when they're whining and complaining and down it's just like they got punched in the jaw by Mike Tyson. They're going to come back, you know what I'm saying? That that sting will wear off. And Evander Holifield got hit in the jaw a couple of times too, but he came back. And so the thing is, winners go through all of those emotions, they just don't stay there. And you know, it's a matter of gather themselves and come back. And so at some point you've got to say I gotta be worth following if I'm going to be the leader of anything that amounts to anything. And I'm probably going to have some amazing challenges along the way. So when one comes, don't be shocked. So that's one stage. But the other deal is I got to have a team, I got to put some good people together because we're in competition for market share, whatever it is, and they're not going to give it up to me and us easily. We might win some, but they're going to come back next year. I want to knock us. You know, you don't win the super bowl every year. And so in terms of putting together a team, you got to have quality people, as good a people as as many positions as possible so you can go out and be competitive because it's not just up to you. So I've dumped a whole lot on your head to comment on, but I know you're up for it.

Well, we'll find out.

But, but I think the one of.

The things that that really rung true that I think is people are talking about it more now is that there's this. The number one thing that I've seen in successful entrepreneurs in the past 15 years that we've been doing this, the one that separates people who get it done and those who quit is grit. It's a like a second helping of grit that somehow that person has accumulated. I don't believe that's a at birth type of thing. We do see that there are much higher levels of founders that have some type of learning disability or grew up in a very difficult childhood or something happened to them that showed them that they can take one in the face and still survive. And there's this really weird like almost kind of Ted Lasso esque optimism that I have that it must be like insufferable to my friends and family and my business teammates and my co founder where we might experience some massive setbacks and I'll lick my wounds and within about an hour. I'm like, so what now what? Like, right, let's do this. Like, do you believe that this is something worth fighting for? Yes. Cool. Let's fight. And, and I think, I think that it's just unreasonable. Like, there is an unreasonableness with founders, especially early stage founders that are just gonna will their way to make something that shouldn't exist in the marketplace happen. And, and I think one of the things that has really blown me away in having a front row seat in so many other successful entrepreneurs journeys. A lot of them way more successful than mine is they just have the ability to eat.

Yeah. Where do you, how would you explain your ability to do that? Because it's got to come down to core belief that at the bottom of the hole there's going to be a way to bounce and climb back out. You know what I'm saying? There, there was somewhere down in there, someone's going to leave me a clue. Someone's going to holler down the hole an answer. Someone's gonna. Somehow they'll be. One way to look at it is if you're in that thing is like you're only one idea away from a complete turnaround in a business, any situation, one idea. But sometimes, and it's like Ecclesiastes says in the Bible, there's nothing new under the sun. Whatever depressing thing we've gone through, millions of people have gone through it and survived. So keep looking up, keep looking out, seek and you'll find. But where you get this is the whole thing. You're only beat when you stop asking questions. You stop coming forward. You just give up entirely. And that's why it's so stupid to do that. But if you keep asking questions, you keep meeting new people. In fact, the dumbest person you might meet today might have the perfect answer to your situation. The answers can come from just about anywhere if you keep your mind open. Have you found that to be true?

Larry, I think you're scratching at something that we recently did a not a culture reset here at Soapbox, but we definitely did a reminder. And I think what's really like a lot of people have said this. A lot of people who are way more prolific than, than I am have talked about how like the Netflix culture deck has been such a pivotal moment for high achieving teams. And what's interesting is our early culture values unknowingly were very similar. And I'm not saying that like we did something better or more drastic or whatever. It's just, it's really interesting as like reading no rules, rules. And, and really looking at what Reed did and, and the whole Netflix team, it's, it's remarkable. But what we've always had at Soapbox is we've always said we are open, honest and professional with each other. And essentially what that means is direct but kind. We want to create an environment where politics do not take over. People having the ability to speak freely and to speak candidly about bad ideas, and if they're hearing bad ideas. So in many meetings, I'm told I'm an idiot. And in honesty, that's a good thing, right? Like, I. I want a consistent barrage of my ego, especially when I'm wrong. And I want people to feel safe within our team to know that they're going to be rewarded and praised for always putting the company's interests above anyone's ego. So that's open, honest, professional, right? And like I said, like, the Netflix culture deck is so much better in terms of articulating everything that I just said.

Now, when did you find out about that? And why did that ring a bell with you?

I think a lot of team management is about empowering that team so that they can perform at their best. And I think this only works with high performing teams. Right, like this. This doesn't work in every team environment. And that's just because you need people who are incredibly motivated to do their best at work. And this is articulated better by others. But like, with freedom comes responsibility, right? And high performing people want to be there. They want to work. They want their work to have purpose and meaning. And I think what's so interesting is when you look at a lot of compensation surveys, people want to get paid a lot of money, but what people really want at work is they want purpose.

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