The Importance of Making Yourself Stand Out with Fashion Leader Matteo Perin

Hello, Mateo.

Hi, Larry.

Looking forward to getting some insights about how to take an idea and something that you're passionate about, you have a little success, but then propel that into your own business and your own brand. And what people don't know was that I spent my early high school years in Tuscany. My father was in the Air Force and we used to get on the train. Small high schools, not a lot of American high schools in Italy back then. But we would take, we would play Verona and Vicenza and Naples in basketball and football. We would ride the trains. It was a limited schedule, but we played over and over. But Ferroda and Vicenza, and the big battle cry for the school was beat Vicenza. Somehow we cared more about beating Vicenza than Verona.

But that's funny.

And you know, I was telling you this last summer about where Camp Darby was there in Torana, below Pisa. And you said that when you went back, you drove down that road and went right by it or something.

Yeah, actually this summer I had a friend who invited us to, you know, go see them. And so we're going there and we go to Livorno. We stay, you know, with his parents, we have dinner and stuff, and then they go, let's go to the beach tomorrow. And we go and we're going to Tijuania. And then I see Camp Derby and I'm like, what is this? And then, you know, we talked and he said, that's the beach. And they have a thing, a flag saying that. The American beach. Yeah, that's where the Americans go.

Yeah, that was my high school job at 50 cents an hour, working putting the chairs out of the American beach. But one of my first. Well, yeah, one of my early jobs. But the thing is that now how did you go from that? You're out in la, you're growing up and now you're starting to think more serious about a business or when did the idea of getting a business of your own and, and being serious about this rather than just picking up a few dollars here and there. When did that get in there? And then how did you make that transition happen? What can people. What did you do right in that area?

Well, so for me, it took a little longer than I actually wished. Cause I started getting my own business in early 20s. And the main reason is because, you know, you, you go through life and then you think on, on things in the past. But you know, I had a few people that were quite negative around and they always made it sound like it would be impossible for my dreams to come True. And these things. So, you know, after you leave these people behind and you actually find people that are not nice and actually look at life with brightness, that really gave me a new understanding and new scope because I had a goal. I wanted to be a designer. But everybody would just tell me, oh, you can't, you didn't go to school. I didn't have money for college, so I basically self taught myself and. But you know, it wasn't until the early twenties that I realized, you know what, I can actually do this. So we got a store in Italy because in the US at that point I, you know, I was basically on my own. I was bigger, but I didn't have maybe, you know, the trust in myself as much as I wanted to. So I went back to Italy and I opened a store with my mom, a clothing store on the lake, Lake Garda near Verona. And you know, but that gave me actually the freedom. I'm like, I can do this. I spent the summer before working for someone else at a store on the lake. And I realized, you know what, I can do this. Everybody thought I owned the other store, so maybe, maybe I should own it. Because that's, you know, that's the one thing that I would say, and I know we've talked about it before, is when you find good people also that work for you, you know, always like actually motivate them and make sure they know that they're well liked and everything. Because, you know, I remember working for this store and the people that would come and shop thought I owned it because of how much I care for it and would take care of people. And then I definitely was not felt like, you know, I made a difference at all. So I just said, you know what, okay. And I opened my own. And because I didn't have enough money, I asked my mom to give me a loan. And you know, so she helped and that got me started. So the first year I had one store, we did incredibly well. And you know, of course I was working from 5 in the morning to 1pm No, 1 1am in the morning because it was a lake town summer. So you stay open? I didn't want to lose a client.

Yeah.

Someone came in at midnight, said, can I. Are you open for shop? I'm like, I am.

I. I am.

Yes.

Can you do this? Yes, I can. Can you draw this? Yes, I can. So whatever they want.

Yes. That's always been one of the. And again, I go back to another family thing. I grew up with my great grandfather. He was born in 1899. Okay. He was a very known, well, businessman in the cattle business here in. Here in our town. He had a cattle business, he had a restaurant and he had a chop house so nothing would go to waste. Figured out how to make money from everything that he did and. But he died when I was 14. He passed. He was 98. And. But I learned a lot of great lessons from him and, you know, so. But that was one thing that pushed me. I'm like, okay, I'm going to do this business. And then after the first year I had a store, I'm like, why do I just need one? I want another one. So I had an opportunity to get two more. And I said, why not? Why only get two if I can have three? So I opened the next. I bought two more. And the next season I had three stores. So that was much busier time and.

More headaches, but pretty rapid expansion.

Yes. But, you know, I believed again, when you love what you do. I was so in love and so energetic and, you know, even though it was a lot, a lot to deal with, you know, 22 employees and I was young, I was in my 20s and you know, but it went well and I pushed and, you know, I started putting in. I used to buy goods also, of course, they were not my design. And then actually with three stores gave me the freedom to actually put in some of my designs because, you know, I get volume and also. But also it allowed me to make some things that I design and put them in the store and. And see how. How they went, you know, that way. It was, you know, my creations.

Yeah. And Lee out in Aspen that we've had on Lee done the same thing. She's got three stories, she's got her. Her own line, Oda now and similar type things. So you get your own brand. And what did. Now your family was. You knew all the artisans in the area. I mean, and. And you were proving yourself. I guess you were proving yourself as somebody who could be trusted too. What do you think caused your stores to stand out? Other than long hours and everything? What made you different, do you think?

Well, I think especially in the town.

Where I own, the point I want to make here is like, if you're going to start a business, there's going to be other businesses in the same industry. You're probably not going to come up with a business. Nobody else has be able to corner the market. So right from the beginning, you've got to give people extra reasons. Something. You got to stand out. And it's not enough to do the basics. You got to do the basics. Plus and so. And plus in everything, pretty much. So what did. How do you think what comes back to you is how you guys stood out?

So my first thing, you know, I went into a town. Italy is very tight and closed. I went into a town on a lake where everybody knows each other. I was the forester. Who is this guy? Foreigner. Sorry, foreign. Who is this guy? Why is he buying a store here? Where does he come from? Does he have money? Like, what does he do? So, of course, I didn't have a lot of those things.

And plus, you were young, you know.

Yes, and I was young.

Young kid.

Yeah. And, you know, but I did have. So my mom handled the public relations. You know, I was not very good at smoothing and talking to people. I'm just more like, get to where I need to go and just do what I want to do and when I wanted to do it. And so she was. She took care of making sure people didn't hate us. But basically what I did with the store was change. This town was just static. And what I noticed it was everybody was either too comfortable because business was just doing well. And I just basically brought in, like, a game changer. Different style of merchandise to the location, to the town, and also different price points. Like, I saw a gap. You know, there's a lot of tourists from northern Europe, and I saw a gap in merchandise, in colors and in designs. So that was my thing. And then I made it fun. You know, I actually took back what I had gotten in the US I took back plaques, license plates, and basically my store was called Route 66, because that was one of my most loved places in America, which I had done already a couple times on the road. And I just made it fun, nice music, and, you know, learn from Abercrombie and Fitch. Back then, they had a lot of music, not a lot of perfume in the store, but just loud music and just fun people. And when people came in, I was just super eager to say hello. And we cheered them in whatever language we thought they were, whether they were Dutch or, you know, French or So we just made it very comfortable for people to come in and enjoy. And plus the hours. And I remember my bags. I made the store, you know, the bags where I would put the merchandise people would buy. I printed Marilyn Monroe on the photo, like on the. On the bag in black and white, but just made the lips red. And then I just wrote Route 66. And, you know, people. I would have people that would Just come in and ask if they could just buy the bag. They didn't want to buy it. And it's like, we heard you have the cool bags here. Can we just buy them? And to me, it was so fun. I remember it would drive people nuts because they would go through the town and see my bags everywhere. I was just so excited. I would go to the bar and have an espresso, and somebody was bad mouthing, like, who is these guys? Like, what are they doing? What are. Like, how are they? Why is everybody shopping there?

Yeah.

Anyway, so. But that actually, like, I was. I realized, you know, I was not the first clothing store in the town. I just did something that the other guys had not thought about, or maybe they were too lazy, or maybe they were not. You know, I remember there's two businessmen that came to me and said, why did you come here? Why are you destroying this town? Why are you doing what you're doing? I said, I'm not destroying the town. They said, yeah, our business. You're taking.

Our business, you're destroying the town.

And they looked at me. I was 23. And they're like, you're taking our business. We've been here, like, 30 years. And I said, you know, I think your problem is you're stagnant. You're stagnant. It's like still water. You have gotten so used to just people buying what you have because there's no other options. I said, now step up your game. And so anyway, needless to say, I was not. They were not very fond of me. They were more fun of my mom, who would go in and, you know, smooth talk people after I would pass.

That is hilarious. Step up your game. That's what I. Yeah. Yeah.

To me, you know, honestly, I was always very competitive in sports.

Yeah.

If. If I would lose a game in, you know, in soccer, in football here in Italy, I would go crazy. I'm like, why did I lose it? Why did I not score?

Yeah.

And so I just thought, if your business is losing money because of me, figure out how to outdo me.

Yeah.

Let's make it a competition. Let's have fun.

Yeah. It's kind of like compete or go home. Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. So I feel, you know, life is like that.

That's hilarious.

You've got different types of personalities, but, you know, you just have to decide whether you want to compete and be a winner or not or sit on the bench.

Well, what I'm hearing from you, Matteo, is that when you got. It's one of the advantages of having a business of your own, that you can call shots, you can see things that need to be done and boom, you know, go back in, meet with your team, install it instantly, you know, or like you said, you know, you have a design idea, you could design it, put it out there, adjust it, tweak it when it goes stale, freshen it up. But the point I'm hearing is that you won by adding sizzle and fun to the business. You know, this, take this stagnation, you know, you expand, did some of the standard things of product line and price points and things like that, but by themselves that wouldn't have propelled you over the top. You know, that might have given you a little boost. But the fact of adding the fun and the sizzle and the excitement into making the experience of people glad they came in, you know, the idea of if you don't make them glad to come in, they're not going to come back. In fact, that's a lesson for all of y' all that are running meetings around the country and working with salespeople or you know, there's, you know, salespeople on the commission is like a volunteer army. You know, they have to, you have to keep them wanting to come back. But if customers are not under your control. So if you don't make it fun and have a little sizzle and excitement going to your store, glad they came in, they're not going to want to come back. You know, they're going to go to places that stick in their mind, you know, as a fun place. You know, and I've always said the people who can master the details of their business and hide the details, make, simplify that, but emphasize the fun side. That's what Disney does. That's the secret of Disney. Disney is in reality the most high tech place in the world. You know, the in Orlando and out in la, in France, you know, that's, it's. Yeah, they got all these compute, you know, computers and machineries and robots and, you know, but it's all under the veneer of happiness and fun and colors and you know what I'm saying? So when people go to Disney, they don't say man at the computers. They have their man, all the machinery. It's just astounding how complex. No, they hide all that. They hide that and they put what people remember as the fun part and that's what makes them come back. And so the people who can do that in business always come out on top because people, you know, you stand out that's how the best way to stand out.

And I tell you something about standing out. I was talking to one of the parents last Monday. Yeah, this last, just this last week, they go to school with my kids. And, you know, they are actually from this little town, Pesquiera, where I had the stores, but I didn't know. And they're talking to me and they're like, you know, there used to be this store down there, you know, so my third one in the town was not in the greatest location. So I had to get smart about it. What I did, I put crazy color wigs on the mannequins. So the mannequins were sitting outside the stores on the street, on the walking street. And, you know, the lady was like, you know, and I remember there's this store who's gone, it's not there anymore. And we would always stop by and go in and shop just because my kids love the mannequins. They had these crazy colored wigs. And I was like, well, that was one of mine. So we just started laughing. But, you know, again, you know, what do you do?

Yeah, making it memorable. So. And the thing is, when you add. Here's a point I want to make. When you add sizzle and fun to your business, you add it to your life. If your business is boring, your life's going to be boring. There's just no way to separate having fun. If you're just enduring the day, just trying to get through and dealing with problems and problem people all the time at work, you're going to be a sour puss when you go home, Right?

Yeah.

But when you've got this fun business of people come in, you're going to carry that home with you. So folks, add some sizzle and some fun to your think about. They say, well, I don't know how to do it well, go shopping, go to, you know, circulate around and see what you find that you like, you know, that you respond to. And maybe go to the most successful stores and see what they're doing, you know, because that's where you pick up. There's some reason they're successful. So go in there and try and unravel that thing. And, you know, if you look at the Apple and Amazon and all of those, you know, Google and all the successful, they're always changing things. They're always using, you know, some color. You know, Apple uses that gray and white a lot, but then they splash the color in and then like really nice designs and fun themes and stuff like that so, you know, get some color, get some sizzle, get some excitement into your. Your business, into your life. Will that. That's where the quality of life will. Will, you know, come out. You know, I also.

I also think, like, it's really understanding what you're doing. Like, for me, we were in a tourist town on a lake. People are coming in, vacation, right. So I remember a lot of people would tell me, oh, your store is so fun. We go into the other stores, people look at you from the top down because you're in shorts and flip flops. And, you know, they, like, look at you. You walk into the store, they look at you weird, and, you know, they don't say hello. They just kind of like, who is this person walking in here? Like, being snobs, I used to be. And I would train my people, be the opposite. We want them to come in, say hello, be smiley, but not fake smile. Like, actually, let's enjoy this. You're here on vacation, right? We are lucky enough to work in a vacation town. And, you know, so the experience people would have, I like, you know, people go out with a smile.

Yeah.

And, you know, because it's also. And it came from my experience, too. I would go into the other stores in the town, and I would be like, God, like. Like, I don't want to come back in here.

Yeah.

Because whether I'm a millionaire or I have $5 in my pocket, you have no idea. Why would you look at me like that? Right.

Exactly. Well, this has been fantastic. And I think people. I think we're. We're making people stop and think about their own life. I mean, you know, you're gonna add some sizzle and pop and fun to your life. You know, that's why, you know Thorsten Overgaard, the photographer, you know, you work with him. You know, that's what he's after. You know, that's what he understands. People like fun. They like the extras. They like the stuff they don't need, but they like, you know, and add some of that. That's why, you know, we click so well and, you know, we like that fun. We understand that you've got to have that to have the quality of life you want. And everybody's different. You know, that will be different things to different people. But think about putting a smile on your own face, and then you can put a smile on other people's faces. So thanks so much, Matteo. This has been great.

Thank you, Larry.