Episode 311: The Remarkable Women Behind Red Promotions (with CEO, Shelley Stewart)

Welcome to Skucast, the podcast for entrepreneurs in the promotional products industry. Skucast shines a light on our industry's best work, features maverick personalities, and discusses what's really involved in running a modern promotional products business. Skucast is the official podcast of Common Skew.

Shelley Stewart is the CEO, the creative experience officer at Red Promotions based out of Seattle, Washington. As a women-owned, led, and fully operated team, they've become a powerhouse for their clients and have worked hard to build an incredible culture and a fiscally vibrant business. Today I talk with Shelley about how they place this emphasis on culture, what that looks like, what's led to her obsession over efficiency and fiscal responsibility, what the phrase leading like a woman means, and some of the best practices that have made Red Promotions one of the most respected brands across the industry today. Hi friends, I'm Bobby LeHew, Chief Content Officer at Common Skew.

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Welcome, Shelley. I'm so glad you're here.

Thank you, Bobby. It's great to be here. It's good to see you.

You too. You've put a huge emphasis on culture at Red Promo and you're 100% remote. And was this an evolution like a lot of folks or were you— something tells me you were always a little bit remote.

We actually weren't. COVID was the catalyst for it. And funny enough, I was pretty against remote work. I just, I wasn't sure, you know, how can you have a great culture? And, you know, we're a creative team. We do creative work. How can we be creative together if we're not physically together? My team actually was pushing me the beginning of 2020 to do some remote work because we had people, everyone was in Washington State, but people were commuting a ways and traffic here isn't great. And so in the beginning of 2020, I had reluctantly agreed to do 2 days a week remote, but still was a little bit rigid in that, okay, we need to know what days you're going to be in, what days you're not. And it was a whole thing. And then March hit and we were one of the first states to shut down here in Washington and we're one of the last to kind of open back up. And so we didn't have a choice to go remote. And so that was really the catalyst to it. And it took a little bit of getting used to, but Thank goodness we had the technology tools in place, even though we weren't using them really. Right.

It must have been in my mind because you had sort of experimented with it a little bit on the Tuesday, Thursdays, and thankfully you had for a little bit. But also, I think what was in my mind is you seem to have made it work rather well. So that's a— now it seems like you're very enthusiastic about it.

Love it.

That's interesting. That's an interesting turnaround, right? Are there component parts to like being a remote company you found that's really important about connection and communication? Because I mean, you, culture is such a big deal to you and that you're fully remote. And I know we're sort of as a business leaders beyond the remote versus not, but I think what we're looking for now at this juncture is better ways to work remote. Have you found those?

I think we have. I mean, we're constantly looking for new ways, but yeah, I mean, we just, we had to be really intentional. We continue to have to be very intentional about it and consistent. I think those are the big things. But some of the tools that we've found that have helped us be successful is finally utilizing those technology tools that we had had. But just weren't using. So, you know, we're always on IM. We have a bunch of different channels with different teams. We are a cameras-on company. Obviously, there's going to be exceptions when, you know, you can't be on camera, but the expectation is that you're going to be on camera, not only when we're doing team meetings, but when we're doing vendor meetings. It just helps create that connection. And I think it's also a show of respect and of showing up, which is a big part of our culture, showing up. And we have weekly meetings that we do with the team where we sprinkle in fun questions that aren't even work-related in the beginning.

Can you give me an idea of that weekly meeting? I think a lot of folks wrestle with this, right? And they wrestle with the rhythm of it and then what they're doing in those meetings. What are yours like?

Yeah, we typically, not typically, we always start with 2 questions. So we had the meeting yesterday. So yesterday's questions as an example was question 1, how do you like your eggs? Question 2, what was the first thing you remember buying with your own money?

Oh, good questions.

Things like that. So we really get to know each other and some of them are silly and fun. Then we go through numbers. We talk about what our number, what our goal is for the month, where we are for the month, what our forecast looks like for the month. If you think, you know, we're on track to hit goal, we celebrate anyone who has hit goal as a team, and then we'll go into miscellaneous. So if there's updates from the operations team or updates from marketing, and then on the sales side, we'll typically open it up for the sales team to put out asks if they have a project they're working on that they need help for. And we do that collectively, even with customer service, finance, everyone on our team has great ideas and different perspectives.

So, right, right. What advice would you have for those who, who might be struggling with it? You know, I think most of us have found a rhythm, but as a leader, what, what would your advice be since you made this transition successfully?

Yeah, I think first and foremost, evaluate the tools that you're going to need. Do we have the tools we need? Are we using them to their full potential and effectively? And then I think putting together a vision of what do we want this culture to look like? Does it look different? Do we want it to look different than it did when we were 100% in the office, or do we want it to be the same? And if so, what do we need to do to create that? And again, going back to be intentional about it and be really consistent about it. And one thing we also recently did is we developed a culture committee because being intentional and consistent is a is a big undertaking. And so, you know, one person can't do it. And I know within our team, we have some people that are really good at it. They love it. They're way better than I am at it. So, that's been really helpful too, to kind of spread the opportunity to participate in that and spread some of the workload because it does take work.

I'm glad you mentioned that because you keep using the word intentional, and it's almost as if the undercurrent for those of us in this business— we are deadline-driven business, and we are literally driven away by deadlines. We— all the other priorities just take a back seat. And so that's what you mean. You've got to shoehorn in that priority and make it intentional and make sure someone owns that particular part of the business.

Yeah, totally. I mean, it's just, you know, they talk about time blocking your day, and, and you have to put it as part of your to-do list, just like you would a client project.

Yeah, right.

Because it's just as important.

That's really good. You used a phrase with me that I loved, and it was a phrase, leading like a woman. I want to talk more about leadership. Can you unpack that more? Like, what does that mean? And how do you feel like that contributes to the overall growth of culture in your business? Yeah.

So first, I have to give credit to my friend Andrea Houston. I was in a WPO group with her for many years, and she wrote an article 4 or 5 years ago entitled Leading Like a Woman. And I just, I loved the title of it. I just thought it was amazing. So I think leading like a woman can be different things to different people. For me, leading like a woman really means leading your way in a way that is authentic to you. It may go against the traditional norms. It's likely not the way we've been taught to lead, especially some of us early in our career when things were a little bit different and there weren't as many leaders. We've always— I'm sure you've heard the term, never let them see you sweat and never show weakness.

Right.

We don't have to— I don't think we have to lead that way anymore. I don't, I don't think we want to lead that way anymore. And a big part of that, I believe, comes down to being vulnerable. And I think I, I believe that vulnerability tends to come a bit more naturally to women. But oftentimes we hide it. Because we think and have been taught that it is a sign of weakness, especially in the workplace. Yeah, but I believe that it's actually a sign of strength. And, and the more authentic you can show up as a leader, you know, the more success you're going to have.

We came out of COVID really all of us desiring far more authenticity and we got a glimpse into each other's personal lives through all of that experience. And so it's so crucial. I'm so glad you're talking about this topic. And, 'cause, 'cause we need to hear it and we need to be reminded of it because there was this interesting facade that was put over leadership and there was a very austere patriarchal sort of emphasis on leadership that, yeah, I'm so glad you're talking because it's, it's much harder to do the way you're talking about in some aspects, but also feels like it's easier just because you don't have to put up those pretenses.

Yeah, the whole, you know, leave your personal life at the door.

Yeah.

That's just, well, one, you know, when the door is right next to your kitchen for some people, now that we're hybrid, that's even more difficult to do. And I think, you know, as women, more so traditionally, but even, even for men, like, you know, we were taking care of kids, we're taking care of elderly parents, we have a house to manage. Yeah, those things, the lines are blurring now more than they used to. And I think you have to be mindful of that.

Yeah, so true. Let's talk a little bit about a particular strength of yours that a lot of people in our business don't necessarily have because we— they come at the business this almost solely from a sales perspective, but part of your journey— you have had a very successful journey as a distributor. You have been in this business a while. There are so many people that admire and respect what you've done. But part of your journey has been this real robust focus on fiscal strength. Um, you arrived at that through a series of setbacks. Can you share what event started that part of your journey and how that became a focus of yours?

For me, it, it started before I even started my business, but I started my business with it top of mind. And early on in my career, I worked for a distributor who was not fiscally responsible. And I, you know, as salespeople, we didn't know when we were going to get our paycheck. We couldn't get client orders shipped out on time because we were on credit hold with suppliers. I remember many of us putting orders on our personal credit cards because we had these strong relationships with our clients and we just did not want to let them down. So we were paying the supplier to get things right.

Ouch.

Ultimately, and I want to clarify this because I've worked for a couple of distributors who were amazing, this, this distributor is no longer in business, right? Right. But that experience of them going out of business while working there, while trying to, you know, take care of clients— I also happened to be 8 months pregnant when this happened.

Oh, wow.

It left a lasting impression on me. So when I started Red, I kept that top of mind. I never wanted to be in that position as a business owner. And more than that, I never wanted to put my team in that kind of position because it was not fun. It was incredibly stressful. So my focus is really on keeping overhead in check while still investing in the business, but just being really responsible and mindful of that, focusing on making sure our clients are paying on time, right? So that we can pay our vendor partners on time. You know, I want to be paying them early, if anything, not— we're only as good as our supplier partners. And I think it's so important to take care of them the way they take care of us. And anyone who knows me, they'll probably laugh when they hear this. I am constantly looking for ways to create efficiencies within the company. I will, I will totally geek out on that kind of stuff. So, but I, I do that because I want to create a, a safe environment for our team and our clients.

Yeah. Do you finance your business differently today than you did in the early days?

I do. Yeah, when I first started the business, I partnered with a company that handled all of the payables, which, you know, came with a steep price.

Right.

You know, it afforded me the opportunity to start the business, but pretty quickly, pretty early on in that process, I knew that I eventually wanted to pull away from that. So, for those first few years, I was really mindful to, put money away so that we, we were eventually able to go more out on our own and self-fund.

That's fantastic. Talking about efficiencies, I mean, that's something we're both passionate about. You're passionate about that. We at CommsCue are. How did CommsCue help you with that? There, you mentioned the tech stack earlier, but I'm particularly interested in the efficiency part since that's an obsession, obsession of yours. How did CommsCue help with that?

Yeah, so we are big on making sure everything is constantly moving forward. Obviously there's going to be times when things move backwards, but anytime things are moving backwards, you're— there's inefficiency. Yeah, so I mean that so many pieces of the Commonsku platform help. We're able, you know, we utilize the tasks and the notes, so everyone on my team, especially the AEs, will tell you they are always putting in there's not a project in the system that does not have a note and does not have a task set for their next follow-up because being able to do that helps you set it and forget it and move on to the next thing.

Yeah.

The communication between our customer service team and the AEs, you know, so they know kind of where things are in the process of the order and being able to communicate details to the CSR so they can essentially own that project when it's passed over to them and don't have to keep coming back to the AE to ask questions. And then, you know, going back to making sure that our clients are paying on time, and we were doing this before Commonsku, but the Commonsku platform helps us continue to track and do this. We have a system in place that has been incredibly successful, again, being very consistent with it. Where, you know, in 16 years, we have had little to no bad debt.

Wow.

Because we've been able to really implement a process to keep on top of that.

Yeah, that's amazing. It really is. As a leader, how does this help you just keep your handle? How does CommsCue help you keep a handle on the business?

Yeah. It just gives me— I mean, I use it for high-level visibility because that's how I— I like to lead. If I need to, I can get into the nitty-gritty, but, you know, every morning I'm able to look through and see what was done the day before. But I do that not in a way to babysit. I do it because it's my way of going through. First thing I do every morning, I look through and I'm looking for all the orders that were submitted the day before and anything over a set dollar amount. I'm reaching out to those AEs and congratulating them on that order, asking them questions about it. Hey, this looks like a really cool project. Should we be doing a case study on this? So it's, I mean, there's so many tools. I'm, I'm still learning all of the opportunities available within Commons View for, for us to utilize.

That's awesome. I love that. I love how you're using the platform and then how it becomes like this morning inspirational moment for you, really, you and your teams to celebrate those kinds of things.

I love that.

Let's talk a little bit about Shelly when she's not working. What do you enjoy doing when you're not working?

I love working out, which I know seems weird, but it's kind of my— it's my version of meditation, I guess. So I love weight training. It should stop raining here in a couple of months, so I'll be out walking.

Right.

I love just being active.

You have built a very successful business and you've done virtually every role, every job in the industry that you can imagine.

What role—

what do you enjoy doing now? What brings you the most joy?

Good question. I love finding efficiencies, as we've discussed, but I think what gives me the most joy right now is Working with new AEs. I, I have so much fun working with new account executives who are coming in with fresh eyes. They're eager, they're excited, they're open to new ways of doing things. I get to learn from them as much as they learn from me, so that's That's probably one of my favorite things. I also like working with my team on really fun, creative custom projects, brainstorming and ideating for clients.

Last two questions. Who's been one of the most influential teachers or mentors in your life? I know you're really big on mentorship and, and just like you said, the passion you find in bringing new folks into the business. You know, a lot of folks, like I said, respect you. I keep referencing that because a lot of folks know you and you've had influence in that regard, but who has influenced you the most?

Um, I, I have mentors within the industry. I have a couple on the distributor side, a couple on the supplier side.

Okay.

If I had to say who has made the most impact on my life, it'd have to be my parents. Not in the industry, but they, they are the hardest working people I know. I, I have to give them I have to give them the credit.

Yeah. Is there— I actually have two more questions. Is there a book, because the community loves this question, book, podcast, movie, anything lately that's made an impact on you that you'd recommend?

Yes. This is perfect timing for this question too.

Okay. All right.

I am obsessed. I just started reading, actually for the second time now I'm reading it, The 5 AM Club. It has been life-changing for me. It's by Robin Sharma.

Yeah.

And one of the takeaways is owning your morning. So kind of taking that first hour of your morning. There's a 20-20-20 rule. I won't ruin it. Read the book. But even if you read the title and you're like, there's no way I'm getting up at 5:00 AM, fine. There's so much more to pull from the book. I'm telling you, it's a must-read.

I have heard this book rattling around a few times, and every time it crosses my periphery, I'm like, I've got to dig into that because I've heard it so many times from people I respect. So I must dig in.

Yeah, I'm going to send it to you, Bobby. It is so good.

Thank you for that. What is the one change you've made that has made that kind of impact on you?

Taking that, for me, it ends up being about an hour and a half. I do get up at 5:00 AM, but it's protecting that first hour and a half of my day. Nobody else is up. I'm not looking at any technology, no social media, no email, and I'm just doing things for myself that make me better and in turn make me better to everybody.

Yeah, I love it. Okay, thank you. And one more thing I want to ask is, going back to your phrase, leading like a woman, let's say you're sitting down with a young entrepreneur. She just started the business, she's 12 months into the industry, maybe 18 months, and she started her own distributorship. She wants to do her own thing. You've seen much success through this, and you just have a minute to share with her. Is there one thing that you wanted impart to her above all?

Yeah, I would say just put the blinders on, stay hyper-focused on your North Star, whatever that is. It could be the vision of what you want your business to be. It could be the morals and values that you want to stay true to as you're headed in that direction. And don't, don't make decisions based around fear as you're on that path.

That's such good advice. Shelly, thank you so much for joining us on the Skewcast today. I really have been looking forward to this for a while, so thanks for joining us.

Thank you, Bobby. I appreciate it.

Thanks so much for tuning in to this episode of SKU Cast. Be sure to keep up with our latest content by subscribing to SKU Cast on iTunes or to our blog at community.commsku.com. Until next time, friends, thanks so much for listening.

Mm-hmm.