This show is produced and hosted by Mark Webber. The show is sponsored by
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the sponsor and not necessarily the opinion of seven ten wo R or iHeartMedia.
Who is Mark Webber. He's a self made business executive here to help you
find your success from the New York City projects to the Avenue Montaigne in Paris.
His global success story in the luxury world of fashion is inspirational. He's
gone from clerk to CEO twice. Mark is classic proof that the American dream
is alive. And well, here's your host of Always in Fashion, Mark
Webber. Mark Webber. I know what I know and I know what I
don't know why, Because I'm a tortured soul. I'm an abstract thinker.
It's a torturous way to get information. I get to where I need to
go while I take this long winding road to each conclusions. I am the
exact opposite of a linea thinker who gets to their destination on a straight road.
It's quicker, it's easier, there's no debate. But they better be
right and better not miss the roadbumps. Me I'm methodical. I thrink through
every option before I make a decision. It's torturous, makes me crazy.
There are too many options. Now talking crazy? What makes it worse.
I have two companions in my life. They live on my shoulders. On
my right shoulder, there's a little guy whispering in my ear. Do the
right thing, Mark, be safe, be sound, leave the risk to
others. Mark. Then there's the other little guy on my left shoulder,
who's the complete opposite, whispering in my mark. Be aggressive, don't be
a whoss. What are you doing? Have some courage, go for it.
You don't try, you never know. Stop worrying. Now, here's
the thing, this battle logic common sense security. Put your money in the
bank versus the unknown, take leap, don't worry about the risk. Put
your money in stocks. I often wonder about choices. There's always an outcome.
On the aggressive side. I have to say. John Kennedy said it.
You can't stub your toes standing still illustrating. You should go for it,
just like Nike. Just do it. But then there's the methodical side.
Safe is safe almost a guaranteed result, Maybe a less reward, but
a reward nonetheless, almost guaranteed not. This constant whispering in my ears is
making me crazy, these opposing sides. It's a war between my shoulders.
Now. I do find this back and forth within my head very helpful in
directing my efforts and keep me out of trouble. However, it gets so
annoying when my right footsteps on the gas and my left footsteps on the brakes.
There's a war between my shoulders. Now, I'm alone. I do
spend a lot of time with my own counsel. I know I'm not alone
out here. We all struggle with decisions and the decision making process, and
that's what this is. It's the conviction of our choices, the comfort and
our decisions on people, business with life, the plans and how we get
there. Man plans god less. The generals will tell you no war plan
less. Beyond the first engagement. Right away it's over. So planning has
its pros and cons. But what to do? What to do? What
to do? I'm a recluse. I'm on record that humans really don't do
it for me. I don't like humans. I'm on record that humans who
surprise me on the high side are rare. When they do something right,
I do appreciate it sincerely, But the others I can do without. People.
Choosing in life is so important, it's paramount. On the one hand,
I enjoy making those acquaintances when people are special, but more times than
not, I do not enjoy interaction. So therefore I'm left to my own
devices. There's no struggle. I prefer alone. I'm in charge. Business
decisions not so simple. There's the short term versus the long term strategy.
Wall Street knows no long term yet long term just might make more strategic sense.
The business positioning of your brands is in a constant struggle, the battle
between profit and investment, or profit versus investment. What's best for a brand
may be in conflict with what's expedient. And then there's the personal. In
business, it's almost impossible to extricate the human condition from decision making processes.
I don't care what Michael Corleone said. It's not personal, Sunny, it's
just business. Well, with all due respect Michael Corleone, personal comes into
play always, how could it not. This week I did a lot of
soul searching, so I might say it's no surprise that there's lots of dialogue
going on in my head. I've been actively involved in talking to myself.
I suppose that's exactly the definition of sault searching. Time alone plays a part
here. Many ideas, many past lessons are in my head. I spent
a great amount of time, even more energy in waging this war between my
shoulders. I hear there's two sides to every issue, but that's not quite
true. There are three sides. One my left shoulder over my left ear,
my right shoulder my right ear, and then the third, what I
decide to do. I woke up dreaming this week about sharing my thoughts.
What a week started? With fashion. I've shopped a lot, I've suffered
a lot. I can't believe what's passing for good taste. If it wasn't
for bad taste to be no taste at all. Another war is raging between
dress up and dressed down. At the moment, suits supply rees theory versus
caterpillar fry in the gap, sophisticated suits and separates versus cargo and plaids and
shorts. At least the ladies are still chic. But I have to say,
thank god, the Senate did one thing right this year. Thank you
to the Senate. There's never been a dress code in Congress. It was
understood, never been a dress code, and Senator, it was always understood
business dress. They just decided to go casual, and a day later,
thank god, they came back and instituted a formal dress code. So the
Senate finally got something right. On a personal note, I was approached to
come back to work and take on the responsibility of rebuilding a number of great
brands that I grew up with, great brands that have lost their way.
What an opportunity I've been told it's an opportunity of a lifetime, What a
great chance to do it again. And one side of my head is saying,
GOPHERD Mark, can you imagine what all look like when you put that
back on the map. But the other side of my head said to me,
what about your me time Mark? What about what you're doing for you?
You've worked enough, you've done enough, you've proved everything enough. You
tip your bartendie, you tip your caddie, you keep your restaurants alive,
your children respect you. Why should you do it again? And this war
has been raging. An opportunity of a lifetime? Well, I have to
say I've had my opportunities of a lifetime, and I've made a decision.
I deserve me time now. Some would say the mark of a true champion
is one that repeats. Sorry, Vince Lombardi, my success is enough.
Two Sints is a CEO, author of two books and on the radio.
War between my Shoulders. So this is where I am. I've been talking
to myself. I find it incredibly frustrating at times. Sometimes it's a fact
of life. We deal we we have to deal with when we have to
deal with it. This week, for me, I've been working on new
projects, new ideas. So I've decided I am not into erupting the tranquil
life that I live right now. I suppose the good news is for me.
I got me thinking, got me on the subjects for tonight's show,
which is talking to myself, exploring right or wrong. My conscience is having
and playing havoc with my ideas. So what is going on tonight? There's
a war between my shoulders. There's two opposing forces battling within my head.
Some might say good or evil, some might say just two different points of
view. Decisions, decisions, decisions. So I'm going to explore choices.
Tonight, I'm even going to play a game. I'm going to read out
a thought process and put it in front of you and let you decide what
should I have done? Now joining the explanation of what's going on in my
head my lawyer co host and son Jesse Webber. I would get into that,
but I first have to say, when you mentioned you have this little
guy on your shoulder, I thought it was me. I like he's describing
me. I always think I'll give you good advice this little guy on your
shoulder, But no, I'm not. You know, I'll tell you.
I do often wonder what is going on in your head, specifically when you're
surrounded by a lot of people, because I've seen you at times you're not
there. You're just not there. In fact, look, anyone is entitled
to their own thoughts, but I think you take it to a new art
form. Clearly you've tuned out and you're in another world. I've seen you
do it before. Do you think it's normal debating with yourself? Well,
first of all, why not, I'd say. Then I'd say to you,
who's more interesting than me? I like talking to me rather than these
other people surrounding me. We all have questions, and we all have answers,
we all have self doubts. I think it's normal for me to think
things through, and very often it happens when I'm in a crowd. Normal
I've seen you talking to yourself sometimes, what's that about? Okay, you
trade, It's nobody's business. I have conversations out loud. Hey listen.
If I didn't say, it's somebody else. So you see this guy's talking
to himself. Isn't that guy on the radio? Isn't that Mark Webber?
He is? He must be using a bluetooth earpiece, the trader. I
don't think there's anything wrong with that, except for the fact that I don't
need people knowing I'm standing around talking to myself that I look at a mirror
and debate things with myself. I know understanding might look a little peculiar,
but I'm not going to apologize. This is how I come to decisions.
I think things through. How do you work things through? That's a great
question, I would say. I think about things. There are times I
want my wife's opinion. I often look to my older brother. He's more
experienced than me, and of course I call you. I call you almost
all the time. Well, you're lucky because I'm the smartest one in the
room and I can't afford to go backwards to talking to you, Trader.
The truth is, I don't have people to call on. Family when it's
personal gets a little tricky. Because I'm the father. I have to be
careful, you know, I have to present rock solid foundation, So I
can't really come to you guys about personal things business at the moment, I'm
currently uninvolved with others, so I have to be left to my own counsel.
Having said it, I think I know better than anyone anyway. Now
I admit that's either a gift or a disest a waiting to happen. Everyone
needs input, but web is law. Unfortunately, when I want your opinion.
Truth is, if I ask you, I already know the answer.
But if I want your opinion, I'll give it to you. There is
an exception I always learn when I talk to you about the law. Now,
I have a fundamental understanding of the law of being a CEO, but
I'm not a lawyer, and therefore your view is always right because it's the
law just works differently. It's a different language in a different way of thinking.
Well, the law is crafted brilliantly. I have to say, it
requires interpretation. There are these brilliant minds that anticipate what is going to happen
down the line, what's going to happen in life, since the beginning of
our country until today. You know, the constitution they say, is living,
breathing, it's organic, it's alive. It changes. I love legal
debate. I really do. Two opposing sides, diametrically opposed point of view,
looking at the facts, looking at the evidence, making arguments. Only
one can be right. Only one wins. It's sometimes an arbiter or sometimes
a judge, it's sometimes a jury whole decide. The appeals process, though,
provides a chance to ensure justice, make sure the right decision happen,
make sure the right things happening. There's a process to allow for higher authorities
to look into this. I think it's brilliant the law. Well, in
Webb's world, I'm the higher authority. I'm judge, I'm jury. I
think there's a conflict there, But okay, that's fine. Look in our
personal lives, aren't we all judge and jury? And that you're not alone
right, we're all deciding what's best for us. I make up my mind.
No one's changing me. I'm willing to get opinions before I decide.
I don't think that's a weakness. It's a strength, very true, very
true, and I think it's very logical. But tonight, I do want
to cover decision making. What's been running through my mind. Why I'm talking
to myself and I want to talk decisions and I want to test some of
the conclusions. How's that with you? It sounds good. What's on your
mind? What did you want to talk about this week? You are very
active on serious radio on News Nation, talking political commentary. I want to
talk a little bit about politics, right man, because my head is spinning.
On the one hand, because I did business with Donald Trump, and
he was a straight up guy. I liked him. I respected him.
He did everything that he was supposed to do on his behalf from my behalf,
so I respect him. I don't know what to think about what's going
on. They just said he committed fraud. Judge didn't even allow for opinions.
Fraud convicted, what's that all about? Not convicted? Liable? It's
a civil case. Yeah, it was when the Attorney General, Letitia James,
she filed the lawsuit against Trump, his sons, the different companies,
saying that for years, even before he was president of the United States,
on financial statements, they were over inflating the value of their assets and properties
to get better terms, better insurance terms, better bank loans. And this
judge, there was a trial that was set to happen in front of a
judge and not in front of a jury. And the judge looked at it
and with respect to at least one claim, a very big claim of fraud
claim, said I don't even have to put this to a trial. You
guys don't even have to battle this out. I don't even want to see
any more evidence, any more arguments. This is a clear cut case of
fraud and Trump and his sons and his team automatically lose. That was a
massive, massive ruling. This is on the valuation of real estate. Correct.
It's like the Trump Tower, Triplex, Mara Lago, golf courses,
even some licensing brands. It's just the idea of what he said was that
Trump and his team were filling out false information. They were creating misrepresentations about
the value of these properties. You know, everyone has a different idea of
valuation of property, including what adjusters come in will tell you. Let me
just tell you that. So he addressed that. He says, it's one
thing for there to be a discrepancy ten percent, twenty percent. He was
saying that Trump was over inflating it by two hundred percent, that mar Laga
was twenty three. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay,
okay, okay, okay okay. Like Joe Peshi and whatever that movie
was, listen to me. I had my house evaluated. I disagreed by
fifty percent. But I'll give you a better real world working example. Donna
Karen DKM why we used to have a bunch of stores in New York.
What in particular it was the Donna Karen Collection store on Madison sixty eighth Street.
It was a beautiful, three story brownstone, beautiful. You walked in,
You had an atrium, huge area that you stood in and you looked
up to all three floors to the skylight. Outside there was a zen garden.
That's the Donna Karen way, if you will. And I'll admit now
it's old news, so it doesn't matter. I was paying nine million dollars
a year in rent, and I was losing a fortune of money because after
all of a sudden done, no matter what volume we did in the store,
you edited all the people involved. We lost a ton of money.
But Donna, Karen and the team believed that the future of the brand was
tied into that store created the image for the brand and was a showcase for
Donna Cairn. We're paying nine million dollars rent and I can tell you we
probably lost a camouflage between five or nine million dollars in that store year.
At the end of the least, we were struggling what to do. The
landlord sold the property and made it easy for us. A new guy came
in and he took an assessment of the property and he looked around and said,
you see this atrium you have right here, Mark, I said,
yeah, what about it? He said, all of that can be retail
selling space. All of it can be used if you put a floor instead
of looking up at the ceiling and expanded the actual space on the floor.
You have to count that, and we are going to charge you new rent.
Your rent is going from nine million to fifteen million dollars a year.
So if you want to talk valuation, that's a great example of one landlord
saying to me that my rent is nine million, the others fifteen million,
based on the way they evaluated the property. So I tell you, my
head is spinning. I read an article in the New York Post. Briefly,
I don't want me to it where the assesses take Mara Lago at eighteen
million dollars, but it's worth three hundred millions. So my head is spinning.
I want to get off of that one. Is he going to go
to jail or just pay a fine? Let me just say one last thing
about that. He's appealing that decision, so maybe a higher court would agree
with you. Okay, great, this is about money, not jail.
What's worse, because if you think about it, this is not about jail.
This is not about committing a crime. But what could happen is all
of his business licenses were revoked, his LLC's were dissolved, and so the
question is would he stop being able to operate business in New York his livelihood.
That's a pretty bad punishment that could result from this. So he'll sell
all those properties, be worth billions and go away. Quietly and it's not
so simple. But you know, everybody out there calling him a fraud and
all of this stuff, this is upen for interpretation. Now I'm biased.
One little guy in my head is saying to me, you know, the
audience wants to hear Trump is the devil the other era. The guy's whispering
my us say give him a fair chance. My mind is I'm biased.
I like doing business with him. I hope this is not true. I
hope he gets resolved without dealing with all the other things he's invited on.
Now, let's talk about Biden's impeachment. Jesse, you've been on the radio
talking about it on a news station. What do you think. I think
it's a waste of time. And I don't say that as if to say
impeachment it's not a serious thing. It is. But the problem is is
that as of this date, and Republicans have had ample opportunity to provide evidence
that Joe Biden engaged in corruption or bribery, or committed a crime, or
did something wrong or abused his office, and they haven't been able to provide
one concrete piece of evidence that he was paid off or took a bribe or
engaged in pay for play. Nothing. There's speculation, there's weird stuff.
And the problem is is that they call it an impeachment inquiry. So they
say there, well, we'll find something. But you had all this time,
and what makes you think you're going to find something now. It's just
it's like you're testing in American people's patience. Okay, time time, time,
time time. I have to say this, Okay, Joe Biden has
four homes. He makes one hundred and seventy five a two hundred thousand dollars
a year as a congressman. He's been doing it for forty eight years.
I don't understand how he could afford four homes. I know what one home
costs. Number two they have counter Biden's laptop. All of this speaking to
the fact that there is the big guy and all these other things. Lastly,
he's been in meetings, he fired the guy in the Ukraine. He's
done all these things that are so questionable you would call him. I suppose
circumstantial evidence. Doesn't circumstantial evidence lead to something. There has to be strong
circumstantial evidence. It's not like if let's say there was a fire in a
house right, and you see a guy walk by. That's it. He's
the guy who did it. He walked by the house. He must have
done it. No, what else is there? Didn't he say he had
no dealings with his son. Now the partner comes forward and he's had you
know, with him, he's had phone calls with them. So you want
to impeach him for not telling the truth. No, Now, I told
you, I have two guys speaking in my head. On one side of
saying they leave the president alone, he's an honorable man, and the other
side it's saying, what are you kidding me? Look what's going on here?
The family has all this money, they're dealing with foreign countries. You
have the text and where it says money for the big guy. You have
the text where they threaten Ukraine to fire the guy who's prosecuting one of the
companies that he's sitting on the board. Biden, Obama and I think it
was the UN or the Security Council all agreed to get rid of that prosecutor.
So put them all on trial for Christ's sake. Bring Obama and to
testify. And you're throwing out words and phrases that you hear and say,
oh, that's evidence. That's evidence, without even understanding that it's not backed
up and it's not credible. So you're saying there's not a single bit of
evidence or questionable activity that deserves an inquiry. Forget the impeachment. De deserve
an acquiry. They want to do it in Arey. Sure, but as
of what you heard the beginning of this inquiry, the witnesses, the witnesses
that were called said there's not enough evidence to impeach. They said, yeah,
I was right. Now there's nothing I say now, maybe something will
come out during the course of this inquiry. I am very skeptical considering nothing
has come out. What more power do they have now than they haven't had
before? No wonder there's a war between my shoulders now last, but at
least the debate, the Republican debate this week, tell me I'm wrong.
I watched those people. I was so underwhelmed. I'm not sure i'd want
them for a school teacher. Let him the president in the United States.
Nicky Haley had a burst where I thought she was good. Ron de Santis,
I think has something good. He's proven he's a good executive. He
just doesn't present well I happen to think Mike Pence is an amazing individual,
all honor and class, but he's so boring, he can't come through,
and the rest of them were a joke. But this is the best the
country can do. Am I crazy? No, You're not crazy at all.
When anybody in the on that stage said I'm going to be the next
president of the United States, I'm like, really, really, there was
nothing in that that was filled with drama or excitement because I don't look at
any of those people as real contenders. And look, it's unfortunate. I
didn't think we were going to be in a situation where it was going to
be Biden and Trump again. But that's the problem. And you know,
back to this candidates Trump, he's so floored, he's so hated. This
is the best the Republicans can do. An if I love him, I'm
concerned that if I am a Republican, I want to change from the radical
left to somewhere in the middle. I don't see it happening on the Democratic
side of Biden's there, and I certainly don't see Trump getting elected. So
no wonder my head is spinning. Listen, thanks for this, Jesse tonight.
This show is the war between my shoulders. I have a guy on
my left shoulder telling me one thing, a guy on a right shoulder telling
me another, and I have to make a decision from what I hear from
them. Take a break. We'll bring you a real world example when we
come back. Always in Fashion. As one of the world's most celebrated fashion
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What a history. How much I enjoy this brand. Welcome back to
Always in Fashion. Here's your host, Mark Webber. I'm going crazy.
There's a war going on between my ears. I have one little guy sitting
on my left shoulder telling me one thing to do. I have another guy
on my right shoulder telling me the exact opposite thing to do. We all
have to make decisions. We all come to him in the same way,
but I am always debating him myself, taking the time and effort to make
sure my decisions are sound at the last the test of time and I won't
be faced with unintended consequences. But it is making me crazy. You think
about politics, there's so many choices, so mhich looks not black and white
gray. There's no answers, driving me crazy. And I thought about this.
I woke up in the middle of the night having dreams about the war
between my ears, and I thought, a real world example, and of
all things, I want to give it to you. And here's what we're
gonna do. I'm going to give you an example of a decision that I
had to make, and then I'm going to ask Jesse what he thinks I
should do, and then I'll tell them what I did do. Of all
things, I want to talk about, fragrance perfume, not what I would
have guessed cologne. Let me ask you a question. Do you know what
a noses obviously not what you're thinking. It means somebody who's very attuned to
good senses and good fragrances exactly. Now, if I didn't tell you I'm
studying with fragrance, you wouldn't have known that, right, No, I'd
be like, my face, what are you talking about? Yeah, they're
a people I've met, mostly women doing this, that are invited into sessions
when you're developing a new fragrance. They come in and they prepare either themselves
they are I fig out what they're called that invent the fragrance, or they
come in and analyze it. And there are a bunch of little bles put
in front of this person. She takes a piece of wood and she takes
it and smells it, and she smells all of them and then says,
this is the right one for you. They called a nose. Now,
why is this relevant for me? When we bought Calvin Klein, one of
the reasons we boarded is Calvin Klein had one of the greatest fragrant businesses in
the world. But while we were buying the business, the business was down
to about four hundred and fifty million dollars and it had been as much as
six hundred million dollars. Now, when I say the business, that's the
wholesale value at retail sales. If you bought in a Macy's and Bloomingdale's and
Northroms, the value of the Fragrance would have been over a billion dollars.
But the fact that we were buying the company and it was so down was
of great concern and it was a project that I myself took on to work
with the then company Unilever, the great Unilever, fabulous for so many consumer
brands had the license to Calvin Klein, and it was, how to say
it right, there was probably the pinnacle of brands in their stable. I
don't remember if they had other Fragrance brands. They might have just had Calvin
Klein. It was an odd ball in their mix, but it was huge,
and it was big and they were market leader because of it. So
I went in to meet with them. I'll never forget I met a guy
who was the president of Calvin clein Fragrance for Unileva. Very interesting name.
You're ready for this one, Fergus Balfour. Hey, Fergus, if you're
out there, what a name? So Anyway, I met with Fergus Balfour
and he said, look, I am devoted. My company's committed to do
everything we can to get this business up to six hundred million dollars. And
Mark, I'm pleased that you hear anything you could do to help would be
appreciated. And let's get this done. I said, I am representing PVH.
We're going to buy Calvin Klein. It's in the work, it's just
being finalized, approved by the ICC, and I'm going to be a partner
in getting this thing launched. And I could tell you over the course of
six months, I was there for every strategic meeting, I was there on
phone calls. I did all this stuff to help make this Fragrance business special,
to get it relaunched. And there was a series of launches of new
massive perfumes. The first that I could think of his eternity moment. And
I'll never forget working with the marketing team, first on the bottle, then
on the actually marketing campaign, and of course on the juice, which is
what they call the fragrance. That's why I mentioned the nose, so they
asked me to smell it, he said. One of the funniest lines of
my career. I said, you can't ask me to smell it. Real
men get their odor from soap, not from perfume. What do you think,
I am, Yeah, I'm sure they appreciated that. Yeah, not
the thing to say to a company that's doing five hundred million dollars in fragrances
in one brand. But I laughed to myself, and sure enough, they
all smelled the same. I couldn't tell the difference. The other interesting thing
is they had an actress in mind that they wanted to put in the advertisements.
I don't know if you notice any fragrance of consequence. Either has the
world's best supermodels or the world's most beautiful actresses to promote those fragrances. This
is going on, and they're trying to develop who And the marketing team comes
to me and tells me there's an actress. You probably don't know who she
is. She's a new actress, she's just coming out. She's just made
three movies. She's going to be huge. And I said, what was
she? And she says, there's a movie, A Girl with Pearl eering.
I probably can get your copy of it, but I don't know.
And they asked me to see her pictures and I saw her and she was
a different beauty as they said, but she was a beauty. We ended
up using her and it was remarkable. So now we have the Jews,
we have the marketing campaign, and we have the effort that's put behind it.
All the retailers brought in for a preview and we launch it and it
is spectacular and it's a huge success. So then we concentrate on men's fragrances.
C K one been one of the biggest men's fragrance had fallen. We
revitalize it, new juice, new packaging, new promotions, new events,
big parties, big events, greatest models in the world, and men's are
involved with it. We got involved with Escape, we got involved with introducing,
reintroducing Eternity for men, and on and on and on, and then
the men's business takes flight and it's huge and it's exciting. The new packaging,
all this is going on, we're introducing flankers. Do you know what
a flanker is, Jesse that I do not. What is a flanker.
A flanker is a mini launch of an offshoot of a fragrance. So if
there's a fragrance called c K they might do CK one. If there's CK
one, they might do CK one for you. And it would become out
a new item, a new idea, trading off the name. And we
did a series of these and over the course of six months, tremendous success
and position shinning going on. And by the end of the first fiscal year,
the Calvin Klein business is approaching six hundred million dollars and fragrance again,
they're proud. I'm proud. I'm proud to talk to our board about it
because it's something I got fully vested it. I had this close relationship with
Fergus Balfour. He got all the credit from his company. I was happy
were working together. And then one day I get a phone call, Mark,
I need to talk to you, so I go up to see Fergus.
He said, Mark, I can't tell you how much we appreciate your
help. I can't tell you how much we appreciate your support. You've been
a great partner. We've had tremendous success. Unilever's thrilled what we've accomplished.
It's been great for me. I'm sure it's great for you. But I
have to tell you we want to sell the company. It takes a lot
to surprise me in business. I was shocked, shocked selling the company after
everything we just went through. You want to sell the company, That's what
I said to him. He said, Mark, to leave it. We're
a consumer goods company and fragrance and perfume and cologne is not really our thing.
We bought it, we loved it, we thought it made sense,
but it doesn't fit in our stable. And the CEO of our company wants
us to sell it. And I was really surprised, but I knew that
in my contract to license them, they needed my approval and I didn't have
to give it. Well, Fergus taken aback. I must admit I'm surprised.
I am extremely disappointed. We all put our best efforts here. I'm
vested in this business and I can't believe that you want to sell it now.
He said, Mark, you still can be vested in the business.
And we found a partner who's willing to buy it, who wants it very
much. This would be the pinnacle in their cologne and fragrance stable. They
are big. They're one of the largest companies in the world selling fragrances.
We think Calvin Klein would fit there dramatically, and they want to buy it.
Who Cody. Now. What I knew about Cody at the time was
they had a lot of brands, but you know, nothing at the realm
of Calvin Klein. They were much lower, much more widely distributed, more
in drug stores and discount stores. They didn't really have the likes of the
business that Calvin Klein was. While there's a gray market for Calvin Klein,
it's a gray market for Fragrance. They end up being everywhere. We didn't
sell directly to calls, We didn't sell directly to TJ Max. We sold
to Bloomingdale's, Macy's, norster Bergdof's. Calvin Klein was a luxury fragrance.
It still is. So I said, you know again, I'm not happy.
Let's meet with Cody. A few days later, I'm invited to the
offices of Cody. Unilever introduces me to the CEO of Cody, and he
starts to talk about how excited they are to buy this brand, how meaningful
it would be for them, it would be the star on the top of
the Christmas tree. They readily admit that they have not done business at this
level, and Calvin Klein filling into that spot would be a premium position that
it would be special within the group. Everyone is excited about it. It
will raise the entire profile of the company if we allow the sell to go
through. Decisions, decisions, decisions. Now I'm big company, and I
have a CEO, boss, and I have a board of directors. But
I gotta tell you and my business operations over the course of my career,
what was remarkable to me when I look back now. Even then I knew
I made these decisions. I might get signed off, but I didn't need
it. I certainly had a brief people what's going on. I certainly would
make the recommendation one way or the other. But more times than not,
these were my calls. When I look back now, I find this amazing.
I made these decisions, and here I am faced with Uni Leva wanting
to sell their fragrance business to Cody. So the CEO is pitching me Fergus
Balfour a universe sitting here, Mark, we want to do this. We
think this company would be great for Calvin Klein. Tonight's show, there's a
war between my ears. I have on one side somebody telling me, don't
let them off the hook. Mark you did all the work. They're responsible
for this. They have guarantees based on six hundred million dollars. Even if
they don't do the business, they got to pay you all the royalties associated
with a six hundred million dollar business. On the other hand, what do
you need them for? They don't want it. Get rid of him,
take the new deal. These guys will be great decisions decisions. The war
between my ears, Jesse, what should I do? Don't sell? And
your logic? I don't feel good about it. Why? I don't know.
I just don't like it. Would you like to know how the war
went on in my head? Please? By the time this was going on,
we own Calvin Klein for less than a year. We got a board
of directors who wants to make sure that the investment we made in Calvin Klein
was right. We had people investment bank who came in and lent us money
to buy Calvin Klein. I had all of these people. I'm thinking about
what's the right thing to do. So I looked at the CEO of Cody
and said to him, how important is this to you? He said,
an arch business. There's nothing more important than Calvin Klein right now. I
said, if I agree to do this, I am going to agree that
you can have the license, but we're going to add one hundred million dollars
guarantee to the license. Okay, And I said to Fergus Balfour, you
have a contract with me. What does your guarantee spend on marketing every year
for people at the counters, for new advertising, for new promotions. What
is your guarantee? He said, twenty five million dollars. I knew the
answer. I said, if we're going to do this, you have to
do seventy five million. And the CEO from Cody said to me, we'll
do more than that if you agree, will agree? Wow, didn't expect
that we transferred the license. So there's that a great real world example of
having to make decisions and one side in your head saying one thing and the
other side saying the other. These two little guys arguing with me and my
shoulders. If they didn't agree, what would you have done? Not done
it? That's sold it. I don't know he would have continued negotiating,
But I thought I really had no choice because if you know, LEVI didn't
want to be in the business anymore, then, so be it now?
Having saying the story on these numbers, These numbers could change. I don't
want to say they were exact. I'm not infringing upon any confidential information because
this information is long gone. I don't know what their numbers aren't anymore.
I have no idea what their business is. I don't know how much they
agreed to, whether the contract was rewritten. Since I've been gone, so
pleased those of you think I'm giving away trade information. It's not current,
it's not alive. So I'm not obligated in any way whatsoever with conflict of
interest and sharing information that I have no business sharing. Having given you that
qualifier, I think that was a great example of a war between my years.
I'll be back in a minute. Always in fashion, spent a lifetime
of my career building the van usen Brand, and I am so pleased that
they're back with us now talking about suits. Men, we're dressing up again,
and it's become cool to wear a suit. Suits can be won on
multiple occasions in multiple ways. You could wear a suit formally to go out
at night or to an event to wear a suit to the office, with
or without a tie. If you look closely, now fashion trends, suits
are being worn with turtlenecks or mock necks. The choices are endless and every
one of them looks right. You could really really look the part. I
believe that packaging yourself this is important. Does the products you package and wearing
a suit is one of those things that make men look their best. Venusen
invented a new idea. It's called the cool Flex suit. It's been engineered
with stretched technology, giving you the most comfortable fit and mobility. It's wrinkle
resistant fabric, it's cool moisture wicking. It makes it perfect for all occasions.
As we discussed just now, this new style of looking shop while feeling
cool and comfortable is amazing and I'm so excited that the van Using company is
involved in this new technology and is embracing the whole idea of dressing up.
Let's not forget Venuesen made its name with dress shirts. It's only proper that
their suit business follows strongly in its way. You can find van us in
cool Flex Men's Stretched suits at JC Penny are online at jcpenny dot com.
Guys. They're great. You should go look at them. Welcome back to
Always in Fashion. Here's your host, Mark Webber. There's a war going
on between my ears. I don't know about the rest of you and how
you make decisions. All I know is every time I have to make a
decision on one shoulder, I have somebody little guy whispering me the safe side,
on the other side, the risky side. I'm not a gambler by
nature. I like surety. I like to take those subjects of the most
complex, the most risky, and make them less risky. I don't know
what the right way to do is. You know, maybe as executive I
should be out there always taking risk. But at the same time I work
for a board of directors who's responsible for delivering results. And therefore, yes
I like explosive growth, but yes I like to deliver what I say I
would promise. So I've always had this war going on between my ears,
three of us, my left side, the little guy, my right side,
the little guy. In the end, my head having to make the
final decision. I'd like to give you a practical example at the moment on
dealing with people's lives. I have always taking the interview process extraordinarily seriously.
I don't like playing with people's lives. In fact, when you interview people,
you're playing with their lives. Take someone who's working in out of the
company. You interview the person, you steal them away from the company that
they're doing well in. You bring them to your company. They have to
do well. So therefore, if you're going to take them out of a
position where they're already doing well. They have families, they have incomes,
they have all these things, you better make sure that they're going to be
successful. And because of that, I'm one of the world's toughest interviewers,
if not for myself, to them, i'm protecting them. If they tell
me they're great at something, they better be great at that. If they
tell me that they need to learn it, then I understand what I'm dealing
with. I take it always, very seriously, and always have. The
other side of the coin is someone's not working, they're nervous, they need
a job. They come in, they'll do anything, say anything to get
the job. But at the same time, you have this obligation. You're
playing with those lives. If you bring in someone you don't give them the
right kind of interview, and you'll hire them, and they're not equipped to
do the job. You're going to end up firing them. And yes,
they may have had a few weeks a few months pay, but in the
reality is they're back on the street looking for a job with another demerit against
their names. So whether someone's employed or someone's not employed, you're hiring him.
Hiring people is a very serious thing. I have to tell you a
story. I had a guy I'm going to pick his name out. His
name is Michael. He was about i'm gonna say, fifteen years my senior
older than me. I was hiring him to be a president of one of
our divisions, an important, important job actually was a group president. The
division came from a really well respected company, had a very good reputation,
and we interviewed him everyone in the company who needed to interview him, including
an industrial psychologist who interviewed him, and we all said that he was a
good candidate and that we would hire him. I'll never forget the industrial psychologist
giving me the expression that I used for myself, maybe to credit for it
the rest of my career, when he looked at me and he said he
had bright eyes. He had those eyes of a guy that was excited to
be there and that he was a comer, someone will make things happen.
And he had a little touch of arrogance, but who cared. He had
bright eyes. We hired him. He gave his company a month, and
as it turned out, during the course of his month, we had a
strategic meeting off site, and because he was coming into an important position,
because we already hired and we signed the contract, we said, why don't
you come to our meeting. He said, great, I'd love to be
there. So we had a meeting. All our presidents were giving information,
all of them were making presentations, and during the course of this event,
this new guy, Michael was there and he was correcting them, he was
challenging them. He was smart, obnoxious, And the question would be,
with a guy who's not really spent his first day at the company, shouldn't
he have had a little more tact, a little more humbleness, a little
more concerned for the other divisions and the people presenting who were tap dancing in
front of us, for their careers, for the lives, for the strategy
to get approved. Shouldn't have had a little bit more people understanding, and
it raised an alarm, so much so that the industrial psychologist, myself and
the CEO company got together and said, did we do the right thing hiring
this? And the industrial cologist once again said, he has bright eyes.
There's an old saying you want to have a racehorse that you have to push
up the track, or you want to have a racehorse, and he say,
giddy app it goes like crazy. Well, he was a giddy app
kind of guy, and we kept him as time went on. Sure enough,
he was arrogant, but he was very talented, and over the course
of time as we worked together, said Michael, you have to be a
little bit more sensitive to the people around you. You got a bunch of
people love you got a bunch of people who don't love you. Which one's
mark, I'm not going to tell you that, but you have to understand
what's going on. And I don't remember what year it was and what the
reasons were, but we had either accession or a downturn, and the business
needed to in general reduce expenses. And because he was a senior executive,
and because he had this asterixt next to his name from that week that he
joined us, and because his performance was not great, but no one's was
great. He was one of the people that were being let go, and
I was fighting to keep him because at this point I respected him, I
worked with him, I knew what he was capable of. I knew that
he was good, but he was damaged goods in many respects. Now I
asked the question, because a battle was ranging between my ears. Should I
warn him so that he's not shell shocked. Should I give him time to
get used to the idea that he might be let go? Should I give
him time so that if he is let go, he'll behave with honor and
class and won't burn his bridges, and therefore he'll get everything he's entitled to
and then some if he makes the right requests, whether he wants to extend
his healthcare plan, whether he wants a little bit more bonus than we promised
in his contract, whatever it was, I would give him all this counsel
to make sure that if he got fired. Now, on the other side,
you tell a guy he's going to be fired, he's going to be
demoralized, he's going to be angry, he's going to tune out. Or
will he appreciate decisions, decisions, decisions, the war between my ears.
What should I do? I'll tell you what. We're on Instagram. You
can find us on Instagram under always in Fashion. Why don't you tell me
what you would have done? And I'll tell you what I did, so
that you know he'll tell me if I did wrong. I went to him
and told him how much I respect him and how much I have valued him
as a part. But I told him the company was in trouble. We
had significant layoffs planned, and he was on the list. I told him
it wasn't because of anything you did. It isn't about merit. We will
consolidate your position into other positions and life will go on. We'll take care
of you, we'll treat you fairly, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. And
I told him that I would do everything I could to keep him employed.
It's the right thing to do. What do you think he said to me?
Thank you? Yeah, he said to me, Look I like it
here. I love the company. I've done everything I can to make it
work. I'm a professional. I know these things happen. I do not
want to leave the company. Mark anything you could do to ensure that I
stay here will be appreciated forever. But I understand, and I thank you
very much for telling me so what happened. We were able to keep him.
He was a shining star, respected by all, contributed to the entirety
and throughout his career until he decided to retire. Did he ever say anything
about that, like, hey, Mark, I want to go back to
what you said that time, what you did for me. Does he ever
appreciate it? Yes, he always appreciate it. He always understood that it
was a tough thing for me to come to him, but the fact that
he was able to stay and make the contribution and be a member of the
team. His personality over time changed. He became a nicer guy, more
understanding of people's needs, and he performed. I was one of those great
things I did when I had to wrestle with a war between my ears with
that is a backtrup. I hope you enjoyed tonight's show. It's not easy
thinking up these things. It's not easy making decisions. It never is.
There's a war between your ears, you man, I think of it like
me with two little guys talking to him. He made as crazy as me.
He might not be looking in a mirror and talking to yourself. But
making decisions, it's not as easy as it looks. Making the right decision
is almost impossible, but you have to make them, whether it's with your
children, whether it's with your business, whether it's for you personally, and
how you package yourself, how you conduct yourself, what you do with your
life. With that in mind, I know I'm waging a war between my
ears. Good Night,