Latest / In Search Of Excellence / Brian Lee: A Roadmap to Success – Passion, Dedication, Innovation, and the Power of Influencers | E45

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Brian Lee: A Roadmap to Success – Passion, Dedication, Innovation, and the Power of Influencers | E45 · In Search Of Excellence

• 0:00
  Brian Lee: I believe in God, I'm Christian. And I really do believe that everything that we do here is for a greater purpose. If I could, I would give even more rioter to everything, because there's so many causes that I believe in.
• 0:13
  Brian Lee: There's so many hurt people in this world that need help, and assistance from homeless to cancer patients who whoever that might be, it's like so many people who are less fortunate than than you and I. Right, and how great would it be if everyone gave back that way?
• 0:39
  Randall Kaplan: Think your first sale of Legal Zoom was $59.
• 0:42
  Randall Kaplan: Well, if I'm not mistaken, and last year, the company had $575 million in revenue, public company worth $2 billion. You repeated the model of working with celebrities, you've done it a number of times, we're gonna get into your latest company arena club in a few minutes, which is amazing. But you went from Robert Shapiro, to the Kardashians to Jessica Alba.
• 1:04
  Randall Kaplan: Tell us about working with celebrities, what's what are the pluses and the minuses? And do they really add value? The celebrities, you know, are much bigger names. And I mean, I know two or three. When we have been trying to get celebrities at companies, we go through agents, and through now there's three big firms now or their managers.
• 1:26
  Randall Kaplan: And they always want an oversized piece of a pie for not adding very much value. And usually you want the A listers, and you're not getting the A listers you're getting the B listers to be Lester's want to get paid like the A listers. The C listers want to get paid like the B listers. You've used this model to amazing success, more than I think most people have.
• 1:45
  Randall Kaplan: So what's it like worth working with celebrities? Do they really add the value that people think they add?
• 1:55
  Brian Lee: Yeah, it's a great question. I didn't set out to work with celebrities as as like my, my career goal. It just, it just kind of happened. And the reason that happened is because remember, I said we wanted Robert Shapiro to work with us to bring credibility to what we're doing, because the internet was so pretty new. But what we realized super early was that every time he went on to CNN, or anytime he went onto some news channel, or did an interview for a magazine, he would mentioned Legal Zoom. And every time he mentioned Legal Zoom, we would get orders.
• 2:28
  Brian Lee: Right? We're like that, you know, we got this double whammy, right? We've got that credibility angle that he brings. Then he's also generating a lot of revenue for us by by talking to us to the public. And so I really, I was probably one of the earlier folks to realize the power of influence and influencer in the early days of the.com. And so when I came up with this idea for shoedazzle, with my wife, mira, we dreamed up the idea in our room one night and we're like, gosh, it'd be kind of cool to have a shoe of the Month Club for a woman. And so we started kind of, you know, honing down on the idea of modeling it out and then you said well, maybe we should get you know someone to be the face of it like we did with Legal Zoom. And we thought Kim Kardashian and and it's really because my wife, mira, she's much more into pop culture than I am. I honestly can't I don't know that many celebrities. I don't follow them or anything. My wife has definitely mirrors more into pop culture. And I remember it was episode two season one. Where where Amir says we should talk to Kim and we had met Kim at one of a couple of Bob's dinners because Bob used to work with Kim's dad so we met her a couple times at his house and I thought she was lovely. And she was just starting her career. Before before keeping up she was a stylist or she was full of stylists actually at the time.
• 3:57
  Brian Lee: But Mira my wife said she is going to be huge. My my Kim Kim is going to be huge. Amir was like yeah, she's gonna be huge like she's just she's got it. So we sat down with Kim and we explained the idea to her and she loved it. She loves you so passionate about fashion and she'd be perfect for this and so she said yes. And so that was shoedazzle We started it she brought a lot of attention to it and from and this is before can be even became the Kim that we know today right? She's the most lovely person to work with. She is one of the hardest working the most loyal people I've ever worked with. Right and you know, not a lot of people get that from you know, just seeing her on TV or this or that but man if I worked as much as she did or as hard as she did and is focused as she did, I'd be a lot more successful today than I am
• 4:52
  Randall Kaplan: they're very successful
• 4:53
  Brian Lee: yeah but she's you're ridiculously amazing and and Christian I was amazing. They were really a joy to work with.
• 5:02
  Brian Lee: And shoedazzle went from zero to 10s of millions of dollars in revenue very, very quickly
• 5:07
  Randall Kaplan: and $100 million or second year in revenue. And I remember I was sitting in your office right before that was happening. He said, Randy, sit down. As I'm sitting. I'll sit, sit down and more. He told me what the numbers are, ma'am.
• 5:19
  Randall Kaplan: It's unbelievable. He sold that to just fab.
• 5:22
  Brian Lee: That's right to textile, then I also get there.
• 5:24
  Randall Kaplan: And let's talk about Kobe Bryant and the artists for in your relationship with him. But what was it like working with Kobe? And then let's talk about his very untimely and very unfortunate death, right as you were launching a company for which he was a partner.
• 5:44
  Brian Lee: Yeah. I love Kobe. I really do. And I met some and he. Yeah, it was it was I don't even have words, really. But we decided to, to incubate a company called Art of sport, which is a men's kind of deodorant and potions and lotions company, I call it right, so body washes, and lotions, and shampoos, and so forth. And so he was going to, you know, be the lead person for it. And a week before we launched to retail, he passed away, and is something that we just, possibly it was almost impossible to recover from. But I mean, our sport is still around, and it's still sold at Target in some other places. And it's a great product and great brand. But I think it would have been so different with Kobe Bryant, you know, at the helm of it. It was, it was very, very unfortunate. But of course,
• 6:45
  Randall Kaplan: one of my partners died in 911, as you know, some of my partners and it really, I was no longer there.
• 6:52
  Randall Kaplan: But it really hurt the company, big time. Eyes, the genius toll genius company CTO had invented the algorithms that were serving our content, we reinvented the way to serve content or the internet and a company recovered, they rallied around him. How important is it on our Search of Excellence to overcome our challenges and keep plodding through even though when things are dismal, even as terrible as someone dying?
• 7:24
  Brian Lee: You just have to, and there's no other way to explain it. But you just have to keep fighting and seeing it through.
• 7:30
  Brian Lee: Or earlier in the conversation I talked about follow through, about completion about being determined to to see something to the finish line. And that's the case with any business really, no matter what comes your way. You want to see it through. So even with artists sport, you know, we scrambled started partnering with a bunch of other great athletes, some amazing athletes, James Harden, James Harden, and Juju Smith Schuster. Ryan Sheckler. Is that
• 7:59
  Randall Kaplan: where I'm at this summer, amazing guy.
• 8:01
  Randall Kaplan: Amazing. He's gonna be a guest on my talk. Oh, perfect.
• 8:04
  Brian Lee: Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, we had a great group, but it's, you know, nothing against any of these, these fantastic partners. But you know, Kobe was Kobe, right and brought a lot of excitement to what we're doing.
• 8:16
  Brian Lee: And so, again, unfortunately, extremely, extremely unlikely I can describe it, but it was a, it was painful.
• 8:26
  Randall Kaplan: You have an amazing ability to partner with icons that most people would die to work with. Derek Jeter is your latest partner and amazing company. Ivan, lucky to be an investor in that company. Let's talk about a new company, arena club. And how important is it In Search of Excellence have passion to be successful? At what we're doing?
• 8:52
  Brian Lee: It's a great question. I think you definitely need to be passionate about what you're doing to get the full effort. Because it's always a grind. Right? It's always a grind. So if you're not passionate about something, you're never going to put in your, your entire body and soul into it unless unless you are.
• 9:09
  Brian Lee: And so even with with Legal Zoom with shoedazzle with the Honest Company. I was very passionate about the missions of those businesses. Right? So the mission of bringing Affordable Legal Services to the world, the mission of having women feel beautiful about themselves, basically for $39 a month and get a new pair of shoes every month. It made it made everyone happy with the Honest Company helping to build a or to create a non toxic world. I mean, what's more important of that right the site there so I was extremely passionate about all the missions of those businesses. But this is the first time with a Rena club that I'm passionate about not only the mission But the actual offering and the service. And it's only because I've been collecting trading cards, baseball cards, mainly since I was a kid, right? So I remember, I was seven years old at the time, and my dad took me to my first Dodger game, right. And I just fell in love with the game and being at the stadium. And Steve Garvey was our, our first baseman at the time, and I went and bought his card. At the card shop, I rode my bike to the local card shop and I, I bought a seed Garvey card, and I held onto it all these years, I still have it. And I started collecting cards then and I never stopped, most of my friends stopped. And it was my friend's house that like, yeah, so most most do they stop in junior high school or high school or whatever. I collect it in high school, college, law school, young adult, old adult, I just, I just love it. Right? I just love collecting my heroes.
• 10:53
  Brian Lee: And it's a category and industry that I thought was, was pretty ripe for some innovation, right?
• 11:08
  Brian Lee: Because there hasn't really been that much innovation in this space for a while. And so the idea that we had was to digitize the physical, I mean, how many how many guys, you know, that collected cards, and those cards are sitting in a shoebox in their closet, or their parents closets, or basements or whatever it is, everybody a lot, right. And so I always felt like, gosh, it'd be so great to bring all those out. And to digitize them all, and then put them on blockchain. And you could display all your cards at Arena club online. And those are your cards, verified and authenticated, that you can buy, sell and trade with each other.
• 11:47
  Brian Lee: And that's the genesis of arena club, it's really kind of, we call it bringing the card show to life. And so my happiest days are spent at the card shows and card shops, going with Davis, my son who who you know, and I just love it. I just love it. I love the the wheeling and dealing and the action of the card shows.
• 12:09
  Brian Lee: And for anyone who's ever been in a car show, you know, it's like you walk around with your little zipper on case and it's like ArtRage, these two cards and 50 bucks for that card. And there's just a lot of excitement. And no one's ever brought that online. Right? It's I think we're one of the first platforms that allow for trading even, right, and we're trying to build this community where people can really follow each other and like each other's cards, and so forth, and, and trade with each other and have a lot of fun doing it. So that's the idea of arena club.
• 13:35
  Randall Kaplan: Somebody aspirations inspiration was because you sent in a card to another grading company, we don't have to mention which one who the way the grading cards work is if you have a 10 for manually graded by people sitting in a room, they measure the center, the car, the borders, the picture, the quality of the colors, everything. 10 card, Michael Jordan, I think you've told me this and correct me if I'm wrong. Rookie card, if it's a tank could be 250,000. If it's a nine, it could be 50,000 25,008 is way less. He had a great card, you know your cards? Well, you send it in, it gets graded.
• 14:11
  Randall Kaplan: It takes three to six months, you pay a fee, and they came back I think at an eight, that's fine. You said this is easily a nine, maybe a 10. You can appeal the grade it comes back and a plastic sleeve that's sealed with a grade honestly, you can't change it. And so you said okay, well, this is not an eight, this is a nine, you send it in. It's an appeal, you pay another fee.
• 14:33
  Randall Kaplan: A more expensive fee. It takes three to six months and maybe even a year because their way back down. This is a huge business. There's a company in this space last year that social$800 million, right? One of your competitors, but you're gonna kick their ass once you get going. And then you started saying, Okay, well, that's not fair. I'm gonna do some more research. I'm gonna see how they grade these cards. And you are very resourceful. By going into LinkedIn, and finding employees who used to work at these companies and say, How does this process happen? And you realize, and you heard that the former employee has told you, well, we sit in a room. We use microscopes. We grade the carpets. We don't have a manager who tells us what to do. But some days they come in and they say no more nights. And you took something that was a problem and you fix it. How important is it not to accept the status quo on something like this and how much of a motivation is it to be an entrepreneur by looking at things not only you have the passion but you're trying to fix something that's broken?
• 15:51
  Brian Lee: I think that's Most of the time, I think for most entrepreneurs, it's usually about experiencing something, or consuming something and thinking I could do a better, right? Or it'd be great if it was done this way or that way. Right, as opposed to the current way. I think that's, that's, that's mostly everyone, right? That has started to something or adult, something at least innovative.
• 16:15
  Brian Lee: Right? It's one thing to say I'm going to be an entrepreneur, I'm just going to completely copy that company. That's, that's a little bit different. I'm saying anyone who's innovating and creating something new, or looking to create something better than the status quo. And so very similar to what you described with arena club. Yeah, that was kind of fed up with what was out there, right from the the marketplaces that exist, or the grading companies that exist and so forth. And I just thought I could do it better with more transparency, with with with more ease, with seamless transactions, all on blockchain. And so I just thought I moved, I'm gonna go do this. Right. And I hope people like it. So that's that that was the idea, even for Legal Zoom.
• 17:02
  Brian Lee: So the idea for Legal Zoom really came about because some of these law firms charge a lot of money for some very simple legal procedures, their forms.
• 17:10
  Brian Lee: Yeah, their forms that you file.
• 17:14
  Brian Lee: Why? Why should it cost $2,000 to form a corporation, right? Or 3000 hours, right in today's inflationary world? So a lot of ideas come about like that. And even with Jessica Alba, and the Honest Company, I remember what she told me, she said, Why do all eco diapers have to be brown? Why can't we make them cute? That's what she said and with with really fun patterns, and it struck a chord with me, I was like, You're right. They shouldn't be in we could do that. Right? So it's like a lot of times entrepreneurs come up with these ideas, because they're not happy with the status quo. And they want to innovate and make something better.
• 17:56
  Randall Kaplan: Let's talk about one of my favorite topics, preparation, not only preparation, extreme preparation. I'm talking about the kind of preparation where you're not spending 15 minutes for meeting or two hours preparing or five hours, 20 hours, 40 hours. How important has preparation been to your success? How important is it to success in general? And can you give us examples of things that you did? Were you prepared? 20 hours, or 30 or 40? For a single meeting? Oh, yeah,
• 18:29
  Brian Lee: absolutely. I mean, I remember when we were starting Legal Zoom. One of our earlier meetings for a potential partnership with was was with h&r block, the accounting firm.
• 18:43
  Brian Lee: And we thought it would be such a great idea if LegalZoom partnered with h&r block, and we could be in all their physical locations to offer our services.
• 18:48
  Brian Lee: And so I must have prepped, gosh, an easy 2030 hours for this meeting, we flew out to Kansas City, where they're based, and we had a great meeting with them. And I remember what the guys told me, he says, you're more prepared than anyone I've ever met.
• 19:06
  Brian Lee: Right? And because we knew everything about about their business, like stuff that he didn't even know, right, and we're just kind of telling him, this is how it should work. And this is the idea and so forth.
• 19:15
  Brian Lee: Now, we never got a partnership with h&r Block. Whenever we got it done. They said no. But I do remember leaving that meeting being like, we were prepared.
• 19:27
  Brian Lee: And so sometimes being prepared and being prepared is always important. But sometimes it doesn't work, but it's okay. You put in the work, you put in the effort, and we left with a very strong they I'm sure we left and they had a very strong positive opinion of us. Because it's all it's all perspective, too.
• 19:43
  Brian Lee: Right. It's how are you perceived? Right. And I think we kind of put a flag in the ground and said, Listen, this is who we are. Right. And we are prepared.
• 19:49
  Brian Lee: And we will outwork you.
• 19:54
  Randall Kaplan: One of the things we have in common is we've had multiple careers.
• 19:56
  Randall Kaplan: We've been lawyers, yeah.
• 20:00
  Randall Kaplan: Unhappy lawyers. We've been entrepreneurs, still are serial entrepreneurs. And were venture capitalists as well. Yeah. So you've had an incredible transition to having your very successful venture firm Dan ventures Brian and Mira leave. I know so many students who are in my internship program. You've been speaker there every summer, you asked people what they want to do on the venture capitalist.
• 20:29
  Randall Kaplan: There's a couple of ways that I know, graduate Princeton or Harvard with triple degrees in computational science and degrees. I don't even know what they mean. get lucky and be the eighth employee of LinkedIn or Google or somewhere like that, or to have enough money where you say, I'm a venture capitalist now. What's your advice to all the students who want to become venture capitalists who don't want to be an employee and Matt have never managed anything before, never met payroll, never balanced the budget, but they want to become a venture capitalist. And they don't realize it's not all that sexy, that seven or eight out of 10 companies will go to zero.
• 21:16
  Randall Kaplan: What's your advice to everyone who wants to do it?
• 21:23
  Brian Lee: It's so interesting, because there are a lot of students and young young folks who want to be venture capitalists. And, you know, it's, it's interesting, because I would say, historically, it's been a very closed, you know, kind of society, very close, very closed. And it was like the old days of, you know, the early Silicon Valley, venture firms and so forth. And as it was all kind of who you knew where you went to college, and what the hookups were right, like, you know, the network. But I think it's grown since then it's matured a lot since then. And you're seeing all sorts of venture capital firms today, right? I mean, there's so much capital out there. And there's so many firms that are focused on different niches. And these issues are large, right? I mean, I've met all female founder firms, to companies that only inverse invest in diverse founders, to consumer specific to platform Pacific to SAS, to whatever it is, I mean, there's so many different segments of venture capital now that you could kind of find your niche, like whatever interests you, right? But at the same time, I'm a big believer in experience and work, real work experience. Yes.
• 22:44
  Brian Lee: I think that makes you a better investor. Right? Because, I mean, I've worked with investors, truth be told, I've worked with investors who have never had a had a job outside of investing, right? And everything's theory. Right, right. It's like, well, in theory, this is, what the numbers should be. This is what your margin profile should be.
• 23:03
  Brian Lee: And this is what you should be doing. But they've ever done it.
• 23:05
  Brian Lee: Right. I tend to like working with, with investors who had been there, done that and could actually provide real world experience to the, to what I'm doing. So I tend to kind of lean towards that. As opposed to, you know, icon lifers, life for VCs.
• 23:28
  Randall Kaplan: Let's talk about access to capital. We know tons of people, I get emails, I get DMS from. I mean, I wake up every day, there's 30 emails.
• 23:36
  Randall Kaplan: I'm on some list. Hey, I got this fun. I got this funding.
• 23:39
  Randall Kaplan: Yeah. But so many people want to know how many kids in college but young professionals, I have people I'm sure you do, too.
• 23:48
  Randall Kaplan: They're 40 years old, they want to raise money. One entrepreneur, we have Julie Roth Novak, now she's a friend from college, she started first company, she was 46 years old party slate. But people want to know, how do they meet venture capitalists? Right? How how did they break through? I've had I've had people just come and knock on the door and sit until I walk out the door. Yeah. What what did they do to actually get a meeting? And if someone flew an airplane, over BAM headquarters, it says, Ban ventures? Will you please meet with me? Would you take that meeting? Or do you think they're absolute lunatics?
• 24:29
  Brian Lee: Oh, prior to that meeting, so
• 24:31
  Randall Kaplan: yeah. It's just like you're investing in yourself. You're creative. And one of the things I like telling people do what no one else has done before. So you don't have to call? You know, hey, it's Brian Lee there. Yeah, good luck. Brian's gonna sit down with you. But how do they get an eating?
• 24:48
  Brian Lee: You know, most of the meetings truthfully, are people we know who recommend or refer someone? Right? It's very rare that we will return to completely cold email. Right, because we get so many of them.
• 25:03
  Randall Kaplan: But at some point, like you, Robert Shapiro took that meeting. Yeah. So you're a first time entrepreneur, like people, people will take our calls today because of our resumes and some of the success we have. But hey, I mean, at some point, you got to break through.
• 25:20
  Brian Lee: Yeah, no, it's true.
• 25:20
  Brian Lee: It's true. But I wouldn't say that there were a lot less cold calls when I made that and whether they are today. I mean, it's a great question. How do you break through? I don't know.
• 25:33
  Brian Lee: You just You just have to figure out a unique approach. If you don't know anyone, but here's the thing. You can be resourceful. And you could you could go to events. And you could go to Angel events. And you could go to you know tech events are whatever it is and meet people. And if you meet people, you can always ask, does anyone here know someone from BAM ventures? It's not that hard, you know, a lot of people, right? Especially in the city, right? And so to you, right? So so if if, if I was an entrepreneur and I and I was determined to meet someone from bam, veterans would figure it out. Right, you would go on LinkedIn, see who's connected to me, ask for a warm intro. You know, go go meet some other people within your network or even outside your network and ask for a warm intro. It's the cold and the cold emails are tough, because there's so many, right? It's like, it's almost impossible. But there's no way I'm going through 1000 emails a day, looking for gold nuggets, right? It's not gonna happen.
• 26:35
  Brian Lee: Right. And that's how many you get. Right. And so it says you can't do it. But in terms of raising capital, that's the I guess the real backbone of your question is really, um, it's hard. There's no going around is it's hard, right? Especially if it's your first gig. Okay. It's like if you're, if you started LegalZoom, and grew a nice business, it's a lot easier to raise capital for for shoedazzle. Right? And for the Honest Company, or whatever it is, but it's that initial start, like, where do you get that capital? And at Legal Zoom, it was really, it was just begging.
• 27:19
  Brian Lee: That's what it was. It was literally begging. I, we asked friends, we asked family, it got to the point where my uncles and aunts wouldn't invite me over anymore, because I was asking for more money. Right? It's, I remember, we started Legal Zoom, a friend of ours. He said, what's the minimum investment?
• 27:39
  Brian Lee: At that time? We're like, it's$10,000. Right? He's like, Oh, okay, I can't I don't have 10,000. Right. So then it's like a month passes, we still haven't raised enough. And he we call him back and like, Hey, would you still want to invest? He's like, Well, I don't have the 10,000 are like, Well, how's five? He's like, Well, I only have $500. And we're like war ticket. I brought us a $500 investment. I mean, it gets to that point, right? It was, but you'll do whatever it takes. You do whatever it takes to hustle and grind it out and just raise whatever capital you can from anyone you can, right that believes in you and be persistent. Be that annoying person. Seriously be that annoying person because you only have one shot at it right at this idea or whatever you're starting and you want to raise capital and you want to try it.
• 28:29
  Brian Lee: So yeah, you guys got to figure out a way to raise the capital.
• 28:34
  Randall Kaplan: I think work ethic is one of the most important ingredients of our success. You and I have had a lot of very personal discussions about work, family balance emails. I remember a conversation we had at lunch a year, year and a half ago. We're sitting there, and we're both bitching about how many meetings we had a day. Yeah, I think I had six and I was aggravated, I was anxious. And he showed me your calendar you attend. You're a great that. You go to all your kids games. I recently learned at dinner last night, we had dinner a few months ago that you don't work nights, and I was just blown out of my chair. And it changed my life, by the way.
• 29:24
  Randall Kaplan: Because after that day, and I have got Sandy, I've got jump investors. I have a real estate company. I'm working on my podcast, I have my my book I'm working on called extreme preparation. And I told you this I've worked in a midnight every night for you know, six days a week, working Saturdays and Sunday mornings it got to the point where it's is too much.
• 29:50
  Randall Kaplan: And I'm good Dad, I'm home for dinner every night. And when Madison my kids go to bed, you know, I go down in my office, but at some point is too much.
• 29:56
  Randall Kaplan: You've done a great job and work life balance. So how do you do it? What's the secret? And how on earth or you're not working all weekend? I don't get it?
• 30:08
  Brian Lee: Yeah. Well, we'll put it this way. It was always like that. Right when whenever I started my first two companies actually, he was not work life balance. He was basically work.
• 30:20
  Brian Lee: Right? And again, no one's gonna just hand you success. No one's gonna ring your doorbell. And we are here's a bucket of success to happen that way. You got to work. Right. And it is about work ethic. And I don't know anyone who worked harder than us. Like literally, I don't know anyone. I mean, we were working 90 100 hour weeks easy. Only goes and we never took vacations. We lost all our friends. Right because we had no social lives. We were eating ramen because we couldn't For anything else, and peanut butter jelly sandwiches, literally that was our story. I remember like going to a movie was like, Oh, can we afford that? This is a movie ticket for like five bucks. And we're like, I don't know if we could afford that.
• 31:07
  Brian Lee: And now, that was Legal Zoom.
• 31:07
  Brian Lee: And it's only because I put in that type of work effort that I can enjoy the life I have today, where I actually don't work weekends, and I don't work at night, when I don't want to, I'd rather spend time with my kids.
• 31:24
  Brian Lee: And I'd rather spend time with my family and my friends. Right.
• 31:28
  Brian Lee: And I'm not saying that, you know, anything I work on now is gonna be less successful. I don't I don't think that's the case, I think is, is as you get more experienced, or older, right? I think you just learn how to how to deal with things better to, and you learn how to manage your time better. And on top of that, you know, how to raise capital to hire the right team as well. Right? Because when I was younger, we didn't have capital. And so it was us.
• 31:54
  Brian Lee: Like it was everything was us.
• 31:59
  Brian Lee: Right. But now I've got, you know, superior teams, right, that I can bring on and I could rely on and and and say okay, this has to get done. It'll get done. Right. And so it's a little different now.
• 32:13
  Randall Kaplan: But you were talking. I get 50 emails at night, I tried to clear them out. I'm lucky if I go below 30 my inbox and leave the ones that require work. Some are long term emails. That's my to do list, somewhat. But I get anxious.
• 32:31
  Randall Kaplan: When I wake up with 70 new emails. Yeah. And I stop looking at emails after our call after dinner at eight o'clock at night. Yeah, but it doesn't make you anxious to wake up to 150 emails.
• 32:46
  Brian Lee: No, it doesn't. I'm used to it. One thing that I'm really good at now, is putting things in a spam. I've gotten really good at. So here's a couple tricks I'd Yeah, teach me number one, I'm really fast at putting into spam and spam folders, because the junk mail just gets too much. Right.
• 33:09
  Brian Lee: Number two, I don't have business cards. And I don't give out my email address right? To anyone. Random, right? Right.
• 33:17
  Brian Lee: Whereas you're never gonna get out of that hole, right? Because then you're just gonna get emails from a bunch of people that you met for two seconds, right minutes or whatever.
• 33:26
  Brian Lee: Right. And then number three, I'm really good at kind of putting things into I call the for like the to do folder. And anything that I can't respond to within like, a few seconds, I put in the to do folder. Yeah.
• 33:39
  Brian Lee: So anything I can respond to quickly or respond to, and then put everything in the to do folder, and then give myself like an hour or two during the day to do the to do folder.
• 33:46
  Brian Lee: That's how I do it. Tell us what are
• 33:53
  Randall Kaplan: the three to five most important elements of success?
• 33:58
  Brian Lee: Well, so I would say it's, it's it's definitely work and work ethic? Right? That's definitely number one, I would say. Number two, is I actually think it's being empathetic and understanding people. So not just your team, but especially your consumer, and your investors, and just index understanding where everyone is coming from. I think that's really important. Number three, I would say, have a good support network. Right, whether it be people who are mentors, or people who just kind of support and help you. I think that's really important too. So I think those three combined will lead to a lot of success.
• 35:03
  Randall Kaplan: I've asked this question of hundreds of people.
• 35:06
  Randall Kaplan: Empathy has never been on any list, and I wanted to ask you, I love the answer. But I also want to ask you about your own personality. And I'm gonna embarrass you. But you're generally known as one of the nicest guys ever, and you're one of the unique people who only will ever say anything bad about and only say nice things about Brian is a great guy. And that's a rare skill by the way. I mean, I don't we've all rubbed people when not you but the rest of us and rub people the wrong way.
• 35:38
  Randall Kaplan: You say something that comes out wrong. Sometimes you're angry you say something I've never heard you ever act that way and every time it comes up, I love Brian. He's the greatest. How much do you think I I have to get out of your humble zone for a minute, but how much of that likability has contributed to your opportunities? And some of the success you have? What's your advice to others? Who need to work on that? And how should they work on?
• 36:12
  Brian Lee: It I never really thought about that way. But I guess I guess it's better to be liked and disliked. Right?
• 36:20
  Brian Lee: That's number one. But I think I think I do get opportunities because, you know, people like me or, or like them, and I tend to just get along with, with almost everyone, like, there is really hard for me not to, to like someone, right? Or not be able to work with someone, it's a lot, right? Because I tend to, like everyone I work with, and like everyone who works with me, my friends, and so forth, as it says, I'd like to get along with people. I'm not a very confrontational person. Right?
• 36:57
  Brian Lee: That's, that's one thing is I don't like to sit and argue about things. Right? I'll just kind of acquiesce most of the time, and just saying like, Okay, I smile, shake hands, and go my merry way. And then when I'm at home, I'm like, I can't believe that person thinks that way. But, you know, it's just, you know, I don't like to I don't like to have I'm not I'm not really a fighter. I don't think like in that sense, right.
• 37:32
  Brian Lee: But in terms of, you know, others, as I look, there's all types, all types of ways to gain success. And oftentimes, it is that person that is just liked, or doesn't like, or people don't like working with, right? You know, or whatever it is. And it's like, everyone has a different path. And no path is the correct path. And so I would say if you're that person who is more than a hole and like is like, you know, builds companies with an iron fist, and everyone hates working for, but it works.
• 38:08
  Brian Lee: Hey, more power to you, honestly, more power to you.
• 38:10
  Brian Lee: You're building an amazing business, I'm sure, right, or whatever it is. But it's the same with company cultures, too.
• 38:16
  Brian Lee: Right? Every company culture is different and unique. And some cultures are places where like, gosh, do I really want to work there? Right, but it works.
• 38:24
  Brian Lee: Right? So I mean, look, no one has ever said, I suppose I shouldn't say this on your podcast, but like Disney. Right?
• 38:31
  Brian Lee: This is a tough place to work.
• 38:36
  Brian Lee: It's a grind. Right? It's definitely the happiest place on earth at the park, but not in the office. Right? It's it's pretty cutthroat and it but it works. Right? I mean, one of the greatest media companies in the history of the world, right?
• 38:50
  Brian Lee: It's a tough culture, in that sense. In Addison Miami, right?
• 38:54
  Brian Lee: And then you got Zappos, which was like a party all the time.
• 38:57
  Brian Lee: Yeah, right. And people are just like, happiness, all I want to do is deliver happiness. And, and let's smoke, let's let's smoke together and like, drink together and party together and build a big, big business. It works. Right? So if something's working, I would say don't change it. Right. So if it's working for you, that being an asshole, or whatever it is, and you're successful, more power to it don't change. You don't have to you don't have to become Mr.
• 39:22
  Brian Lee: Empathy. You really don't. But if something's not working, maybe you need to think about, okay, what can I do better. But if it's working, don't change it
• 39:32
  Randall Kaplan: does. Apple is one of the most unique and greatest corporate cultures and the luxury of a company, I had the pleasure of meeting and then getting to know Tony Shea, because, you know, passed away very, unfortunately, a couple years ago. And he invited me out with my team and my insurance.
• 39:48
  Randall Kaplan: So we all went and one of our portfolio companies. And it was a life changing experience to see a company run this way.
• 39:58
  Randall Kaplan: Delivering Happiness, I believe his name was book. And I recommend every single person read that book, because it really is the culture there is amazing. Everybody's happy. They have no turnover there. The customer service reps are on the phone. You're not on a quota system, and you have the ability to send a customer flowers.
• 40:17
  Randall Kaplan: Yeah. And you have a budget you can just made people happy just walking through the company and the way he built it and hearing the story was life changing for everybody. So I agree. Corporate culture is key. Let's, we're going to end it on philanthropy and giving back. So you're incredibly generous. You've done extremely well financially.
• 40:40
  Randall Kaplan: You're known for helping people.
• 40:40
  Randall Kaplan: You're empathetic to a lot of causes. gave to the Imagine ball this year. You always do every year. I'm grateful. All fighting homelessness in Los Angeles, I've sat at the pleasure of sitting at one of your tables, I felt like the big, important person, because you had me sitting right next to you with all the important people. And they gave, I think, $50,000 at night to brain cancer research for UCLA. How important is giving back to our community in Search of Excellence,
• 41:16
  Brian Lee: I think it's incredibly important. It's incredibly important for to give back because, look, I, I believe in God, I'm Christian. And I really do believe that everything that we do here is for greater purpose. And you definitely want to leave, making that impact, as opposed to going to the grave with not making a difference, right, I want to make an impact. And it's like, if I could, I would give even more rioter to everything, because there's so many causes that I believe in. There's so many hurt people in this world that need help, and assistance from homeless to cancer patients who whoever that might be, it's like, so many people who are less fortunate than, than you and I. Right, and how great would it be if everyone gave back that way? Right. I mean, I look at people like I'm, like Bezos and gates, and like some of these no icons. And I just really admire how philanthropic they really are, of course, they could afford to be too, but it's amazing. It truly is. It's amazing how much impact they've had on society, and how much good they're doing for the world as well. You know, it took a lot to get there. Right. And I'm not saying they're like, you know, the perfect, you know, people getting to where they are, but at the same time, they're doing some great good for all of us.
• 42:57
  Brian Lee: And I just like, I look at that.
• 43:03
  Brian Lee: And it's a roadmap for myself, like, I definitely want to help as much as I can in a lot of different areas. So I think it's incredibly important.
• 43:14
  Randall Kaplan: I shared with my guests how I know some of my guests. And I don't know if you remember how we met or not, but we actually met through a nonprofit. I remember this, I had started an event called The Justice ball for beds at Legal Services and grew into a huge event, nonprofit legal firm in Los Angeles. ran it for 10 years was my idea. I had a great team, they were responsible for its success, not me. Part of success is hiring the right team. And then I took some years off, I want to create another one I was focusing on kids with cancer, or homeless or foster care, because my grandmother passed away was raised in foster care and had this incredible life. And as a as a way to give back to her I chose homelessness. And I interviewed executive directors of these nonprofits, I just call that was in the phone book and said, Who's what charities are doing this. And there was one, homeless charity, I don't even remember the name, la y en la yn. And I invited the executive director to my office. And if you're an executive executive director at a charity, and someone's calling you with a very strong interest in donating money, who's raised $10 million for another charity. They probably should be running to your office sprinting to your office and don't don't stop and go. And this guy had had such a hard time coming. He can't he wouldn't come on either. Push on what is going on here. And we had a meeting in a canceled at the last minute to remember why.
• 44:56
  Randall Kaplan: You remember why? Yeah. Because it's his cat Murphy had died.
• 45:01
  Randall Kaplan: No, the game of the day. The cat Murphy wasn't feeling well.
• 45:05
  Randall Kaplan: Yeah, the Candida the mafia wasn't feeling well, which is just a crazy story. So I looked and see who who's on the board.
• 45:15
  Randall Kaplan: And there's your name. You know what? I've heard a Brian. I heard what you done. I was entrepreneur. I think it's important to meet like minded people. I'd read about you and I said, you know, I'm gonna call Milan I'm gonna pitch that I'm trying to give some fucking money to this charity, and the guy won't come by my office and meet with me. And that's how we became friends. Yeah,
• 45:40
  Brian Lee: that's true. So it's thank you for giving me the journey. That thank you for giving.
• 45:44
  Randall Kaplan: I remember going to the charity and I remember buying a lot a few auction items. Yeah, I did. Indianapolis 500. A race where you got to do the race track and go and please escort to the stadium. Yeah. Are there any questions? Before we end that you wish I'd asked you that I didn't ask. You
• 46:06
  Brian Lee: know, I don't think so. I mean, you went pretty deep. can't forgive you.
• 46:13
  Randall Kaplan: So, Brian, I'm grateful for you being here. I'm grateful for your friendship.
• 46:18
  Randall Kaplan: You've been a role model to me, a mentor to me and to so many other people. Thank you very much for your time today, and thanks for being here.
• 46:26
  Brian Lee: Thanks for having me, Randy. It was fine. It was awesome.