Latest / Earn Your Leisure / Cliff Notes: Pinky Cole on Raising $25M for Slutty Vegan

Transcript

Cliff Notes: Pinky Cole on Raising $25M for Slutty Vegan · Earn Your Leisure

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: This episode is brought to you by P and C Bank.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: A lot of people think podcasts about work are boring,
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: and sure they definitely can be, but understanding a professionals
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: routine shows us how they achieve their success little by little,
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: day after day. It's like banking with P and C Bank.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: It might seem boring to safe plan and make calculated
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: decisions with your bank, but keeping your money boring is
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: what helps you live or more happily fulfilled life. P
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: and C Bank Brilliantly Boring since eighteen sixty five. Brilliantly
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Boring since eighteen sixty five is a service mark of
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: the PNC Financial Service Group, Inc. P and C Bank
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: National Association Member FDIC erness What's Up? You ever walk
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: into a small business and everything just works like the
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: checkout is fast, the receipts are digital, tipping is a breeze,
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: and you're out the door before the line even builds.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Odds are they're using Square? We love supporting business that
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: run on Square because it just feels seamless. Whether it's
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: a local coffee shop, a vendor at a pop up market,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: or even one of our merch partners. Square makes it
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: easy for them to take payments, manage inventory, and run
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: their business with confidence, all from one simple system. If
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: you're a business owner or even just thinking about launching
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: something soon, Square is hands down one of the best
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: tools out there to help you start, run, and grow.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: It's not just about payments, it's about giving you time
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: back so you can focus on what matters most ready.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: To see how Square can transform your business, visit Square
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: dot com backslash, go backslash eyl to learn more that
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Square dot com backslash, go backslash eyl. Don't wait, don't hesitate.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Let's Square handle the back end so you can keep
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: pushing your vision forward.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: You talk about it when you raised twenty five I
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: remember that was a few years ago. I think that
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: was the values your company out one hundred million dollars, right, yeah,
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: so talk about that. A lot of people see the
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: headline like slutty Vegan has one hundred million dollar valuation, right,
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: But talk about the process of actually raising that money.
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: When you got the money, what was the first thing
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: you did with the money? Were you beholden? Did you
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: have to answer to other people to make sure that
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: that you was doing the right thing with the money,
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: Like looking back on in hindsight, how was that experience
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: of actually getting that twenty five million.
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: The experience of getting twenty five million dollars? So when
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: I first got the money, y'all, I cried. You never
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: know what you're going to do when you get that
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: much money. I cried. I cried because you know, it's
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: one thing to put pressure on myself, because this is
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: my business and I don't owe any like it's my equity.
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: It's mine, me, my my mind. But when you take
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: money from a strategic investor, it's no longer just me
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: my it's hours. So I'm not just answering for myself.
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: I'm answering for the people who believed in me to
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: invest this level of cap capital to help me grow
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: and scale my company. So that's a different kind of pressure.
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: If anybody's watching this, if you've never raised twenty five
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: million dollars or anything remotely close, it is a different
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: kind of pressure because people are counting on you. So
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: what happens if people can't count on you no more?
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: That really gets tough. So when I got the money,
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: I was a bit overwhelmed because you could either do
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: great things with the money or you could fumble the ball,
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: and here I am. I'm a black woman, and not
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: many black women get this level of capital. So it
• 3:32
  Speaker 3: ain't just Pinky they just got twenty five million dollars.
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: It's every single black woman entrepreneur, every black entrepreneur, every
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: minority entrepreneur. You understand what I'm saying. So like, it's
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: not just about me when I go in these rooms. Now,
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: it's not just oh, Pinky is in the room. No,
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: it's that's a black person in the room. And if
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: I fumble the ball, then it affects all of us
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: because the way that the world works, the reality of
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: it is, is sometimes we get grouped together. So I
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: come as one, but I stands ten thousand. And I'm
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: telling you that because ninety percent of what we said
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: we were going to do with the money, we did right.
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: We opened up locations, we paid off that, we did
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: all of the things. But you never realized how fast
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: twenty five million dollars can go when you're building and
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: you're scaling and your growing businesses. So if I could
• 4:19
  Speaker 3: do anything different, when I change anything, no, however, what
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: I would make sure is I would make sure my
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: advice to anybody who is about to get a level
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: of investment. You need to go and somebody should create this.
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: You need to go through a program where you sit
• 4:39
  Speaker 3: down with strategic advisors, you sit down with financial advisors,
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: so they could really make the money work for you.
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: Because actually, I take that back. If I could go back,
• 4:48
  Speaker 3: I would alter something. What I would do is I
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: would make sure that all of that money would go
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: into a fund that is occurring interest and we could
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: grow the business off of interest based on that hard money.
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: But again, right, it took for me to have this
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: level of real time experience to learn. But if you
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: do get a lump sum of money in that kind
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: of way, you can put it in an account where
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: you can live off the interest. You can open up
• 5:13
  Speaker 3: stores off the interest, you can pay your payroll off
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: the interest. You can put it in treasury accounts, which
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: I did, right, and you can utilize that interest to
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: make the money that you need to continue to grow
• 5:22
  Speaker 3: the business so that you don't run through cash so fast.
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: So when they gave you, when they gave you to
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: twenty five, they just gave you a check for twenty
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: five million dollars and like, do your thing.
• 5:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and we did. We did our think we did
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: I think. But what I'm saying to you is doing
• 5:39
  Speaker 3: your thing means a lot. Doing my thing ain't necessarily
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: doing my investors thing. Understand what I'm saying. So if
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: I had to do this all over again, I would
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: make sure that I'm being super intentional on the who, what, when,
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: where and why. Luckily for me, I've been blessed with
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: the best investors in the world. So Richie lu Dennis
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: from New Voices is my lead investor, and then EHI
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: and Lightened Hospitality Group. That's Danny Meyer who created shape Shack.
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: So like, it don't get no better than that. Like,
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: God really just blessed me on that opportunity because I
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: can pick up the phone and any relationship that I
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: want to have as a phone call away. So it's
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: also very important to be mindful of who you decide
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: to take money from. But I'm glad that the twenty
• 6:25
  Speaker 3: five million allowed me to propel my business to now
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: being a household name from covers of magazines to being
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: in Target stores and getting picked up in Walmart. We're
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: going into Walmart week thirty seven, to being able to
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: open up more locations, to be able to have brand
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: partnership deals, so the opportunities are continuing to roll. But
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: it's a result of the level of investment that the
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: investor said, you know what, I'm gonna give you this
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: money so you can grow this brand.
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: So you said you did ninety percent of the things
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: that you wanted to do, which leaves the door open
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: for the ten percent that still hasn't been done. Talk
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: about that because as you're scaling, you're also diversifying, whether
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: you know on your personal level in real estate. I
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: know Barvegan has had some of the change. We got
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: a lot of events happening there, loved music having in there.
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: To talk about that balance. As you're growing in scaling,
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: you're also diversifying and accomplishing that ten percent that we
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: still want to get done.
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: You know, it's interesting because I am diversifying, but right
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: now I'm trying to undiversify. What they don't tell you
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: is that when you start to grow this business, then
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: we want to do all of these things. And I
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: mean we all creatives on the phone. Let's be honest, right, Like,
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: we got this thing that's the bread and butter, and
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: then we want to go off and do this and
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: movies and television and blah. Blah blah blah, and all
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: these things are great, but the reality of it is
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: is you cannot serve two mansters, right, So it's important
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: to make sure that home is always good because home
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: will always make room for other things. So when I
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: created bar Vegan, that was really just a concept that
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: was like overnight, Oh, this is a multimillion dollar company too.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: Who would have thought?
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: And I came up with this concept and I made
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: what like five million dollars the first year and that
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: one location. So I'm like, oh, this is like, this
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: is a real business and this is separate and a
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: sign from Slutty Began. So I'm like, okay, this is great.
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: So then I just recently I did a soft opening
• 8:12
  Speaker 3: for my next Barbgan. It's opening and next week. But
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: Barbiingan and Slutty Vegan I kind of like my bread
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: and butter right now. Before I wanted to do like
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: a Slutty Vegan record label, and I wanted to do
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: all these things. But then I had to have a
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: conversation with myself as an entrepreneur that guess what, when
• 8:29
  Speaker 3: I get Sludy Vegan to where I wanted to be,
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: whether I decide to go public. Whether I decide to sell,
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: whatever decision I make on the business, that'll make room
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: for me to do all the other things that I
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: want to do. But I have to make sure that
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: this is sound. I got to make sure that this
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: continues to make the money. I have to make sure
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: that this brand continues to grow, because this brand is
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: going to set me up for everything else that I
• 8:48
  Speaker 3: want to do in my life.
• 8:49
  Speaker 4: An illegal alien from Guatemala charged with raping a child
• 8:53
  Speaker 4: in Massachusetts. An MS thirteen gang member from El Salvador
• 8:57
  Speaker 4: accused of murdering a Texas man. Venezuelan charged with filming
• 9:01
  Speaker 4: and selling child pornography in Michigan. These are just some
• 9:05
  Speaker 4: of the heinous migrant criminals caught because of President Donald J.
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: Trump's leadership. I'm Christy Noman, the United States Secretary of
• 9:13
  Speaker 4: Homeland Security. Under President Trump, attempted illegal border crossings are
• 9:18
  Speaker 4: at the lowest levels ever recorded, and over one hundred
• 9:21
  Speaker 4: thousand illegal aliens have been arrested. If you are here illegally,
• 9:26
  Speaker 4: your next you will be fined nearly one thousand dollars
• 9:29
  Speaker 4: a day, imprisoned, and deported. You will never return. But
• 9:33
  Speaker 4: if you register using our CBP Home app and leave now.
• 9:37
  Speaker 4: You could be allowed to return legally. Do what's right.
• 9:41
  Speaker 4: Leave now. Under President Trump America's laws, border and families
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: will be protected. Sponsored by the United States Department of
• 9:49
  Speaker 4: Homeland Security,