Latest / eCommerce Podcast / How to Charge Double for Paper Plates (And Have Customers Thank You)
Transcript
- 0:04Welcome to the e-commerce podcast.
- 0:07My name is Matt Edmondson and it is great to be with you today.
- 0:11I am chatting with Selena Knight all the way from the other side of the world, from the land down under, as we would say in Britain.
- 0:19What, in fact, Selena, let me ask you a question.
- 0:21What do you say about Brits?
- 0:23Are we the land down up?
- 0:24I don't know.
- 0:26How do you refer to it?
- 0:28Well, my husband's from the UK and I think we just say from the UK or in the UK.
- 0:34You know what?
- 0:34It's kind of like, oh can we look, I don't know if this is a great start.
- 0:38You know how you can edit this out if you're not happy with it, but you know how Americans, lot of Americans have like, I think it's like 90 % of Americans have never left
- 0:46their country.
- 0:47it's a really big number,
- 0:48And when you ask them, you there's those memes where you ask Americans to point out different countries and they can't find them.
- 0:54I feel like Australians are like that with anything that is remotely UK-ish.
- 0:59It's just the UK.
- 1:02And it could be, it could be Scotland, it could be England, it could be, it could be Paris, but you know what?
- 1:07It's just the UK.
- 1:09the UK.
- 1:10Yeah, no, fair enough.
- 1:11Fair enough.
- 1:12That's brilliant.
- 1:13We just call it the UK.
- 1:14Why don't we just call it Australia?
- 1:16I don't know.
- 1:16Why do we have to call it the land down under?
- 1:18Who knows?
- 1:19Who knows?
- 1:20I'm sure there's some history buff somewhere that's going to give me, you know, LinkedIn message telling me why.
- 1:25But that's great.
- 1:26It's great to see you on the show.
- 1:27Thanks for coming.
- 1:29No problems, thank you for having me.
- 1:31I have to be honest with you, for those of watching on YouTube, you'll notice that you actually have a really good microphone.
- 1:38So I have slight mic envy.
- 1:40Ooh, ooh, I love this microphone.
- 1:43Are we allowed to like digress this early in the podcast?
- 1:47I may well have many microphones, but I went, okay, we're talking about retail and the experience.
- 1:54Like this is, I'm just side barring and bringing this back in.
- 1:57When I first started podcasting, which was 11 years ago, I had some crappy microphone and I remember somebody giving me a horrible review saying, oh, the audio is terrible.
- 2:09Because back then we didn't have video, we just had audio.
- 2:12And so I remember thinking, okay, I'm going to do this.
- 2:14I'm going to go to like a microphone shop, do they exist?
- 2:18And I'm going to see if I can find someone who will let me try microphones.
- 2:22Because I remember back in the day listening to people like Pat Flynn and
- 2:27I'm just trying to think of who else there was, but they had these like quite smooth microphones.
- 2:35And so I did, I did all this research and I found this store.
- 2:38actually wasn't too far away.
- 2:40It was a music store.
- 2:42Right.
- 2:42but they had a sound booth in there.
- 2:45And so you would go in and you're like, I would like to try a podcast.
- 2:48And I'm still, I still have literally no audio knowledge whatsoever, but they're like, do you want a bright pod?
- 2:54Do you want a bright microphone or a, I don't know, all these other words of microphones.
- 2:59I just want to sound, I want my voice to sound like husky and sexy.
- 3:05I want the hucky and sexy microphone, that's what I want.
- 3:07Yeah, but apparently there are different microphones that can change.
- 3:11I mean, you may know more than me.
- 3:13And so he put all these microphones through and I listened to this microphone and I was like, this is the one.
- 3:20And it was a brand I'd never heard of.
- 3:22It is an SE 2200.
- 3:25Yep.
- 3:27and never heard of it, didn't care.
- 3:29It was reasonably priced, I'm going to say like $600.
- 3:32And you know, those Sinehouser microphones go for a ridiculous amount of money.
- 3:37This is my third one of the exact same microphone.
- 3:41So one I may have dropped.
- 3:43um One they did repair under warranty and it just started crackling.
- 3:49And so this is my third one and I absolutely love it.
- 3:53I'm yet to find somewhere else.
- 3:54But here's the thing, if we can bring this back to retail, and I know that the people who are listening are e-commerce, it's how do you think about that customer experience?
- 4:03Like I will continuously go back to that store and I have bought many microphones from that store just because A, they know what they're talking about.
- 4:13And B, they could provide something that no one else could, which was I could go in and try the thing and find the thing I wanted.
- 4:20Now, I appreciate you can't always translate that to online, but I'm gonna guarantee the people listening probably have a lot of experience in their field.
- 4:30And so my question would be, how are you translating that Insta experience to online?
- 4:36Because there are ways of doing it.
- 4:39So.
- 4:40That's my little story about the microphone and I'm sorry I've just wasted about 6 or 7 minutes talking about microphones.
- 4:45No, no, no.
- 4:45It's fascinating.
- 4:47You're right, aren't you?
- 4:47Because what they did listening to you talk, it reminds me of the Apple store, right?
- 4:53I have done this with folks.
- 4:57I've taken them into the Apple store and just like made them stand there and just watch the salespeople in Apple.
- 5:05Because I remember the first time it was made aware to me how well they actually did was I remember going into the Apple store.
- 5:12I was looking at something.
- 5:13So, you I can't remember what it was, but I remember this, this old fella coming in the door and the person greeted him at the door and said, how can we help you?
- 5:23And he was like, I need to get one of those eyes thing.
- 5:28What are they?
- 5:29Saucepans or something?
- 5:31I don't know.
- 5:32And the guy goes, do mean an iPad?
- 5:33He says, I think so.
- 5:34I don't know what it is.
- 5:35I've just been told to come and get one.
- 5:37And he's like, what do you want to do with it?
- 5:39He says,
- 5:41I do that thing where I call my granddaughter but I see her on the screen and the guy goes, ah FaceTime.
- 5:47Now the granddad here has no idea what FaceTime is.
- 5:51He doesn't even know what the iPad is.
- 5:52He just knows what he wants, right?
- 5:54Like you, I want a microphone with the sexy and the husky settings, please.
- 5:58That's what I want.
- 6:00What they did in Apple was they got him an iPad.
- 6:05And they showed him how to do a FaceTime call.
- 6:07They didn't talk to him about screen resolution.
- 6:09They didn't talk to him about battery life.
- 6:11They didn't talk to him about the app store because I was listening to every single bit of it.
- 6:15All they did was talk to him about how did FaceTime and they even showed him how easy it was by doing FaceTime calls across the Apple store.
- 6:23He was like, the guy was like, do this.
- 6:26I'm going go over the other side, hit the button and let's see how it works.
- 6:30And of course, Grandad goes out with an iPad.
- 6:32I thought it was
- 6:33utter genius, the ability to quickly diagnose what it is they, the customer wants in the language that the customer wants it and deliver that.
- 6:43I think you're going to win every day.
- 6:45And without overwhelming them.
- 6:47so I think what we, what I take away from that is I remember, I've been in retail a really long time.
- 6:53And I remember back when we had our stores, like I was on, I had an e-commerce store in 2007.
- 7:02Now that may not seem like a long time ago, but I like to reference it with guys in 2007, we had to push the number one button three times if we wanted the letter C.
- 7:12Okay.
- 7:12We did not have data on our phones.
- 7:15just to put it into reference.
- 7:18we had dial-up as well.
- 7:19Oh no, do we have dial-up in 2000?
- 7:21Probably.
- 7:23Okay.
- 7:24were here in Australia.
- 7:25So I had an e-commerce store then and Flash was our favoritest thing in the world.
- 7:29But besides that, I remember bringing in a, I don't know, a system.
- 7:38Because I'm going to say I had a business degree, told me nothing about running a business.
- 7:42This is the kind of stuff they should teach you.
- 7:45So I remember people would come into my store and they would say, oh, I'm looking for a gift.
- 7:50So to give you some reference, we sold eco baby products, like eco baby products and gifts.
- 7:57So wooden toys, as well as things like reusable nappies back when eco wasn't even a thing.
- 8:02And so a lot of people, exactly what you just said, they would come in and they're like, oh,
- 8:06I'm shopping for my friend and she's like a crunchy hippie person and so I've got to find like you guys seem like you might have something for them.
- 8:13And I was like, cool, okay.
- 8:14And so here's, we called it the three questions and gosh, hopefully I don't like crash and burn here and forget what the three questions were.
- 8:22But it was, it was something along, and I give myself the ability to come back and rectify this if I remember correctly, but it was.
- 8:30Are you looking for, so when people would walk in, would be, you know, hi, have you been to the store before?
- 8:37And if they said yes, then we would have a little matrix, which was like, okay, great.
- 8:42um
- 8:45you know, it was something along the lines of, you shopping for yourself or for a gift?
- 8:50So the idea was that you never had yes or no questions.
- 8:54And are you shopping for yourself or for a gift?
- 8:56I'm shopping for myself.
- 8:58And then it would be, okay, what can I help you with today?
- 9:01And then if it was a gift, we had the three questions, which were, um
- 9:06what type of person are they?
- 9:10So are they a sporty person?
- 9:11Are they the crunchy hippie person?
- 9:14Are they the modern person who just wants to be a little bit eco?
- 9:18And then I guess the next question would be like, what sort of pain point do you want to fix?
- 9:23And so we would say something like, are they the kind of person who would like a candle or are they the kind of person who would like antibacterial soap?
- 9:35And so we would start to get an idea of who this person was and what they would want.
- 9:39And then the last question was, what's the budget?
- 9:42And those three questions could usually mean that you could pinpoint where to point somebody, especially if they were like your granddad, not your granddad, the granddad, who
- 9:54didn't quite know what they were looking for.
- 9:56And so what I've learned is that if you give someone more than three choices, they probably won't buy anything.
- 10:03That's true, yeah.
- 10:04because they want a high price thing, a low price thing and a mid price thing.
- 10:10And inevitably, I tend to find that they buy the high price thing, which is great.
- 10:14And so when we're thinking about like e-commerce, one of the tips I always give people is you have the ability to structure how customers are going to see your products when they
- 10:26come to a category page.
- 10:29It doesn't have to be highest to lowest.
- 10:31It doesn't have to be alphabetical.
- 10:34You get to choose, is canonical the right word?
- 10:38I think I feel like it's the right word.
- 10:40Yep.
- 10:40You get to choose the canonical structure of your page.
- 10:45so one of my tips, and I only usually share this with like my really high paying clients is when somebody comes to a category section, will always have at least, assuming you have
- 10:58three across the page, two really high priced products.
- 11:04And then I'll have the product that you really want to sell.
- 11:07So like the best seller.
- 11:09And it's usually, you know, maybe 30 % cheaper.
- 11:13But what we're doing now is price anchoring.
- 11:16And it's the same reason that when you go into some stores, stores change the way they do their layout, some will put discount stuff at the front, but some will put premium at the
- 11:26front, because the idea is the first number that we see, and this is behaviorally proven, is where we set our benchmark.
- 11:34So let's say we're selling jeans and your average pair of jeans is $200, 200 pounds.
- 11:41If we put the first pair that they see at 300 pounds, yes, you may turn some people away.
- 11:49But you know what, they probably weren't gonna buy anyway.
- 11:52But if they go to the next wall and all of those jeans are 200 pounds, they're a bargain compared to the first ones that I saw.
- 12:00And our brain has benchmarked the 300 pounds.
- 12:03So now what we're seeing, in fact, we're not even putting them at 200 pounds, are we?
- 12:06We're putting the 199.
- 12:08So we've gone from a three to a one and instantly they're more valuable.
- 12:13Does that make sense?
- 12:15No, totally.
- 12:16I think price anchoring is a really interesting strategy and it's a really interesting.
- 12:20I've, I noticed this at the Savoy.
- 12:24I don't know if you've ever been to the Savoy in London, you don't need to go, but I, we went to meet a supplier there and the supply was buying me drinks and I opened the menu
- 12:36and the first, I just, I just have a gin and tonic.
- 12:38I don't need anything fancy.
- 12:40Give me a gin and good old fashioned gin and tonic.
- 12:42I opened the menu, gin and tonic was £16, Selena.
- 12:45I was, I was apoplectic.
- 12:47I was like, this is a Gordon's gin and tonic.
- 12:49Why are you charging me so much money?
- 12:52And then I turned the page and saw the cocktails and the cocktails were three or £400.
- 12:57I was like, that's just, not only is that nuts, it's itsy moral to spend 400 bucks on a cocktail.
- 13:04I turned the page and there was one cocktail, their super flagship cocktail for £12,000.
- 13:12Right.
- 13:12I think I've heard this story actually in marketing.
- 13:18Yeah.
- 13:18Yeah.
- 13:19Why I asked the lady, said to do you actually sell this 12,000 pound cocktail?
- 13:23So you'd be amazed how many we sell, right?
- 13:25The bankers that come and get their bonuses, they've just got a million pound bonus.
- 13:28They want, they're like, yeah, I'm just going to taste 12,000 pound cocktail cause I can.
- 13:32But what was happening?
- 13:33The reason I tell this story is same thing.
- 13:35And I recognize what was going on in my head.
- 13:39The first time I'm like gin and tonic 16 pounds is ridiculous.
- 13:44At that point I'm having tap water.
- 13:46And then I saw a 400 pound cocktail and thought, well, maybe a 16 pound gin and tonic is not that bad.
- 13:51And then I saw a 12,000 pound cocktail and thought, 300 pound cocktails, not that bad.
- 13:56And the guy that was buying the drinks, the supplier was like, should we have a couple of cocktails?
- 13:59I'm like, we would never have had that conversation had we not seen the 12,000 pound cocktail.
- 14:06And it was all around pricing.
- 14:08Can I say you're kind of person who I had to hang out with because I would be like you, I'd be like, you're paying but 16 pound cocktail, just give me some water, I'll be fine.
- 14:18So can I ask you a question then about how, when it comes to pricing, if we pull this back to e-commerce.
- 14:30How do you tell people, or how do you advise people to charge, let's call in air quotes, ridiculous prices?
- 14:41What's your suggestion there?
- 14:43absolutely.
- 14:44You should do it.
- 14:45But how?
- 14:45How do you...
- 14:47Can we talk about this?
- 14:48I've just like railroaded your podcast.
- 14:49I'm so sorry.
- 14:50no, no.
- 14:51Let's take over time.
- 14:53uh You know what, I do the same when I go to the people's podcast.
- 14:59It's like, well, let me ask you a question.
- 15:00It's like, no, no, Matt, I'm the podcast host.
- 15:03m
- 15:05where I'm going with this is what I saw last year.
- 15:07Now, I'm sure it's the same in England.
- 15:09We've got some English customers and I'm sure it's the same there, which was 2025 was a bit tight.
- 15:15was some people saw growth, but we definitely saw a change in consumer spending.
- 15:20And so where I saw the people who did, who either stayed the same or did well, were people that were brands that would I, what I would call premium.
- 15:32So not luxury, not your Louis Vuitton's, but they're
- 15:34charging above the average for things.
- 15:40And some of those are very niche, so they can charge what they want.
- 15:44But others would just...
- 15:46And there's a company here in Australia that I always come back to because it is the most basic ghetto thing, and they charge more.
- 15:53So there's a company here in Australia called The Party People.
- 15:56They sell party supplies, paper plates, hats, Dora the Explorer piñatas, all that kind of stuff.
- 16:03Now you can buy a set of paper plates for, I'm just gonna say dollars, because we're dollars here, you can convert, for $3.
- 16:11Pink paper plates, $3.
- 16:13However, they charge between $5 and $6 for the exact same plates.
- 16:20because and I'm talking same brand same everything but their point of difference is that when you come to get your Dora the Explorer and clearly my kid has long since grown up if
- 16:32I'm saying Dora the Explorer
- 16:35You can have everything.
- 16:37You can have the pinata, you can have the plates, you can have the little paper bag, you can have everything.
- 16:42You don't have to go to that store for the bags and that store for the hats.
- 16:46You can get everything.
- 16:47And so their whole point of difference was range and that you can shop for everything in the one place.
- 16:54And as a result, as the consumer, you're like, well, I'll pay $6 for the plates because if I go over there, I'm going to have to pay for shipping.
- 17:02And this is an online store, just FYI.
- 17:04If I
- 17:05to that store, then I'm going to have to pay another $10 shipping and then what if they don't come?
- 17:09Like at least this, it all comes together in one thing.
- 17:13And so they can charge more because they have a different point of difference for something that is very basic.
- 17:19But what I found in 2025 was the retailers that did well were people who were charging above what everybody else was charging.
- 17:29And so I would love to hear your thoughts on
- 17:33What do you say to your clients, to your retailers about, you know what, you're selling the same product as Joe Bloggs over there, but I think you should charge more.
- 17:42Yeah, absolutely.
- 17:44I think it's, I mean, I do it.
- 17:45I have an e-commerce site and we, one of our sites is a supplement site.
- 17:49We sell vitamin C on that supplement site.
- 17:51You can get vitamin C for two pounds from the supermarket.
- 17:53We sell it for I'm never going to clean up selling vitamin C, but I, the people that buy it are just like, we know the brand, you know, you guys are going to make a good product
- 18:03and it's convenient.
- 18:04Right.
- 18:05And so that in itself has value.
- 18:09The other thing I like,
- 18:12I remember talking to a lady who owned a restaurant.
- 18:16I appreciate this is not e-commerce, but this is just one story that springs to mind.
- 18:21They were struggling.
- 18:22They were burger restaurant and they were like, there was three of them on the street.
- 18:26I walked up and down the street and there was these three burger shops and they're all selling burgers for 10 pounds.
- 18:30And she's like, what do we do?
- 18:31How do we get more people in the shop?
- 18:33Cause they were just one of three.
- 18:35And at that point, when you're selling everything for the same price, there has to be a point of differentiation.
- 18:40And there has to be, doesn't it?
- 18:42Like, see, you say that to me and my first thought was, judge 15.
- 18:46Well, I told her to double the price of the burgers.
- 18:48I said, don't sell a 10 pound burger, sell a 20 pound burger.
- 18:51Don't just double the prices, but find a reason to sell it for 20 pounds.
- 18:55And she's like, well, no one will buy because there's 10 pounds down the road.
- 18:57I said, they'll buy if you have a burger on your menu for 150 pounds.
- 19:01Right.
- 19:02look, it's like Kizmo.
- 19:03We're back to the same conversation.
- 19:04oh
- 19:05Right?
- 19:05So this is how I think you do price anchoring.
- 19:09like you say, if you online go and find some, we had a guy called Norm come on the show.
- 19:17Norm was great.
- 19:17His whole philosophy in life was you take something from Amazon, like a knife.
- 19:22I think he used the example of a butcher's knife.
- 19:24Norm, Norm Ferroir, think, I can't remember, it's really bad.
- 19:27Sorry, Norm.
- 19:30But he took a butcher's knife, took it out of the...
- 19:33the cardboard box and put it in a wooden box, charge four times the price for it because his photos now had a wooden box and sold gazillions of them at much higher profit margins.
- 19:43And I'm like, for me, that's how you figure it out.
- 19:46You sell, you figure out a reason as to why you become the most expensive.
- 19:51And I always think that's better than being the cheapest because then you're just selling commodities and you have to try and differentiate.
- 19:56And the way you differentiate is you just differentiate on price, which is rubbish.
- 20:01So I think
- 20:03like you, I'm a fan of how do I put the prices up?
- 20:08How do I do that in a way that demonstrates value to the client where they feel like we're getting something here?
- 20:14All right, I love this conversation.
- 20:19If we tie it back to as the business owner, if you are stuck, and I don't know about you, but I know that most of the people that we work with, the owners or the founders are...
- 20:33freaking amazing people.
- 20:35They will work themselves to the bone and they've built this business because of like a hard work tenacity, this sheer doggedness of, I was thinking this morning, why would
- 20:49anybody get into retail?
- 20:51Like, when you think about it, and I'm just side barring here and I hope you're okay with that, is that most retailers I know are very adverse to risk.
- 21:02Mm.
- 21:03They, you don't know if I want to go into that new range or open another location, whatever.
- 21:08But then I sit back and think, I was doing my hair this morning, I was like.
- 21:12How does it work that you, if you're that adverse to risk, that you decide to open a business where literally every decision you make is a gamble.
- 21:22It's a gamble that when you order the product, it's going to turn up.
- 21:25It's a gamble that anyone's going to buy it.
- 21:27And you are investing tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in inventory on this hope that someone is going to buy it you will make some money.
- 21:37And that is one of the biggest gambles when it comes to business.
- 21:40It's not even like a service business where you
- 21:42go out and do the work.
- 21:43That's pretty reliable.
- 21:44But retail, I'm like, how do you get into this?
- 21:47And so sometimes I do think, why don't we start retail businesses?
- 21:50um And so with that, my question to you, if the conversation we could have would be around when retailers are so, and e-comment, I'm just going to use the generic word retailers.
- 22:03When we're so used to buying everything at wholesale price, how do we combat
- 22:11that idea of being affordable is the best place to hang out.
- 22:19And that we should be okay with telling our team that, you know, I'm going to go back to Norm.
- 22:30Like, imagine he has a team of people who take knives out and put them in the wooden boxes and the team potentially are saying, Norm, this is unethical.
- 22:40How do we deal with that?
- 22:44That's a great question.
- 22:46This is why I take people to the Apple store.
- 22:49Simply because they're the most successful retailer out there per square foot.
- 22:53No one sells as much as Apple per square foot.
- 22:55At least they didn't.
- 22:57They have the fewest products you would expect to have in a store.
- 23:00And it's just like go and look, right?
- 23:02Go and see what is going on there and figure out how you do that online.
- 23:08Because it's...
- 23:09Well, they do it online.
- 23:11Yeah, And they're magical with it in many ways, right?
- 23:16I think it's a really interesting success story.
- 23:19How do you do it?
- 23:23uh I think there's a lot of things, if we draw back to, um if we draw back to what, let's go with Apple.
- 23:32What did they do well?
- 23:34Do you know what their product from what I hear.
- 23:37the Google products and Android products can actually supersede Apple, but they've built that the cult status.
- 23:45to be fair, once I change and I can copy and paste between phones and iPads and things, that was my saving grace.
- 23:52I will never go back.
- 23:55And it's amazing how many people don't know how to do that.
- 23:58But if we take away, so one, think they have the cult status and they've done that through
- 24:04things like pre-selling and like really building up the hype.
- 24:09But the reality is it's sexy.
- 24:11Like they made something very boring, very sexy.
- 24:15Whereas if I go to Google, they've made their phones fun.
- 24:21And I think that if we look at them, they're very different brands and they attract very different people.
- 24:28But...
- 24:29there is an exclusivity that comes with Apple products and the people who buy them want other people to think that they're cool and I have the good stuff.
- 24:41And when it comes back to translating that online and the unethicalness, uh I would say that what Apple have done well,
- 24:56is have their team buy into the vision.
- 24:59I don't even know what Apple's vision is, but what they've bought into is the brand.
- 25:04And if you can build that, you won't ever lose employees and they won't question.
- 25:13I think the problem becomes when the, you hire people for the sake of hiring people.
- 25:22And you can fix this in the hiring process.
- 25:24And this is something I accidentally did very, very well.
- 25:27Like I didn't know it at the time.
- 25:29I've been doing it for 20 years and I still do it.
- 25:31I still tell my people to do it now, which is when I write a job description, I very rarely write it for the job.
- 25:41I write it for the culture.
- 25:44And I think there is a point in business where you can...
- 25:50train someone to do anything versus when you have to have the expertise.
- 25:56And you will hit that usually around seven figures where you have to, you know, you can just train Sarah.
- 26:02She's gone from, you know, uploading products to now she's the e-commerce manager because she's just got the experience.
- 26:08But that gets a point where you need expertise.
- 26:14regardless of which one of those stages you're at, if you're not really clear about where your business is heading and how customers value you and how you're going to turn up, it
- 26:27is really difficult to get people to buy into that.
- 26:29So I know that even to this day, I start my, I do a group interview to begin with, and even in store and online, I do a group interview and I start that with,
- 26:41talking about the business, but not talking about the business.
- 26:44So what I'll do is I'll be like, our customers are these kinds of people and what we love about them is this.
- 26:51we're on a mission, you know, our, our, our mission in our company is we create solutions that make money for your store.
- 26:59And so if you're not okay with that, this is not the place for you.
- 27:03Like if you're not okay with helping people make money and become rich in whatever way that looks like for them.
- 27:11this is not the place for you.
- 27:12And I have run into this problem before where as the business grew, our business manager hit that point where she could not think to the next level.
- 27:28And she was just stuck in the, like, I can't fathom what this business would look like at 20 million, 30 million, $40 million.
- 27:36And that's okay.
- 27:38because who got you here won't get you there and what got you here won't get you there.
- 27:42And so coming back to that conversation of how do you make sure that your team are on board?
- 27:50This is a leadership thing.
- 27:51It's not even a hiring decision.
- 27:53is you as the founder, as the owner.
- 27:56If you don't even know where you're going, then how the heck do you get someone else to buy into that?
- 28:02If you are so busy working in your business and
- 28:07Micro-managing, I always say that, you you could always tell the businesses that are stuck because the owner needs to know everything, everything about everything.
- 28:17But if you need to be that person, you won't get to $20 million.
- 28:22You might get to 10, but you won't get past that because your business cannot be capped at how smart you are.
- 28:32And I will always say, I've literally just hired a new marketing manager.
- 28:36And I said, you're saying things I don't know, which is great because you can't be as smart as me.
- 28:42You have to be smarter than me because if this whole business is only as smart as me, we're screwed.
- 28:50I can't be smart in every single area of the business.
- 28:54I just need to be smart in this part of the business.
- 28:56You guys all need to be smarter than me and you need to come back and tell me what we need to do and I will make a decision.
- 29:01And so all of that comes back to
- 29:05Sometimes I'm just again, sidebarring.
- 29:08My brain goes in like 700 different circles.
- 29:13But there is a point when you grow where what you wanted has now changed and that is okay.
- 29:22And when you start making good money, I think it can become a difficult thing to go, but why do I need to make more money?
- 29:31And here's my answer to that.
- 29:33If you make
- 29:35$100 million this year.
- 29:38One, on a personal level, you have choices.
- 29:41You don't have to decide, do I get medicine or not?
- 29:45Do I get surgery or not?
- 29:47Do my kids go to the best school or not?
- 29:49So one, money gives us choices.
- 29:51Two, you get to choose what to do with that money.
- 29:55And every time you buy something, whether that is a Lamborghini or that is a bottle of Coke or that is a $12,000 cocktail,
- 30:04Think about all those people that you're supporting by doing that.
- 30:10So you've got, you know, let's go with the $12,000 cocktail.
- 30:12You've got the waitress, you've got all of the bar staff, you've got the supplier who brought in the cocktails.
- 30:18Yes, you've got the massive conglomerate who owned the Savoy, but all of those people work as well and all those people get paid.
- 30:25And so I came from a very, very, very poor background.
- 30:30And this is how I have resolved that is okay making money is that
- 30:34every time I spend money.
- 30:36And you know what, even if I don't spend it, if it sits in the bank and makes money, then all those banking, well, there's not many banking employees anymore, but there are a few
- 30:44banking employees who have jobs as a result of that.
- 30:48And so that is how I've resolved, because I grew up with money, rich people are horrible and rich people are greedy.
- 30:55And I think the media portrays that as well, which is especially for women, maybe it's different for men.
- 31:00But when you think about any movie you've ever watched,
- 31:03the female CEO or executive, she's either a bitch, sorry if I can't beep, she's not very nice person, or she's doing this at the expense of her family, or she's doing this at the
- 31:17expense of herself.
- 31:19And it's funny that men are not always portrayed like that.
- 31:22So I'm just taking from my bias.
- 31:24And what I have discovered is it doesn't need to be like that, but the more money you make, the more you have the ability to make the world the way that you might want it.
- 31:33to be.
- 31:34And that's your choice.
- 31:36really interesting point, isn't it?
- 31:37Because I think uh people want to make a fewer if you're in business, you want to make money, even if it's to fund your mission.
- 31:46And I think, I think conversations about wealth are quite fascinating.
- 31:50You know, we were talking about wealth earlier on, like how you build wealth with us with a group of guys.
- 31:55um Stay talking about building wealth and you kind of like
- 32:02Money without mission, I think is a waste of time.
- 32:06I think the people that struggle the most with wealth have no mission for their money, whatever that mission is.
- 32:13And, you know, I've, I've, I've been fortunate enough to know some of the wealthiest people on the planet, you know, and I've been on their private jets.
- 32:22So I could tell you all kinds of stories, which I won't bore you with right now, but most of them are like, I wish.
- 32:32Most of them are unhappy.
- 32:35And they get their self-esteem from work, right?
- 32:38So they're not getting it at home from their family.
- 32:40So they pour themselves into work because they've made more money at work.
- 32:43So therefore they can feel better about themselves.
- 32:45At least they're successful here.
- 32:47And so I think you're right.
- 32:50I think you have to wrestle with this.
- 32:51What's the mission?
- 32:52What is success to me?
- 32:55What does that look like?
- 32:57Because hopefully you're going to get there.
- 33:00Yeah, and if you know, and if you, sorry to cut in, but if you know that, how much easier is it to get people on board and get them to buy in rather than this is a job and you get
- 33:17paid and they're just waiting for somebody else to pay them more.
- 33:21And I think that that is what I accidentally did well.
- 33:25Yeah.
- 33:25I was so invested in what we were doing to change.
- 33:31As I said, this was before eco was a thing.
- 33:34I came from a background, well, I came from a job in sustainability.
- 33:39I was passionate about the planet.
- 33:40I was passionate about my kid's skin and what she was going to grow up like and where the world was going to be.
- 33:49If you know that and you can express it, you will bring the people in who want to be part of that.
- 33:56And I think that if we bring it all back full circle, think that Apple does that well, whether it's the mission or whether it is the cult status, what they've done is put a
- 34:05group of people together who love the product so much.
- 34:10And you know that, like you said, every time you go into an Apple store, they know the product inside out, that they're going to fix.
- 34:18granddad's problem and then they're going to fix my problem completely differently.
- 34:24It's so much easier to get people to stay and to help and to over deliver.
- 34:32And if someone over delivers, you can charge more.
- 34:35If they're bought in.
- 34:38That's so true.
- 34:39And I think they buy into, if you're the leader, if it's your company, my experience is they, I've never had a member of staff sit down and interview with me, know, potential
- 34:51member of staff sit down and interview with me, Selena and go, how do I make you more money, Matt?
- 34:55I'm really, my whole life's goal is to make you richer, right?
- 34:58It just, that's never ever happened.
- 35:02And I understand why.
- 35:04And because I don't think anybody that works for me, ultimately, I don't think their goal is to make me richer.
- 35:08I think they'd like the consequence of my wealth growing because they do better, right?
- 35:14It's always better to be involved in a company that's growing, that's dynamic and good things are going on.
- 35:21So they have got to buy into it and it's got to be, I think what they buy into, like, don't think many people at Apple buy into making Tim Cook richer.
- 35:31I don't buy an iPhone to think, there you go, Tim, have that one on, that pints on me, right?
- 35:38Doesn't happen.
- 35:39I could care less in many ways.
- 35:43But like you say, they're bought into the brand.
- 35:45They're bought into the story and they're bought into the mission of the company.
- 35:49And if the company makes a shed load of money, well, that's a consequence of the mission.
- 35:53That's a consequence of the vision being fulfilled.
- 35:56And so you hear of companies like Patagonia doing really well because they just people just love their story and it's so unusual.
- 36:05The whole guy just gives his company back to the planet.
- 36:08I mean, how does that work?
- 36:09I don't know, but everyone loves it.
- 36:12Patagonia Patagucci.
- 36:15That's a good name.
- 36:17Yeah, they should trademark that.
- 36:20They should definitely trademark that.
- 36:21But no, I think you're right.
- 36:22think, I think money has to have a mission.
- 36:24People like to be involved in something which is bigger than themselves.
- 36:30Um, that has a mission, whether that's helping the planet, whether that's helping their kids, whether that's whatever it is, there has to be a reason for them to be involved.
- 36:37They got to feel like a member of a tribe, a community.
- 36:40Um, and I think if you can do those things.
- 36:45you'll ultimately do well.
- 36:48The people that lose I think in the end are the people that are just no no no I'm not gonna I'm not gonna have that on over there because it will save ten bucks and that ten
- 37:01bucks I want in my pocket.
- 37:03Do know what mean?
- 37:03It's like I think people feel things like that.
- 37:07I think they do too.
- 37:09I, what I would say there is when it comes to, if it, when it comes to you as the owner, as the founder, you said many, many rich people are not happy and coming out of 2025, I
- 37:26can tell you that many retailers aren't happy now either.
- 37:30And I think that happens when we fall back into all of the doing and we lose sight of that bigger picture.
- 37:38And so maybe this conversation is you just thinking, why do I do this?
- 37:43And if the answer is so that I can have a million dollars in the bank and I feel secure and I can send my kids to a good school, well, that's fine.
- 37:52But know that that may not be the same thing that your team buy into.
- 37:57And if that's where you want to go, that's where you want to go.
- 38:00But I'm guessing that even if you want those things, the reason you did this was something else.
- 38:06I just know that most of the people that I work with love their product or they love their customer or they love their niche.
- 38:13I would love to know about Norm though.
- 38:14Like, why does he do it?
- 38:17He, that would be a question for him.
- 38:20mean, from what I know of Norm, he's a great guy.
- 38:22I've been on his show a couple of times.
- 38:23He's been on this one a couple of times.
- 38:26I think he loves the hustle of it and, the people around him are like, yeah, you know, this is, this is kind of cool.
- 38:32It's got that kind of hustle vibe about it and it's dynamic and they're growing and they're, making stuff work over here and they can experiment and they can do all these
- 38:41kinds of different things.
- 38:42And they've got the capacity to do that.
- 38:46Whereas I think if Norm just sold the same knives in the cardboard box, they wouldn't have the capacity to do that because then it's just a volume game, isn't it?
- 38:52It's just like, I've just got to sell the same thing 10,000 times to, you know, buy a Mars bar or something.
- 38:58And so...
- 39:01I think people like that.
- 39:03think I'm curious to know why he is in it though.
- 39:06I mean, Norm must love people.
- 39:08I hope there'll be something in that.
- 39:11But what I think you have highlighted there is what I took away from that conversation, whether you meant it or not, was your dream doesn't have to be this great big thing.
- 39:22Your vision could just be, I like wanna find better ways to do stuff.
- 39:26And if we're talking about that example, it's kind of like their culture from what you're telling me would be like.
- 39:36almost like testing and measuring.
- 39:38So, you know, it's this constant test.
- 39:40It's constant A-B test.
- 39:41What's this knife worth?
- 39:42What if we stick it in an aluminium box?
- 39:46What would happen versus a wooden box versus a, I don't know, a stainless steel box?
- 39:52And that curiosity, so what they're fostering there is curiosity.
- 39:56Curiosity and, you you said hustle, but I'm thinking it's, you curiosity and innovation and the success that comes with testing.
- 40:06yeah, experimentation is that
- 40:08That's a good word.
- 40:08Thank you very much.
- 40:10Yeah, and there are some people that are just thriving that they just learn.
- 40:14And those people are probably not going to be great people at the Apple Store, because the Apple Store is, I'm going to say it's formulaic in the sense that this is our product and
- 40:23we solve this problem.
- 40:24Whereas that is a completely different environment to where you get to, you you get to take risks and you get to think about things that it's outside of the box or inside of the
- 40:36box, whichever way you want to put it.
- 40:37um
- 40:39And you're going to attract different people.
- 40:41And so I can imagine without knowing Norm, something along those lines is when he's hiring, it's kind of like, hey, if you're the kind of person who, you know, used to stick
- 40:50forks in electrical outlets to see if you would get electrocuted, this is the job for you.
- 40:56Please don't do that.
- 40:58every, every young boy goes and applies for the job because we've all done it.
- 41:01That's great.
- 41:05Great.
- 41:06It's no, it's fascinating.
- 41:07Um, what you say, Selena and I, and I love it.
- 41:11think it's, it's, I don't know where you are listener in terms of your e-comm journey, right?
- 41:16I don't know you're just starting out.
- 41:17I don't know why you're doing what you're doing.
- 41:19I don't know if you're years into it.
- 41:23But I think it's good to tap into the reason why you're doing it and to articulate that and to remind yourself of why you're doing it.
- 41:31To remind yourself of what it is you're trying to build.
- 41:35And to also remember why your team are doing this.
- 41:38Because like you say, Celine, don't, those two aren't always the same thing.
- 41:44But there has to be some congruency if you're to keep people long term.
- 41:50And to think about that.
- 41:52And I was always told in leadership school that how do you know when you've talked about the vision enough in your company?
- 42:03I think the answer was well, when you're absolutely sick and tired of talking about it, because you feel like you've done nothing but talk about it all the time, then you're
- 42:12probably just about starting to talk about it enough.
- 42:17My answer to that, I agree with that, but my answer would always be if you have the kind of people who come in early and stay late and don't expect to get paid for it, I'm not
- 42:28advocating don't pay your team, but if they are, if they want to go the extra mile, I think you've done a really good job.
- 42:35Yeah.
- 42:36Finding those people is like finding unicorns teeth.
- 42:40Really is.
- 42:43Yeah.
- 42:44It's it's remarkable.
- 42:46I think one of the biggest frustrations a lot of people have when it comes to hiring people, and maybe you've seen this as well, Selina, but it's certainly the people that I
- 42:53talk to is the people that they hire don't think like them.
- 42:57Now they're not going to do that because they're not the founder.
- 43:01But founders and entrepreneurs think everybody should think like a founder and an entrepreneur.
- 43:05What do you mean?
- 43:05We're just going to work a 12 hour day here to solve this problem.
- 43:08What's wrong with you?
- 43:09Just get on it.
- 43:10I don't care if you've got a family.
- 43:12What's wrong with where's your commitment?
- 43:14And there's a frustration which builds inside everybody when people don't think about the business the same way that you or I maybe would think.
- 43:24Can I, are you saying more or can I talk to that?
- 43:28Okay.
- 43:28I'm just, terrible at cutting people off because you know, let's be honest, most business owners have ADHD of some, or are on the spectrum of some, which is why we're doing exactly
- 43:38what you just said.
- 43:39We're thinking about a million things where we can process a million different things.
- 43:44And I think we forget that neurotypical people don't work like that.
- 43:54And we need those people.
- 43:56We need those people to be focused on one thing and get that thing done.
- 44:00And yes, it's annoying and yes, it's frustrating.
- 44:02But I've been through quite a bit of hiring through 2025 and I worked with Gary V's organizational psychologist.
- 44:10It's a of a name drop.
- 44:12And one of the things that she said to me was that even though I thought I had written these position descriptions quite well,
- 44:24that I hadn't.
- 44:26And so one of the things she made me do was write down everything that annoys me.
- 44:33Everything.
- 44:35It's a really long list.
- 44:36It started off with people who talk slow, people who walk slow, people who send me very long emails instead of dot points.
- 44:44And I just, I just kept adding to that list, adding to that list.
- 44:50It was, and then...
- 44:52When you ask people what they want, they can't usually tell you, but they can tell you what they don't want.
- 44:57And so what I will say is if you have a direct report, you need to be honest with yourself about what frustrates you.
- 45:07And of those things, which one is the one that your business actually needs?
- 45:13And even if it frustrates you, you're just going to have to put up with it.
- 45:16Because there were some things that I wrote down that I realized that like an operations manager, an operations manager, if you ever do Enneagram, it's going to be a one.
- 45:26Like they are process driven, that everything has to be data.
- 45:30And you need that.
- 45:32Any business owner needs one of those people and they will frustrate the hell out of you because they want all the information.
- 45:40like, told you, I told this to you.
- 45:43At least I thought I mentioned it in my brain and you couldn't read that.
- 45:47And so there are a few things there.
- 45:50If we break that down, which is one, I think a direct report.
- 45:55you need to understand how you communicate and the things that frustrate you, but also the things that you need to make a concession on and just deal with.
- 46:06The second one would be for your, I mentioned before, have donkeys and unicorns.
- 46:11So unicorns are the thinking people.
- 46:14Donkeys are doers.
- 46:16You need donkeys in your business.
- 46:18Like your bookkeeper.
- 46:20These are just do the job, right?
- 46:22The job is not to think of great ideas.
- 46:24It's just to get the numbers done.
- 46:25And so understanding that as well, that when you're breaking down these roles, what do you realistically need this person to do?
- 46:35Not necessarily want, but I'm with you.
- 46:38Like my operations manager was so frustrated because we tried to hire for four months in a CRM role.
- 46:45And she's like, can we not just hire somebody?
- 46:48I'm like,
- 46:48No, because we need someone who will think I need someone who goes, Oh, this doesn't work like, like you want it to do this, it doesn't do that.
- 46:57So here's the solution.
- 46:59It's not my job to know how the CRM works.
- 47:02And she would get we go through round after six into six people on an interview, six people on an interview six people and she's like, you have to hire someone soon.
- 47:10And I'm like, what and what you just get frustrated.
- 47:14because that person can't think for themselves.
- 47:15And then we've spent all this time building something that doesn't work because that person just wants to tick tasks off an Asana project.
- 47:23And we finally found somebody.
- 47:25It takes time.
- 47:26And again, this is where it comes back to, you've got to have the patience, but you've got to be really clear about who it is you want.
- 47:32But sometimes you just need people, like sometimes you do just need a body, but you the guy who's packing your pallets, maybe he doesn't need to be thinking outside the box.
- 47:43But I will put, will hands down, hand on heart say that your sales associates or the person who is answering the chat on your e-commerce site needs to know what they're
- 47:55talking about.
- 47:57Because you and I both know that you get on that chat and it's in some offshore agency and they go, please call back, please call the store between nine and four.
- 48:04And you're like, well, you just wasted my time.
- 48:07Now I'm angry.
- 48:09What was this live chat even, what were you even here for?
- 48:14So this is where I AI.
- 48:20I'm with you.
- 48:22The worst thing you can do is make customer angry.
- 48:24It's like, why would you want to do that?
- 48:25Why would you provoke that?
- 48:28It makes no sense to me at all.
- 48:30Selena, listen, I'm engrossed in the conversation.
- 48:35I feel like we're just scratching the tip of the iceberg, but I'm also aware of time.
- 48:39uh And so if people want to reach you, if they want to find out more about you, get in touch.
- 48:45What's the best way to do that?
- 48:47you can find me on the bringing business to retail podcast or on all of the socials.
- 48:52am the Selena night and selenonight.com.
- 48:55You can find me there and come and hang out with me and listen to me on my soap box.
- 49:00I do tend to get on my soap box.
- 49:01Thank you for allowing me to do that.
- 49:03And I feel like I, I, I, I took the conversation away for you to do your little like sidebar.
- 49:10Remember to do that after we've recorded of go and sign up.
- 49:14yeah.
- 49:14Yeah, no problem.
- 49:17That's great.
- 49:18Now, we will of course put all the links to Selena in the show notes, which you can get along for free with the transcript at the website, ecommercepodcast.net.
- 49:27And of course, if you haven't subscribed to the newsletter, make sure you do you can do that at the same website, ecommercepodcast.net and all of these things will wang their way
- 49:35straight to your inbox every week without any drama.
- 49:38So you'll just get them all automatically, which is a beautiful thing.
- 49:41Selina, thank you so much for coming on the show.
- 49:44Genuinely loved the conversation and getting carried away with it and going down all these little side streets.
- 49:50Love those kinds of conversations.
- 49:52It's been an absolute joy and privilege to just chat and hang out with you.
- 49:56Thank you, thank you.
- 49:58I have one last question for you if that's okay.
- 50:03We finished up, but I had a conversation that I wrote down.
- 50:05We kind of talked about it, but not, I would love really um answers that you can put into action.
- 50:13So, and answers that you can put into action in a reasonably short period of time, if that's okay.
- 50:19So how do you...
- 50:22I'm going to say deal, but I don't mean, how do you manage a key leadership person on your team?
- 50:29So maybe that's a store manager or e-commerce manager who struggles with pricing.
- 50:38when you are a premium brand.
- 50:40So we kind of talked about this in terms of vision and whatnot, but I would love some real life advice.
- 50:46So yes, go back and understand what your vision is and communicate that to the team.
- 50:50But if you are a premium store with your average order value is $250 and your e-comm manager or whoever is managing your inventory, every time a shipment comes in, they're
- 51:01like, look, cost of goods have gone up and like, I think we should just keep the price the same though.
- 51:09because they come from, like me, a background where money was tight and they don't understand that people will pay for those things.
- 51:19And clearly they do because the business is in business and doing really well.
- 51:22But I would love to know some really actionable tips of how the founder could, this is obviously a real life scenario, how the founder can address this.
- 51:33Is that okay for me to ask?
- 51:35That's entirely fine.
- 51:37I think it's a very good question.
- 51:39And I'll tell you what I'm going to do uh is we have this section called question format, where I go and answer the questions on social media.
- 51:46So I'm going to answer that question on social media.
- 51:49I'll give you all my practical knowledge that I can possibly think of it take about 20 seconds.
- 51:57But no, will do that on social media.
- 51:58So thank you for that.
- 51:59That's good.
- 52:00Save to me the question format.
- 52:01Well, I wanted to ask it and I realized we're out of time, but if you could do that and you could share it with your people and please tag me, I would love to hear the answers
- 52:09because I've just shared what I think, but I think like tomorrow when the founder turns up at work, what does the conversation look like?
- 52:18Because redoing your, you know, your vision and whatnot, that's not something we do overnight.
- 52:23But what are some real life things that this person could implement to help with that obstacle?
- 52:31Fantastic.
- 52:33Fantastic.
- 52:33That is going to be answered shortly.
- 52:36So watch this space.
- 52:37Come follow me on LinkedIn if you want to find out how I'm going to answer that question.
- 52:40But Selena, genuinely, I feel like it's going to keep going.
- 52:45Four hours later we'll be going.
- 52:45This was a great conversation.
- 52:47But it was lovely.
- 52:48It great to meet you.
- 52:49Thank you so much for coming on.
- 52:51I really appreciate it.
- 52:52Thank you.
- 52:54Well, there you go.
- 52:55Another great conversation all wrapped up on the e-commerce podcast.
- 52:59Thank you so much for joining us this week.
- 53:01Make sure you like, follow and subscribe and do all that good stuff because we've got yet more great conversations lined up and I don't want you to miss any of them.
- 53:08And of course, if no one's told you yet today, let me be the first.
- 53:11You are awesome.
- 53:13Yes, you are.
- 53:14Created awesome.
- 53:15It's just a burden you've got to bear.
- 53:17Selena's got to bear it.
- 53:18I've got to bear it.
- 53:19You've got to bear it as well.
- 53:20But that's it from me.
- 53:21That's it from Selena.
- 53:22Thank you so much for joining us.
- 53:24Have a great time wherever you are in the world.
- 53:26I'll see you next time.
- 53:27Bye for now.