Sean Frank is the CEO of Ridge Wallet, a men’s wallet and accessories brand that does over 9-figures in annual revenue. The company started in 2012 and raised $266,000 in a Kickstarter campaign to sell the first 5,200 wallets. Ridge hasn’t raised a single dollar of outside capital since, and has also expanded into new categories like rings, knives, watches, backpacks, and keys, with dozens of more products coming soon. Sean is known in some circles as the “Einstein of Ecommerce”, and he gives us an inside look at running a consumer brand in 2023.

Brought to you by Packsmith, better fulfillment for growing brands: https://bit.ly/PacksmithBanana

In this episode, we discuss:

• Why wallets are a terrible product category
• How Ridge has 80% gross margins
• Why brands should generally not raise venture capital
• When a founder should step down as CEO, and how to hire a new one
• Why Ridge is one of the top 10 advertisers on Twitter
• When and how to hire a marketing agency
• Why Ridge never raised outside capital
• Closing clients in a 1991 Honda Civic
• A crash course on the men’s and women’s fashion markets
• Why Sean thinks women’s fashion will have 50% return rates this holiday season
• Investing in a watch manufacturer and building a factory in Arizona to vertically integrate
• Why every company needs a core competency
• The simple tech stack Ridge uses to run their business
• Why Crocs is a great business
• Sponsoring 5,000+ influencers
• Why Amazon shut down its private label program and every brand should sell on it
• Why influencer marketing performs so well, and how to start and scale an influencer marketing program
• Why more companies should incorporate creators in their content
• How FTX and other crypto companies inflated influencer marketing prices
• Paying $1,000,000 to hire a creator in-house
• How the Ridge Wallet has saved customers from a bullet and a chainsaw

Where to find Sean:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SeanEcom
Substack: http://seanecom.substack.com/
Podcast: https://9operators.com/

Where to find Turner:
Newsletter: https://www.thespl.it
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak

Referenced:
https://www.amazon.com/Great-CEO-Within-Tactical-Building-ebook/dp/B07ZLGQZYC
https://www.theloganbartlettshow.com/
https://www.maryruthorganics.com/

Production and distribution by: https://www.supermix.io

For sponsorship inquiries: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform