Well Made

No matter how you brew it, coffee is hot water dripped through ground beans. But somewhere down the line, good coffee started to feel out of reach, even for the everyday coffee drinker. Some coffee historians may disagree, but Tony Koecny (aka Tonx) believes that coffee's turn toward the bourgeois came with its third wave — a post-Starbucks generation of gadget obsessed brewers looking for the best quality beans. Tony's roots in the coffee world run deep. His initial company, Tonx was the first coffee subscription around. Now, a couple years after selling Tonx to Blue Bottle, Tony launched Yes Plz. In many ways Yes Plz feels like the culmination of everything he's learned, not only about the nuances of the supply chain or the flavor complexity of different beans, but how coffee culture went wrong. Yes Plz is on an earnest mission to make really great coffee easy to buy and brew at home. With their weekly deliveries and beautifully executed zine, Tony and his team are lowering the barrier to entry for exceptional home brewing, and they may steal back some pod coffee converts along the way. Find links and show notes on the Lumi blog.

The way people entertain at home has completely shifted. As consumers look for opportunities to design their ideal morning coffee ritual or movie night in, they’re investing in more items that make a personal connection more attainable. Founder, Kathyrn Duryea is betting on it. She started tableware company, Year & Day, after 10 years working in ecommerce and brand marketing. Year & Day offers complete table sets of ceramic plates, bowls, and flatware. By focusing on functionality and a direct-to-consumer model, the startup encourages customers to focus on what and who is around the table. On this episode, Kathryn and Stephan chop it up over family heirlooms and a love of entertaining at home. They dive into the “playground of industrial design” — spoons, knives, and forks (3:16), the technical nuances of glazes (8:08), and the Gardiner Museum (9:29). Kathyrn designed all Year & Day plates, flatware, and glazes herself, and partnered with artisans in Portugal. She reveals the rich history of ceramics in that region (21:00). Kathyrn talks about defining their aesthetic to resonate with modern customers (38:02) and encouraging all types of home gatherings (47:18). Link and images from this post can be found on the Lumi blog.

In 2016, Joanna Griffiths found herself at a crossroads. Knix, the size-inclusive functional intimates apparel brand she founded three years prior, was omnichannel. They were selling online and in hundreds of retail stores, but their customers were experiencing a disconnect. That’s when Joanna took her bras and leakproof underwear brand completely online, 100% direct-to-consumer. This fresh start was a chance for Knix to transform their marketing and share honest stories directly with customers. Knix photographs their products on everyday women and they tell raw, honest stories about the messiest, unsexiest, and most humbling challenges women face. Joanna's career has been an exercise in risk-taking. On this episode, she reveals how she's finding Knix's brand voice (13:54) and solving unsexy problems (17:10). Joanna talks about launching products on their timeline since going completely online (21:28). She explains the benefits of not raising funding (for now) (22:53) and the creative control in only answering to yourself (28:42). She shares plans for events and how to know when it’s time to walk away from pop-up experiments when they’re not working (35:08). Lastly, Stephan and Joanna talk about Knixteen, Knix’s teenage line of underwear (38:08) and her plans for the Faces of Fertility podcast (44:30). Link and images can be found on the Lumi blog.

For the last 15 years, Manish Chandra has motivated pivotal shifts in how and where we buy things. Manish is the CEO of Poshmark, a social marketplace for people to buy and sell secondhand fashion and home goods. Long before founding Poshmark, he was creating social shopping experiences online. An engineer and marketer by trade, he believes in connecting community and technology, with people at the platform’s core. Community guides all the decisions that he makes for his company. On this episode, Manish talks about the logistics of online consumer-to-consumer resale (7:39). He shares how Poshmark negotiated PoshPost, the first-ever USPS shipping label designed for the marketplace economy (9:19). Most ecommerce plays start on the web and then move to mobile — Poshmark bet on an iPhone app first. Hear how they design their app as the expectations for selling pre-owned items evolve (12:21). He talks about challenging linear growth (15:56) and the Marie Kondo effect (23:46). Manish wants consumers to rethink the merchandising for social (31:50), and how Poshmark facilitates discovery amidst millions of items on the platform (33:04). Finally, Manish shares how he’s fostering an authentic community (36:59) and steadily growing their big ideas, even when it means taking a step back (43:27). Also mentioned on the show: Celebrating the Stories We Wear with Nellie Cohen on Well Made Moving the Rock from Zero to One with Ryan Babenzien on Well Made Oprah’s SuperSoul Conversations Oprah and Eckhart Tolle: A NEW EARTH Links and images and can be found on the Lumi blog.

Jeffrey Hollender co-founded Seventh Generation on a mission to create home products that are better for the planet. He co-founded of Sustain Natural (with his daughter Meika) to make sex and wellness products that are healthier for women and the planet. But now, he says his product making days are over. Now, Jeffrey spends most of his time as a professor at NYU, the co-founder of the American Sustainable Business Council, and a writer. His career path has been one of a steady zooming out. He started by facing the sustainability challenges of specific industries and products, and now he's working to fix the fundamental systems that are holding companies and consumers back. Jeffrey believes that systems thinking is invaluable, transparency is key in creating trust, and sometimes doing things the old way is best. “Systems thinking is invaluable because it teaches us to anticipate the unintended consequences.” In this episode of Well Made, Jeffrey starts at the beginning, sharing a bit about the teachers that put him on the path of sustainability advocacy (1:17). He talks about how education can create a fundamental shift in how we think about sustainability and how it impacted his kids’ firsthand (11:30). In his decades as a leader, Jeffrey has realized the importance of being a generalist. He shares how he prefers the generalist mentality over the specialist (12:07). Company culture was a huge focus on Jeffrey’s growth as a leader. He shares the importance of transparency and culture when building a business that’s good for people and the planet (19:31). He talks about the how systems thinking is not only a sustainable choice, but a competitive one (34:27). Jeffrey shares how he and his daughter Meika started Sustain (38:26). And finally, he talks about how he started working with Ben & Jerrys and the Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility(47:07). Links and images from this post are on the Lumi Blog.

Function of Beauty never makes the same products twice. Each bottle of shampoo, conditioner, or leave-in is individually mixed, colored, and filled into personalized bottles for your unique hair type and goals. Every step of the process is rooted in technology. Founder, Zahir Dossa believes that lack of personalization is the biggest problem in haircare, so he rounded up the best team to tackle the problem. On this episode, Zahir talks about creating the hair quiz behind Function of Beauty's 54 trillion product combinations (6:36). Function of Beauty is on their 100th bottling iteration. Zahir explains how they automated their hand-filled process and improved their manufacturing methods (12:27). He gives the fundamental questions that successful startups should think about (19:50) and talks about how he applies personalization to the rest of his life (23:32). He shares how individualized haircare can be limiting (28:27) and creative ways to reach new customers (29:59). He talks about his previous business, Argan Tree, and how he’s building a sustainable enterprise today (31:30). Finally, Zahir talks about perfecting their product and focusing on creating a tailored and complete haircare system (45:26). Also mentioned on the show: Well Made Episode 75 with Nancy Walton and Caitlin Strandberg: Launching a New Unboxing Well Made Episode 38 with Heidi Zak: Taking Measured Risks Well Made Episode 43 with Rachel Blumenthal: Designing Awesome Clothes, Backed by Data Link and images can be found on the Lumi Blog.

Most people don’t understand the muddy manufacturing process of olive oil. Aishwarya Iyer is changing that. She is the founder of Brightland, a new olive oil brand that’s grounded in honest, conscious production and local sourcing of olives. After working in public relations and marketing for startup and technology companies in New York, Aishwarya switched coasts and careers. Now, she makes fresh, traceable olive oils with farms she trusts in California. The hand-harvested oils are meant to make you feel alive, awake and nourished from deep within. On this episode of Well Made, Aishwarya talks about building a traceable olive oil supply chain (7:14). She reveals moments of self-doubt before taking the leap of faith into entrepreneurship (8:21). A particularly warm harvest led to a switch in olive varietals. Aishwarya talks about how sharing that openly with their customers led to one of their largest sale days (12:40). She unveils how she vets her partners (15:35) and the practicalities of launching a brand (27:17). She describes the inspirations for Brightland’s photography, color palette, and white powder-coated glass bottles (29:22). Finally, Aishwarya shares her favorite ways to use Brightland (36:52) and the lasting influence of her mother’s cooking (46:13). Also mentioned on the show Blue ocean strategy Well Made Episode 72 with Backdrop Home: Connecting with Color Brightland's Spotify Link and images can be found on the Lumi Blog.

The throughline of Matt Alexander’s career is his ability to curate and create community. Three years ago, on episode four of the podcast, Matt talked about building a focused set of small retail brands. Today, he’s running Neighborhood Goods — a modern department store that’s the culmination of those early ideas. Neighborhood Goods is a unique retail experience that rotates featured brands, products, in-store activations, and ultimately, the stories they want to tell. On this episode, Matt talks about bringing together local, digitally native, household name brands together under one showroom (9:45). Rather than sales-oriented goals, he shares his hopes for helping online brands explore offline concepts (12:55). With so many featured brands, Matt created a unified point of sale through a consistent rule set, carving out in-store quadrants, and training staff to be brand experts (17:26). Matt speaks on discovery and utility with a rotating, pop-in business model (25:02), and reveals plans for opening a second store in Chelsea Market (28:01). Finally, Matt talks about combating the noise (36:09), creating a dignified retail experience (49:59), and bringing people together (54:27). Also mentioned on the show: Vertical commerce and how the next generation of retail will be built Well Made Episode 70 with Paul Munford: Building on Greenfields Camp STORY b8ta Rothy's Unbranded Mizzen+Main MeUndies Sonos Link and images can be found on the Lumi Blog.

As online shopping grows, ecommerce companies are struggling to make returning products as easy as buying them. Enter Happy Returns. It’s simple: buy online, return in-store at any Return Bars. You get your refund and Happy Returns handles the rest. In 2015, after leading the in-store returns program for Hautelook and Nordstrom Rack, co-founders David Sobie and Mark Geller started Happy Returns. Their reverse logistics company addresses a unique set of consumer and retailer challenges: inconvenient mail-in returns, shrinking in-store traffic, and management of an often complicated and expensive process. By appealing to customers who want the flexibility of shopping online and returning in-person, Happy Returns is building a critical solution. On this episode, David talks about setting the standard for in-person returns. He talks about using technology to build out physical return locations (6:24) and tracking surveys and coupons to quantify the business they drive for local partners (10:00). David dives into the logistics of returning items to their original retailers (15:36). He talks about Amazon Prime’s effect on free returns and instant refunds (33:43) and retaining customers while leading marketing operations at big ecommerce retailers (50:15). Lastly, David talks about a future in product recalls, returns disposal, and reducing packaging waste during returns (56:07). Also mentioned on the show: Everlane Parachute Home How China’s Recycling Bans Have Impacted The Fate of Curbside Recycling in the U.S. Find a Return Bar Links and images can be found on the Lumi Blog.

A mechanical engineer by trade, co-founder Adam Simone worked for medical technology companies before bootstrapping his sustainable razor brand, Leaf Shave. After the acquisition of his first company, and a year of product refinement, Adam took his experience creating medical-grade tools to develop the refillable, plastic-free Leaf razor. Leaf Shave’s hero product combines the form factor of a disposable cartridge shaver with the durability of a double-edge safety razor. Adam still works for a surgical tech company but hopes to take Leaf Shave full-time, for now, he’s focused on creating great facial instruments and growing the small consumer brand on its own strength. On this episode, Adam talks about making well-designed tools (3:21). Adam tried to shoehorn a consumable business model — it didn’t work. He shares how he and his co-founder Adam Hahn found value in a focused core product (10:30). Adam talks about building brand loyalty (12:32) and innovating distribution strategy with retailers, like Package Free Shop (20:44). Adam shares why they decided to fulfill in-house and how they found a great overseas manufacturing partner (24:42). Lastly, Adam talks about robots, regulations, and applying conscious consumerism to build the Leaf Shave brand (40:40). On this episode, Adam talks about making well-designed tools (3:36). Adam tried to shoehorn a consumable business model — it didn’t work. He shares how he and his co-founder Adam Hahn found value in a focused core product (10:45). Adam talks about building brand loyalty (12:47) and innovating distribution strategy with retailers, like Package Free Shop (20:59). Adam shares why they decided to fulfill in-house and how they found a great overseas manufacturing partner (25:00). Lastly, Adam talks about robots, regulations, and applying conscious consumerism to build the Leaf Shave brand (39:03). Also mentioned on the show: Well Made Episode 79 with Kyle Hoff and Alex O'Dell: Sitting is Timeless Well Made Episode 75 with Nancy Walton and Caitlin Strandberg:Launching a New Unboxing Patagonia’s Plastic Packaging – A study on the challenges of garment delivery Link and images can be found on the Lumi Blog.