In 2007, Steven Sashen went on a 5K run in his bare feet, an experience that felt so surprisingly natural that it led him to launch one of the best-known minimalist shoe brands in the world. After reading the best-seller Born to Run by Christopher McDougall and fashioning his own, thin-soled sandals that helped him fully feel the ground, Steven noticed he wa ... Show More
Today
Sweet Loren’s: Loren Castle. How A Recipe Makeover Built a National Cookie Brand
Loren Castle started baking cookies after surviving cancer in her early twenties. Five years later, Sweet Loren’s refrigerated cookie dough was generating just $350,000 a year. But instead of giving up, she listened to customers, and reinvented the dough without gluten, dairy, eg ... Show More
1h 4m
Oct 12
Alamo Drafthouse Cinema: Tim and Karrie League (2023)
In the early 1990’s, Tim League spent $50,000 in savings to lease an abandoned movie theater on the wrong side of the tracks—a shaky experiment that eventually grew into a thriving national chain. As Tim and his wife Karrie built theaters in Austin and beyond, they made a name fo ... Show More
1h 16m
May 2024
Why Marketing Works: Hoka
The running shoe set to compete with Nike isn’t who you think it is.
Move over, Under Armor, because you had your chance and couldn’t cut it.
Aidan dives into the tale of trail running’s greatest brand, and unpacks how two former Saloman employees crafted one of the most comfor ... Show More
10m 49s
Aug 2023
How Hoka Ran Away With The Competition
Episode 33: Lace them up! Alex Lieberman (@businessbarista) dives into the meteoric rise of Hoka, the popular shoe brand that just crossed the $1 billion mark in revenue. Since the pandemic, it went from having less than 10% of Deckers’ (parent company) revenue to nearly 40%, and ... Show More
17m 26s
Nov 2020
Nike’s Phil Knight: How to sell without selling
Great branding is about identity – and it’s about matchmaking too. No one knows this better than the legendary co-founder of Nike, Phil Knight. When he and his partner, Hall of Fame track coach Bill Bowerman, started the sneaker company, they never tried to force-feed customers a ... Show More
35m 40s
Apr 2018
#79: Tamara Mellon: Founder, Entrepreneur, and Shoe Designer
When Tamara Mellon would give her friends wardrobe makeovers in school, it hadn't yet occurred to her that one day she would co-found the luxury shoe brand, Jimmy Choo. Armed with a ?£150,000 loan from her father, 27 year old Tamara teamed up with Jimmy Choo, an East London shoe ... Show More
28m 36s
<p dir="ltr">In this episode, I'm speaking with Steven Sashen, who founded minimalist shoe company Xero Shoes with his wife Lena Phoenix in 2009.</p> <p dir="ltr">His philosophy? Modern footwear is actively hurting you. </p> <p dir="ltr">In this discussion (which was so fun and i ... Show More
