Secrets from the Dropout Millionaire

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On this episode, we have Kola Teitler, the visionary founder of Dropout Milano, a brand that's redefining the landscape of exclusive streetwear. Kola's journey is nothing short of rule-breaking.
From the halls of medical school to the vibrant, fast-paced world of high-end streetwear, Kola's story is a masterclass in pursuing your passion and building something extraordinary. In this episode, we'll unpack how Cola has created a brand that's all about exclusivity and immersive experiences.
We'll dive deep into his strategies for cultivating a fiercely loyal community, harnessing the power of data-driven marketing, and the life-changing impact of investing in personal growth and continuous education. Whether you're a veteran entrepreneur or just starting to dip your toes into the business world, this episode is packed with actionable insights and inspiring lessons.
So grab your notebook and join us as we explore the dynamic world of fashion and entrepreneurship with Cola Teitler. The show starts now.
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Today with Kola Teitler, and this is an individual who dropped out of school and became a multimillionaire and is going back to school. Blows my mind.
Welcome to the show. Welcome to the lab.
Thank you. Thank you for having me, Charles.
Absolutely. So walk me through this.
You named your company Dropout and the entire process of how you do it, we're going to get into in detail.

But how did you go from dropping out to now owning multiple stores and crushing it? Walk me through the beginning. What made you want to be an entrepreneur and do this? I think, you know, just for clarity's sake, I didn't technically drop out of university in the sense that I did complete the course.
You know, I was in medical school when the company started. I certainly didn't want to fully leave the course.
Hence why, you know, amongst other reasons as well, my company is called Dropout. Certainly, you know, I'd say at the time mentally, I was in a place where, you know, I was probably thinking, what's going to give me more? Or, you know, is it doing my own thing? Or is it, you know, pursuing you know pursuing this uh you know the degree and the you know the career path that is probably um i'd say structured after after graduating from medical school nevertheless for me personally i'd say you know a lot of uh a lot of what came you know to to create my company and the business uh had to do with leveraging what i saw as a market opportunity in the sense that actually um you know what we created was um you know a business modeled on on an opportunity that we saw within a market we were very familiar with uh and i say that as they you know considering the streetwear and the sneakers industry as a niche that we you know me and my business partners at the time were already consumers of, number one.
We were also probably, I'd say, you know, collectors, fans, enthusiasts. And I think that, you know, we realized that actually, you know, in Milan, in Italy, one of the major fashion capitals of the world, you know, we were lacking, you know, a physical outlet in particular and, and, you know, a place where, you know, street enthusiasts could go and recognize themselves the same way that, you know, was present in New York, in London, in Paris.
So, you know, we went and did our own. I think at the time, you know, especially given the father that was at university still, I think for me it was about, you know, realizing that I could have multiple interests and I could have, you know, I could develop different aspects of my persona.
So not just the, you know, the medical school aspect, but also, you know, my other interests, I think fashion and medicine, I think they're more similar than probably one may think, but actually they are certainly, you know, apart. And, you know, for me, it was also about saying, actually, you know, I'm not confined to what I'm studying, you know, I could do more.
And I can probably draw some parallels between the skills that I gather, you know, and gain from my degree, and the one needed for the business. I think so few people you mentioned it where, you know, I can be more than one thing.
So many of us go to university, go to college, like, hey, you know, I went to school for computers. I went to school for, you know, you even got as far as in your medical degree that we get locked into that.
This is who I am. This is who my parents expect me to

be. This is who my family, this is who everyone in my environment, they expect me to be a,

but there's more to me than that. I'm more dynamic than that.
Was that a hard process for you to

pivot through to say, you know what? No, I can do this. I can continue to university.
I can continue

with my studies, but I also, I can do this. What was the moment where you realized that you could do both and you kind of gave yourself permission to do both? Because a lot of people are struggling with that.
I think, you know, probably, I mean, from, from an individual or from a personal perspective, I'd say I'm a rather, you know, self-driven and self-motivating individual anyway which means that you know whenever i'm faced with you can't do these you know that's not gonna work why this why that you know i almost um you know i almost blocked out even though that may or may not be positive certainly there's some negatives to that uh but in particular you know i had seen you know individuals out there who you know were able to do different things you know and i remember for example um you know one of the uh if not maybe the most influential individual within the streetwear sneakers niche you know in kanye west and i remember um you know watching some interviews and how he was talking about wanting to be you know the greatest producer alive and then wanting to be you know the best rapper and then wanting to be you know the best designer and then wanting to do you know his own clothing line and then talking about how he wanted to do hotels and i think you know i was also looking concurrently at how uh you know the commentary on that often used to be you know this man is just out of it and i think you know i'm not gonna comment on that but sadly, actually, you know, why do we have such a fixation on telling people what they cannot do rather than what they actually can do? And to me, you know, I think it was about telling myself, you know what, you know, I think the only limit to whatever you want to do is yourself, i.e. me.
And, you know, I have different interests and I think, you know, there's a market opportunity, so I'm going to go and take it. And likewise, you know, I always used to see how, you know, I used to play pickup basketball a lot.
And I used to play also, you know, football with friends. And I was, you know, I think decent at both.
And again, you know, I always drew the parallel with that. I mean, you know, you don't have to be, you know, good at one thing.
I mean, you know, you can be decent at multiple things. And ultimately, I think to me it was about, you know, asking myself, what do I enjoy? And, you know, the moment where, you know, the answer was, I enjoy different things, you know, for different reasons, you know, I was just like, okay, you know, time to go and, you know, do whatever makes me happy.
I think one of the best things I ever heard about this was instruments don't just play one note. You can play multiple notes as an individual.
So you're in medical school and all of a sudden you have this opportunity with sneakers. And I didn't even know there was, there's a completely new market to me completely.
I have the fashion sense of a, well, I don't have any fashion sense. It's really embarrassing.
My little brother picks on me and he's like, what, what are you doing? I wear, I mean, I shop at Target. I don't, I am not fashionable in any way, shape or form.
It's embarrassing. My little brother picks on me.
You clearly are not. You've turned it into a massive empire for you with multiple stores.
Walk me through what you do. Walk me through what is it with sneakers? Why did you, you're like, I'm in middle school, cool school.
Here's, here's sneakers. I don't understand.
Walk me through that. Walk through that process.
How did you know you could monetize itize it i think let's say you know we we've got to take a few step backs in the sense that um you know there was a now is is wider but it's less uh i'd say on the ground but you know imagine uh we're talking now about you know early 2010s and you know there's a lot of communities online uh there's reddit you know that is obviously blowing up uh and and reddit in particular is the type of place where you get people who you know maybe maybe they um i mean this might sound controversial but maybe you know they even the loners of the of the world that are finally finding a place they can find people like them and things to talk about and you know there's more and more places like you know there's reddit there's facebook groups there's uh you know a little bit on twitter on Twitter, and there's a forum, it's called Kanye Today, in fact. It was named after Kanye West.
And then there's another forum called Nike Talk. And those are places where people are congregating more and more to discuss the latest Nika release and the latest Streetwear releases.
And the reality is that there was already a significant, already like a, you know, a significant but probably very sparse and, you know, varied community of individuals who had these interests in streetwear. And, you know, in order to get information about the latest releases and the latest, you know, drops and what your, you know, what the latest collaboration was going to be, you had to find those little communities, you know, mostly online, unless you lived, you know, in a major city like New York or LA.
um and that's where i start you know i saw it from there and then i saw you know as the as the phenomenon of you know limited sneakers releases um you know took took more and more and the brand started leveraging it in order to draw attention to the actual you know to the wider product releases you know um there was people that had already this interest that were already part of the communities who saw literally the phenomenon grow and grow and grow.

And I think we almost foresaw how the trajectory was, you know, was going. And we, you know, I think there's certain pivotal moments where, you know, collaboration starts.
And then, you know, Supreme start collaborating with Louis Vuitton and Nike start collaborating with Off-White. And you see how know the old-fashioned houses you know that were catering to a public of you know wealthy um you know maybe unapproachable clientele and now actually deciding to target to a you know to a different demographic who's often younger who's yes perhaps wealthy but who you know may actually have their interest in more casual wear compared to formal wear so basically i think you know uh from this evolution online i saw um you know we i saw this trajectory and actually my business partners at the start are people that i met online so we actually met on those facebook groups um and uh you know there's when we saw you know we had this chat i think you know it was very brief it was almost like look you know can you see what i'm seeing as in where this is going i think that you know if we get you know our name out there we create a brand within this segment and you know we leverage the growth of the sneaker market we can actually create a sustainable business which you know will make a mark and will you know will be potentially um you know known within at least the italian streetwear community so you know drop actually starts as that.
It starts as a business that aims to leverage the growth of the sneaker industry, but placing itself as an independent streetwear brand that can be associated with, again, this wealthy, young clientele. So really for us, I think one of the first steps was about understanding the market.
And for us, that was somewhat easy, I'm going to say, because we were our average target consumer. So the average target consumer for us would have been me, would have been someone young, someone with a little bit of disposable income, who are the network, who knew how social media worked, and who was a little bit disillusioned with the high-end fashion houses products and wanted to wear something more casual.
So we modeled, I think, the business based to a market that we knew rather well. And for that, really, a lot of it was about asking, okay, what do I want to see? What is my problem? How am I going to solve the problem that I have? Problem being, I don't find an outlet, a store that actually reflects what I'm looking to buy.
And I think that's basically the first questions that we started at the beginning asking ourselves. So I love the model which is you know identifying your audience understanding who they are luckily in this case it was you you were your own test group and then from there being in the environment going okay where are they hanging out where is their quote-unquote watering hole going where they are and then speaking to them in an organic way saying hey this is what's going on this is what's happening leveraging a community and saying hey there's a pain i found a to fill that pain.
We talk about this all the time. Don't be vitamins, be Advil, get rid of the pain first and then scale from there.
So in this place, you've identified the audience, which is you. So you already have your own test group.
You went to the community where everyone's hanging out for, so you went to the watering hole from there. You're like, okay, I've got this.
We've, we have the idea. We know what their pain is.
What are the steps you start doing? you start posting do you start interacting how do you what are those first initial all right i get it i know the audience where do i go from here i think for us you know we had actually created especially having you know a keyword here's community in the sense that um i think you know again you gotta you gotta remember where where you're playing you know where your playing field is and and and maybe you know the sport that you're playing in the sense that uh the reality is that you know if we dissect what actually fashion is especially uh all right not just fashion but any um you know discretionary porches really we buy in generally for for you know only a few reasons which will be for sustainment you know such as food or such as you know shelter or you know we buy for um you know for convenience for example you know something to do you know something that i would need to do but uh whatever i'm purchasing is gonna make that thing easier or we buy for you know to cater to social need and obviously fashion you know is the social need now um there's an element of yes you know you buy clothes to cover yourself fair enough but but you also buy clothes to either identify within a certain group or you buy clothes to be not identified within a certain group, but to show to a certain group what type of person you are. Or again, you buy to show particular traits of your persona.
Now, in our case, when we're talking about small communities you know that you actually speaking to a to an audience that probably want to identify as a as part of that one of those like you know you wear something and you know you know the next person is not going to know what that is but the one that know will know it's sort of a you know if you know you know type of thing and then there's another element which was growing within the streetwear market which was because it was a limited you know a lot of this was limited edition product, it was about demonstrating that you had access and you're demonstrating that exclusivity because also now you can differentiate your audience in multiple ways. Sometimes you do that by price, by say, you know, okay, you know, Porsches.
Porsches create a lot of Porsches, but, you know, as in the car brand. But, you know, if you have a lot of money, chances are that you can probably buy one.
However, you know, Richard Mille, on the other hand, certain watches, you know, there's only 20 of them. So you may have the money, but you may not have any access to them.
So brands start leveraging both of those, you know, by doing certain very limited edition releases. And the person that, you know, the people that were actually the audience of these were also individuals who, you know, may be able to get hold of, you know, a particular product.
So for us, it was about really digging into why are people buying, what do they want to show and what would they like to know. So, you know, the reality was that rather than sort of starting posting online and going the whole okay you know we're gonna skyrocket our e-commerce we actually went the other way because we said okay you know how can we actually show that this is something rather limited and actually rather niche and only not it's not just about how much you can spend but it's about being part of something that only some people can can be part of so we open physical stores uh physical stores first, which we actually opened initially in 2018 without posting any pictures of the store online.
So we only posted like one picture of Instagram and of our social media, which said we're opening a store, we're going to treat limited, curate limited edition releases. We're not even going to show you what it looks like.
It will open on this day, at this time. We post it, I think, like, three days in advance.
And basically, we say, like, you know, you want to be there. And I remember, you know, that actually Starbucks, the first Starbucks that opened in Milan the week before us.
And, you know, there was a lot of press in the media in Italy about how many people the Starbucks had. But because of the way we were able to leverage our message, especially in the Facebook groups, without even showing a picture of our store, we actually, you know, I have a picture and a video taken from a drone.
The whole road was blocked. You know, we had more people at Starbucks that came to look at our store without having even ever seen a picture of it.
And that was because, again, the message for this community really is about exclusivity, it's about, the coolest and being able to do to do things that other people will not do and you know the very first day we actually only sold our own branded products so the very first day you couldn't even buy sneakers so everyone that rocked up in our store you know could only see the store and buy our own branded products you know they couldn't even buy sneakers then obviously you know for commercial leader reasons in a after we obviously, you know, we opened the e-commerce because obviously we said initially, you know, this is also an experience, it's an experiential shopping, which means that, you know, it's not just about buying a product because ultimately, especially in 2024, but also in 2018, you know, almost any product that you buy, you know, you can find online somewhere for cheaper. That almost goes for any physical enterprise.
So it's about, you know, what are you going to, you know, how are you going to leverage the fact that you have a physical store? How are you going to leverage the fact that you're creating a brand? And so it was about, you know, for me, it was about doing something that, you know, if you want to be associated with that, you got to come to a store, you got to see what it looks like. And, you know, you will see that there's also some pieces that are you know um essentially you know just just to digress slightly but we had

one piece which was very high you know was very highly covered also vice did a whole documentary

on it we had a sneaker um which was you know basically a factory i wrote sneaker which had

been valued at about 150 000 and you know only one pair um and we had it and basically we just

put it for display saying you know ultimately you know if you want to come and see the sneaker, you know, you got to come to a store, almost like if it was a museum piece. And, you know, that worked really well.
So I think again, you know, for us, it was really about, you know, leveraging how are we going to cater to the needs of the people. And for us, the needs of the people were about, you know, being part of something exclusive and being part of something that, you know, only a few selected people essentially, you know, would be almost invited to.
And I think what I love about this is you knew your audience, you made it exclusive, and you sold the experience as well. Because remember, people don't buy products or services, they buy stories, identities, and ways out of pain.
And you were selling an identity, which was, Hey, the only place in the world is you can see this store. It's $150,000 for the shoe, which you're going to have to send me a picture of what $150,000 shoe looks like.
Cause I've never seen $150,000 shoe in my life. I mean, unless it came with a house or a car, but I love the example that you gave with Porsche as well.
Anybody can own a Porsche, but there's only a certain number of watches that exist. There's only a certain number of shoes.
So you knew that your branding was like, listen, we're not going to compete with everybody else because anyone in the world can copy our products. We're going to go exclusive and we're going to do the experience.
So when you have this and you have your physical storage, you mentioned you did a bit of an e-commerce with your own products. How do you find the balance between, all right, we have this exclusivity, we have this experience, but now we're online.
How do you continue to bring that into a digital world? Because in a physical world, super easy, right? Not anybody can do it, but it's easier to do. But if anybody in their underwear can jump on their phone and go and visit your e-commerce, how do you keep that exclusivity and that experience? I think really, you know, the reality is that for us it's been pretty um you know because of the way that we were born and the community aspect of it uh you know japan started to become known in milan as a place where okay you know this is where the celebrities shop this is where you know the wealthy people shop so you know there's an element of that where you know people want to be associated where you know there are you know favorite football players who shop for example or almost knowing that like okay you know i'm going to walk into a store where you know the the football player from you know just played the champions league final was or where you know someone who's popular in a holiday in milan you know they'll pass by so you know i want to be associated with that and in terms of leveraging the online you know again it was sort of, you know, the reality is that I think, you know, focusing specifically on the product alone, I think is quite difficult nowadays, especially with, you know, the advent of, you know, digital marketing.
and ultimately we're all beating against each other for the meta ads and the TikTok ads and whatnot.

Or we are essentially subject to whatever policy or you know strategy those social media uh you know employ in order to actually you know determine the uh virality of a of content really so you know for us it was about establishing really the brand which means that you know we want people to know that okay you know you're looking for limited initial sneakers you're looking for cool streetwear i'm not even going to research you know on google i'm going to go straight on dropout because i know that whatever i'm going to buy there is cool whatever i'm going to buy there is you know something that you know has been curated for me and it's been um you know and it's in demand in fact so you know that really was was what it was about for us. And in order to do that, we really went to look, okay, how much does our average spenders spend and where would they be likely to shop and what would their usual shopping habits be like? So for example, I won't obviously make specific names, but we said, okay, if our you know euros for a pair of sneakers then like you know what type of person is buying a 300 pair 300 euros per sneakers and which other shops you know would they likely shop at and you know which shops would they probably not shop at so you know started looking at those type of things started seeing you know what the commonalities were what the themes were you know what type of messaging you.
And, you know, I think we started not necessarily mimicking those, but we started trying to align our messages with those in order to, you know, say leverage the fact that ultimately, you know, we want, you know, we wanted our consumers to really strongly associate Joppa with a cool place where, you know, it would be just almost normal for them to show have you ever done cross partnerships like hey you know brand a really is close with us we want to kind of have that inherited trust from brand a have you ever done partnerships or involvements with them so we've done because we have because we we we have physical spaces spaces we've done collaborations which also include pop-ups from other brands and often the message and the idea is basically the same, you know, say we have, you know, there's been a, for example, very strong branding in the UK at the moment, which is called Trapstar, which I believe is also, you know, there's some involvement with Roc Nation and JC and the US as well. And, you know, they, they basically saw, they looked at the Italian public and they said, okay, you know, we're now targeting to young, you know, cool demographic in the UK, in France, in the US.
We'd like to do the same in Italy. And, you know, Milan and Dropout is an outlet where, you know, this will be reasonable and, you know, logical to do.
So, you know, we hosted pop-ups, you know, with brands such as that. And we found that they work really well because people are like, okay, you know, they say, and again, it was one of those where certain brands, like, you know, maybe they're popular elsewhere, but in Italy, there's still like the small niche, you know, of people that are a little bit ahead of the curve and they already know the brand.
But maybe, you know, they're a little bit sparse. Maybe there's a few people in Milan, a few people in Turin, a few people from somewhere else.
But when they know, okay, you know, physical experience, a pop-up is coming in Milan, they're like okay you know jump at the opportunity come to milan and you know dropout serves as the almost you know aggregator for all of those people to come together and again so you leverage the community aspect you leverage the fact that you know you have a brand um you know yourself and you have another brand coming from abroad and all those people are you know you reinforce how you know, Dropout is the place where cool stuff happens.

So we've done several of those. We've done at least like, you know, six or seven, you know, we've done every now and then, you know, activities sort of, you know, once we took people to watch a serious game.
So a football game or rather soccer game, you know, as you say in the US. And we paid for actually people to come in hospitality.
and the reason why we did that wasn't, there was no financial advantage for us, direct anyway, but there was the element of being able to say, look, you know, your average, you know, just born online only brand is unlikely to be able to bring people to watch soccer game at the stadium in hospitality. So there was that element of brand signaling, you know, that we do every now and then.
We've taken people on a yacht in Portofino. We paid for people to go in a private minibus from Milan to this place, this luxury destination.
And again, it's just about being able to say, look, this is not just about the product that we sell. It's about what we stand for.
It's about the type of brand that we are. And it's about being associated with us.
And I think that that is something that ultimately is where the difference happens between brands. And it's about what type of message do you give? And how will you get people to want to associate with your brand? Because I think, again, we look at the great brands of today.
know you have you know you almost develop those persona like you have you know you have a nike persona you have an apple persona versus a samsung persona the idea obviously you know in a much much much much you know millions times smaller scale for job parties you know create something that okay you know i want to be associated with a brand like that because they're able to do cool stuff and i want to be someone who you know who does cool stuff so you know i will shop where they you know where they are and i will buy you know the products that they offer so it i love that it's more about the experience and the identity the the physical product is almost an after effect or an afterthought because it's really about the experience and the identity so if because this is most people aren't doing this most people are trying to said, lots of sales, they're trying to do Facebook ads, they're trying to just be everywhere all at once. If someone finally realizes, oh, wow, I should do this differently.
And what Cole is talking about makes light years of sense, creating this exclusivity. What are the steps or the tools that you've used to say, listen, I'm going to sell XYZ product.
How does that, how does someone begin in that? If they're like, okay, I get it. My product offering is just inefficient.
I want to focus more on experience and exclusivity. What are the tools that you would start using? What are the first steps? I think the very first thing always is about, I guess in the industry, it's probably called an audit, but the reality, I think you need to know where you stand.
You need to know the resources that you have. I think you need to know, as I said earlier, the public is very, very important and the type of message.
Putting aside the finances, obviously, even though those are clearly key, but I'd say you want to know how much awareness does your brand have and where are you in the potential customer's mind at the moment? Are you a brand that they'll just buy because you are the cheapest product? Or are they something that they will buy because it's the most quality product? Or is it something that is because they want to be associated with your name? And if you really want to create the name, which I think is basically what we're talking about here, I think it's about trying to understand what type of message will resonate with your consumer and your consumer and to us uh as i said you know we were looking for example at you know what do young wealthy people look like and uh i remember you know looking at at um um you know thinking okay well people want to know want to go where you know you know where where often they cannot be or where their favorite people are and we looked at these locks with destination interly which was portofino and uh you know we said okay you know what is the most efficient way that we can actually take people you know on a trip there and do something otherwise they wouldn't be able to do and then obviously capture content that you know we then be able to repost online so for us really it was about trying to create an experience and then you know get content from that experience that would not necessarily resonate but would uh at least uh you know maybe spark something in someone you know in the people that want to be you know like our target consumer if they are not because you know there was two elements of that one element was okay how are we going to uh let the our target consumer know that we are the type of brand that we are and secondly how are we going to let the people that are not there yet because maybe they can't afford it yet know that you know with this type of you know brand so that we become an aspirational brand for them so that you know maybe in the future when they can afford to shop from us you know they will come because maybe you know some people will grow up thinking okay you know i would love to shop a dropout but you know to their account and so you know it's about targeting both you know what who can be your customer now and also who you think can be you know maybe able to be your customer you know tomorrow for us really i think you know some of this again was about knowing um you know the market almost inside out because we are you know consumers of it and because we a strong part part of communities from it otherwise i would say probably you know trying to do um you know market research which may go via you know hiring third parties or trying to speak you know with influence with a strong following um you know within the niche or trying to understand or even creating a small service actually you know at the, at the end of, you know, at the end of the purchase

for an linear website, I think would be quite useful.

And there are certain tools, you know, I would say even nowadays,

you know, even Google and even MetaAds actually give you enough data

for you to be able to study and understand, you know,

where an analytic, Google Analytics as well, you know,

trying to understand where your public is coming from and, you know, habits and that you know can give you a start um i think you know personally the probably the best organic way in my opinion is to if you know if whatever product you're selling um can be related to a community is try and really really understand where those communities develop and try really really as much as possible you know to learn right inside those communities so as i said you know nowadays there's a lot of communities on reddit facebook twitter and you know trying to understand those i think really really is the key um certainly you know has been for us um and you know that really is is where i think you know it is at really really in terms of probably immediate practical steps is really, as I said, trying to understand where the community is and, you know, how you can get involved and, you know, understanding from the inside. So if you find your community, let's say on Reddit, because I agree, Reddit is huge.
It's an untapped resource. If you find your community, how do you engage with that community? What have you found that is the most successful do you post daily do you try and answer questions what are you trying to do in that community so that they start looking at you as this elite offer i think an element an element of that would be um you know understanding it first of all uh being useful you know answering questions you know likewise on quora i think you know is a strong part it.
Now, if there is a specific pain point that can be addressed and you're able to address that and you can create answers for that, great, even better, you probably might be able to go on with almost direct marketing and even Reddit ads, for example. However, I'd say it's more of a almost try and understand uh you know what are the commonalities you know that people are um you know displaying you know in in in there and i think uh you know try and asking for you know asking for um you know opinions for example and then trying to leverage those on a natural social media platform which may be you know tiktok maybe instagram for example you, because of very visual platforms, I think, you know, is where I will go next.
So I would say, you know, you know, sort of ready to market research to understand where you're at, you know, TikTok and Instagram for the visuals, you know, to provide the visuals. Once you've figured out, I think, you know, the pain points.
You can go back to Reddit, you know, asking for direct feedback. I mean, you know, that sounds reasonable to me.

You know, I think you probably do want to do as much organic as possible.

Nowadays, probably compared to six years ago, it maybe is a little bit easier to, you know, go viral in the sense that almost everyone has the same chance. In the sense that, you know, you don't need to have, you know, 100,000 followers, but, you know, you need the best content.
and having the best content really because the platforms ultimately they want you to be able to hook you know the consumers as much as possible you know uh to stay on there on their platform so if you can figure out you know what type of content actually is going to cook your target um you know user on the platform you know to watch it then really that's what you want to do and i think again you know understanding your your public is the best thing that you can do for that um so, you know, I would do that. Now, the reality is that unless you're doing something that is so innovative, that like, you know, there is the community, but no one else has done whatever you want to do.
Probably, you know, I will attach to this something like, you know, try to understand who's your closest, not necessarily competitor, but, you know, similar business and try and see what they are doing. And not necessarily copy, but, you know, try and see if there's any specific elements, you know, that are recurring in their most successful contents.
And, you know, again, repurpose those. Because ultimately, you know, the reality is that almost whatever you're doing, someone else is probably thinking at the same time and, you know, maybe even proposing.
So, you know, I think, you know, it's not unreasonable to try and figure out also how other people are approaching their marketing and see if there's anything that you can, you know, you can learn from them. So when you're doing this and you're doing how many different market strategies you're doing, cause you're trying to go viral, right? And it's significantly easier now than it used to.
And you can always, you know, don't reinvent the wheel, take it from else. That all makes sense.
When you're doing your own marketing and you're trying to go viral, how many things are you testing at the same time are your metrics that you're like hey this one worked is it just followers is it just views what are you trying to do in that environment for us at the same time we are running now depending on you know the quarter month numbers and depending on the revenue and also i would say specifically you know for our case because it's a lot about brand building rather than just product product focus i think you know if you're focused on product specifically probably your best bet is actually you know almost straight on you know try and go for that virality try and do you know those social media ads working out you know what your raws should be and you know target that and probably that's you know and scale it up till you know you you have the optimal raws and you know and that's that uh you're trying to build brand, you know, and continue to build brand and community like we are, we almost often have something going on for awareness, which may be, you know, a digital campaign. Like, you know, it can be meta, Google ads.
I know people say, and, you know, there's a lot of controversy as, you know, the best awareness is the one that's given by sales. Yes, it is.
However, equally, if you're really in there for the long term, in my opinion, you do want to try and get your brand as much as possible in front of people's eyes so that maybe, you know, in six months' time, when maybe the person wasn't ready to make the purchase, you know, will be, they actually think, oh, you know, I've heard of this brand before and they will be already, you know, one or two steps closer to converting. So, you know, if you're really breeding brand and community i think you know focusing on awareness which may be the digital ads personally you know we have run a digital out of home so we've actually done billboards uh we've done you know digital billboards we've wrapped a tram in milan once a huge tram you know that was going around for a month we sponsored um uh you know advertising at football games uh you know and a lot of times you know obviously those are things that you are doing uh for a limited amount of people that physically you know will see those those pieces of advertising amongst other hundreds of pieces of advertising that is every day but it will also allow you to create content for those which you can then use you know in your newsletter you can use in your website, you can use in your social media.
And just to show again that your brand is tangible, you're not just necessarily online. And even if you're just online, but you can do practical things and that you are something that exists out there.
And that also increases the trust that the average individual has in yourself. Concurrently with this, we usually have something that is a drive to store uh and again you know that is something where you know we do digital advertising which actually has practical and physical you know sort of other pictures of and footage of our physical store we show okay look you know yes you can buy online but actually you know we have physical outlets where you can come and shop and that again you know increases the trust definitely if you have a you know physical store i would say 100 leverage the fact that you have that because not everyone has that and then you know we run also concurrently you know the usual element of conversion ads uh in there i think you know you need to work on the creatives and try and find you know whatever's best um and there you know you just need to go with the a b testing you know you need to go as many creative as possible again trying to find out you know similar businesses what are they doing what works propose something similar iterate reiterate reiterate and change you know and see what what you know what works best and double down on that um you know now when you spend you know a certain amounts uh met i think is quite helpful in giving you uh you know um support and and teams and whatnot actually can help you optimize further and the reality i think in there is just one thing that is key meta like tiktok like google you know ultimately nowadays you want to let them do the heavy work you want to let them do the heavy lifting because they have more data than probably anyone ever had in human history and they know you know they have all the touch points you know to figure out what's what so really i think you know try and just focus on the creative see what feedback you get and try to understand you know from the feedback to see if there's anything that you can create and push back in your other marketing for example you know if we see online that all our blue products are doing better then we know that okay you know blue is what we might want to push in our physical store because you know that's what the data is say um saying.
You know, so I think this really is where, you know, I would say conceptually one need to stand. Now, probably I think, you know, the biggest challenge really is the creation of the content that ultimately, you know, I think is the difference nowadays.
You can probably do it yourself. You know, you can get other people within the team to do it or you can hire agencies.
We serve, you know you know we make use of agencies um that you know with which essentially we give mood board and and uh and um you know sort of a storyline and and our our whole like you know aesthetic and then they go and create and then you know we we decide how best we use the digital assets but i think really you know trying to create the best possible creatives is where really it is at. And if I only had, you know, sort of, you know, if I was at my last pennies, you know, I didn't know where to spend them.
You know, that's where I would go, you know, creative to sort of try and create the best possible, you know, creative to leverage, you know, our, you know, the assets that we have, which for us, as I said said predominantly is the presence of physical and tangible assets i love that your focus is not on the product but the experience and the community first and you've got to feed towards that and you adapt to that based on data-driven things it's very it's extremely polar opposite to what most people are doing most people are going after price okay i'm going to compete with on price i have the cheapest thing in the world. Let's try and do that.
Or I'm going to try and do their folks, their product focus, your community focused and experience focus. And that's a rare thing.
The other thing, the thing that's about you, that's rare is in your age group. Most people are anti-school.
They're anti-university. They're like, this doesn't work for me.
You're an individual who's already created this very successful business, but you're doing something that I don't know anyone else in your age group that's doing that actually for the first time actually agrees with me on this.

you're going back to university.

You're currently involved in that process and it's not a little university.

Tell me more about where you're going,

what you're doing and why you decided,

even though you've had this level of success,

you're going again against the grain

and going, I'm going to go over here and then do this. I think, um, you know, certainly also growing up, you know, for me, a lot of this has been about, um, you know, what do I know? And, and, and also, uh, there's always about the unknown unknowns, you know, and the more you learn, I think, and the more you try and keep your eyes open, the more you realize that, okay, I could know more.
There's something else that I could do better. And really, ultimately, it's always about, are you going to go and get someone who can do whatever you can't do, which very often is the answer.
Most of the times, it's exactly the answer. Or are you going to get that knowledge yourself? Now, again, sometimes know you can do both but equally uh to me you know i'm a very i'm a person i think it's thirsty you know to for knowledge and i really like studying as well so you know aside medical school actually which i studied at kins college london um in in the uk you know medicine is not necessarily a postgraduate degree so you don't need to do a pre-med course.
You just do a longer, you know, undergrad course. That's what I did.
I also studied some law courses at the London School of Economics. I studied some business courses at Imperial College London.
After starting the business, after graduating from medical school as a medical doctor, I completed an MBA as well. So part remote learning part executive uh but you know it's full mba master business administration which i did at university of birmingham and um which i think again really helped me you know understanding especially the financial aspects things that you know sometimes i think it's not just about you know it's not because you want to be superman and know everything but sometimes it's about you know that for a business you know you are going to need to maybe you're not going to need to know any finance but you definitely are going to need to speak with people that you know will be talking about numbers and accounting and whatnot so really you know ideally you want to know what they're talking about and there i think that um there i think that you know increasing your knowledge in those things is very important so for me doing mba was was about not because I'm going to necessarily going to run 100% of my accounting, but knowing, you know, what I'm being talked about, you know, when people are talking with me and, you know, also being able to be more confident, you know, because I think ultimately, you know, if you are more stressed, more worried, you know, your decision making process will suffer.
But, you know, if you can increase, you knowledge and and what you you know and what you you know what you're comfortable with then i think that really helps um again you know i i decided um you know some last year to uh undertake you know further studies especially you know specifically for entrepreneurship and the university of cambridge in the united kingdom offer a full master in entrepreneurship so you know i've been um you know proud to say i've been accepted into that so i'll be starting that from uh from august this year so i'll be going to king's college cambridge um and there you know again you know for me man i know you just you're passing over like oh i've got this degree i got this degree i got this degree you're the only person i've ever because you know i've like i've lectured at yale i'm certified by harvard i have these things, you're passing over it. You're like, oh, I've got this degree.
I've got this degree. I've got this degree.
You're the only person I've ever met because, you know, I've like, I've lectured at Yale. I'm certified by Harvard.
I have these things and we just pass over it. Seeing someone else do the same way I do it.
Take a second and celebrate, man. That's huge.
Cambridge is huge. And the fact that you're doing it after you've been so radically successful, people would dream just to get to the base of where you are.
And you're like, no, there's so much more. This is just the beginning.

And to be able to stand in front of people and say, listen, I don't know what I don't

know.

And I want to be able to stand in front of you confidently and understand what you're

articulating to me.

Because when I sit down and I'm doing real estate deals, or I'm sitting down and doing

a business deal and I'm analyzing a business that we're going to scale, that knowledge

is mission critical.

And being able to have that background, that have it in your back pocket is massive.

And having the ability to also have some of these higher name drops, because when people ask me if they should go to university or they should go to college i'm like the name matters i mean if you go to university of you know fuck no idea where it is that doesn't matter you pull cambridge out of your pocket you pull harvard you pull yeah you pull those things out of your pocket it matters so it as much as you're building an identity around an exclusivity around your brand, being able to do that to yourself as well changes the ballgames.

The doors that it'll open and the reaction that the audience and the people across the table from you will have with you changes the ballgame. And it also, as you said, for your confidence, changes how you interact with the people across the table.
you'll find a community because one of the great things about being at these higher end

universities and you'll be able to experience this intensely is you're going to be dealing

with people who are light, you're smarter than you. And just like you built your business with all these guys that you kind of met in this group and you built this little community, my hallucination is that you're going to connect with people in Cambridge.
All of a sudden it's like, hey, I know you've done this and I've done this magic thing and you've done this. Okay, cool.
We've both done things that no one else has done. Now what's the next step? Because you're building your network and your network is your net worth.
So I've always told people this, you're not going to school just for what you learned. It's nice.
It's wonderful. It's helpful.
But what it does for you as a human being and the people you connect with and the network you build will make you more money than you possibly understand. So I love that you're going back to school and getting your master's at Cambridge.
And just do me fair and celebrate the fact that you're going back to Cambridge, man. That's amazing.
Dude, seriously, you just got to brush it over. Like, I did this, I did that.
I'm like, no, celebrate that. That's, it's amazing.
It's huge. Because I mean, how old are you again? I'm 30 as of last week.
Yeah, I'm not talking to you anymore. We're done.
Goodbye. I've got 17, 16 years on you.
Go away. I'm not talking to you.
At 30, I wasn't even thinking about doing half of the things, dude. So you're, you're crushing it and you're, you're absolutely in the right direction.
If someone's listening right now and they're like, I've never even thought about business this way. I've never interacted with business this way.
I didn't even understand the exclusivity of, of inherited trust, of having the experience of, wow, maybe I should look at school and do all that. If someone has never done this, what are the things that you would tell them? Say, okay, these are the two things you need to read.
These are the three things you need to do. Or if you're stuck in your business, here are those things.
What are the things that you're like, oh my God, I've got access to Cola. What would I actually tell people? I think, you know, it might almost sound very cliche, but to me, I think, you know, really the fundamentals and the basics are quite important.
And actually, I think, you know, if there's only one thing, you know, that I would, you know, I think someone could practically do, to me, it's about, you know, again, trying and, you know, increase your knowledge base, you know, if you have access to the internet, like, you know, most, the majority of people do, even more so, you know, within the business the setting and the business world is, you know, uh, if you have access to the internet, like, you know, most, the majority of people do, um, even more so, you know, within the business setting and the business world is, you know, try and find out, um, I'd say, you know, what, um, sort of, you know, I would say what is, you know, where you are lacking in confidence and, you know, what is, um, you know, what actually know, is stopping you from doing that next step. And, you know, just research that, you know, as a starting point.
I would say, you know, really is about, you know, anything that you can do that will increase your confidence is a start, you know, in my opinion. Now, you know, moving on, I think there's certainly an element of, you know, how do you usually learn? And, you know, for me, a lot of learning is about, you know, having a structured approach, which, you know, clearly comes from, you know, having studied a lot at university, you know, having studied a lot in general.
And I think there, you know, for me, you know, doing the structured courses really helped. But again, I'm very aware that, you know, a lot of the things that I learned in the MBA, you can pick up online, like on a free YouTube video, like you don't, on podcasts, you know, you don't need a whole degree.
But, you know, are you going to are you gonna you know leverage your network you may or may not you know if you do those things online if you have other ways of you know expanding your networks and you know you can learn everything online and you want to save on the fees money by all means absolutely but you know do something and you know again those are the things that i think you need um you know so you know try and increase your knowledge initially you know try and increase your network 100% you know I think is one of the most important things um you know and again you know try and connect with people that you know you think may help you I think ultimately you know for me you know the businesses I did with well the business I did with you know people that I met online literally like you know met online like um you know you might meet people you people from all walks of life.

You never know.

But I think just being open, open-minded, I think really, really, really, really is

important, really helps.

And I would say sort of the concepts, at least, that I would say you might want to

reflect on if you are thinking about starting a business but don't know where to go.

Are there certain books that you're like, these are my Bibles?

These are, I love these more than anything else. are there certain ones that resonate with you more than anything i think conceptually you know again uh i would say shoe dog by phil knight so the creator of nike it's very very very good book uh i think he expresses uh actually i think i can't remember if it's a biography or an autobiography nevertheless Nevertheless, probably a biography, in fact.
Nevertheless, it explores well in the thought process. Again, Steve Jobs' biography, I think, again, explains well in the thought process.
Rich, poor, that, I think is an interesting way into understanding the pitfalls, perhaps, of how accounting and finance is usually viewed from people that don't really necessarily have backgrounds within those disciplines. And those, I would say, probably are some.
I've read 48 Laws of Power, which I probably would recommend. But equally, I think the reality is that there's no, to me, one size fits all.
I think it really depends on what really resonates with you what type of individuals are you what type of to me like Shoe Dog and those books they're very almost immediate answers because you're working in streetwear and fashion I mean Nike is like the staple of you're talking a lot about you know i'm talking a lot about branding and experience i mean you know apple is the ones that did it you know better than anyone else in his so you know those really are the people and the reality i think you know probably you know these are the ones for me but i would say you know conceptually you know you might want to find whoever's done the very best of you know what you want to do and go and you know see what you can learn you know from from not necessarily the specific steps because they may not apply to your circumstances but at least conceptually i think that will be always a start so you're going to university you're doing your next round what's next for you what is the next go what are your plans that you know i've got all this knowledge. What is the next journey for you? I think, you know, to me, the next journey, there's no specific like, oh, you know, my five-year plan is, you know, opening whatever AI company.
No, none of that. I think, you know, I certainly am someone who I like to improve myself and, you know, better myself as a person and certainly studying, you know, goes towards that.
You know, business opportunities, you know, will come around. You know, I have obviously experience within different fields, retail, you know, healthcare, you know, also artificial intelligence and data analysis.
You know, I will certainly take a look, but, you know, there's nothing specific as such. To me, really, it's about, you know, improving myself and, you know, expanding my knowledge, expanding my network, because those are the things that make me happy.
And ultimately, you live life to be happy. I don't really have the blueprint for happiness, but I think I know what happiness looks like for me.
And that's what really I work towards continuously. So if the audience wants to get a hold of you and they want to reach you, or they want to find out more about your brand and how you did it, where can they find you online? What's the best way to get in touch to see what you've done i think for me you know the best ways would be probably linkedin um so you know call a title on linkedin so name so name um you know also really you know they they uh my instagram profile i i look pretty much every day you know which is again at call a titler so name so name you know with no spaces um and and you know here also you find you know my email contacts, which would be, at Kola title, so no names or name, you know, with no spaces.
And, you know, here also you find, you know, my email contacts, which would be Kola at dropoutmilano.com and, you know, I'm always open to, you know, a chat or, you know, discussing potential opportunities as well as, you know, I mean, by no mean I'm a you know, wildly successful person, but I think I'm always open to sharing, you know, what I did and, you know, my thought process and exploring other people's thought other people's thought processes and see if there's any synergies or if there's anything that could be done together or explored together. And I think really, ultimately, that's what I'm here for.
I think we can all help each other. I think we can all learn from each other.
So I'm definitely someone who's out there and who's hoping to conversation for sure.

I really appreciate it.

You've scaled in a way that most people have never even thought of.

And the fact that you're continuing to invest in your education and invest in you, I wish more people would do it.

Honestly, if I could go back 20 years, I'd be doing the exact same thing you're doing.

I'd continue to expand my network.

I'd continue to expand my knowledge.

I'd be honest about where my weaknesses are, and I would just go into it without any sort of ego. Like, okay, let's scale this and go from there.
I really appreciate it, man. Thank you so much for being on the show.
Thank you for having me. That's a wrap on another deep dive here on the show.
Today, we had the pleasure of sitting down with Cola Teitler, the visionary entrepreneur behind Dropout Milano. I hope you found his insights into crafting an exclusive, experience-driven brand as intriguing and valuable as I did.
A massive thank you to Cola for generously sharing his time and wisdom. Your relentless pursuit of learning and innovation is nothing short of inspiring.
For those looking to dig deeper into the concepts discussed today, we created the

companion guide exclusively for Cola. In this detailed guide, we distill the key takeaways from

of how to build based off exclusivity and experience, offering actionable strategies

and resources to elevate your brand today. Until next time, keep experimenting, keep implementing,

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