Secrets from the Dropout Millionaire

Speaker 1 to another episode of the I Am Charles Schwartz Show, where we delve into the minds of the world's top performers to unlock the secrets you can start using today.

Speaker 1 On this episode, we have Cola Teitler, the visionary founder of Dropout Milano, a brand that's redefining the landscape of exclusive streetwear. Cola's journey is nothing short of rule-breaking.

Speaker 1 From the halls of medical school to the vibrant, fast-paced world of high-end streetwear, Cola's story is a masterclass in pursuing your passion and building something extraordinary.

Speaker 1 In this episode, we'll unpack how Cola has created created a brand that's all about exclusivity and immersive experiences.

Speaker 1 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.

Speaker 1 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.

Speaker 1 So grab your notebook and join us as we explore the dynamic world of fashion and entrepreneurship with Cola Teitler. The show starts now.

Speaker 2 Welcome to the I Am Charles Schwartz Show, where we don't just discuss success, we show you how to create it.

Speaker 2 On every episode, we uncover the strategies and tactics that turned everyday entrepreneurs into unstoppable powerhouses in their businesses and their lives.

Speaker 2 Whether your goal is to transform your life or hit that elusive seven, eight, or nine figure mark, we've got the blueprint to get you there. The show starts now.

Speaker 4 I'm today with Cola Teitler, and this is an individual who dropped out of school and became a multimillionaire and and is going back to school. Blows my mind.
Welcome to the show. Welcome to the live.

Speaker 3 Thank you. Thank you for having me, Chance.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 I certainly didn't want to fully leave the course, hence why, you know, amongst other reasons as well, my company is called dropout.

Speaker 3 Certainly, you know, I'd say at the time, mentally, I was in a place where, you know, I was probably thinking,

Speaker 3 what's going to give me more? You know, is it doing my own thing or is it pursuing this, you know, the degree and the, you know, the career path that is probably

Speaker 3 structured after graduating from medical school. Nevertheless, for me personally, I'd say

Speaker 3 a lot of what came

Speaker 3 to create my company and the business had to do with leveraging what I saw as a market opportunity in the sense that actually

Speaker 3 what we created was

Speaker 3 a business modeled on an opportunity that we saw within a market we were very familiar with.

Speaker 3 And I say that as the, 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.

Speaker 3 We were also probably, I'd say, you know, collectors, fans, enthusiasts.

Speaker 3 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,

Speaker 3 you know, a physical outlet in particular

Speaker 3 and, you know, a place where, you know, streetwear 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 we went and then and did our own i think at the time you know especially given the fact that i was at university still um i think for me it was about um you know realizing that i could have multiple interests and i could have you know i could develop uh 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 uh i think they're more similar than probably one may think but actually they are certainly you know apart.

Speaker 3 And, you know, for me, it was also about saying, actually, you know, I'm not confined to what I'm studying.

Speaker 3 You know, I could do more and I can probably draw some parallels between the skills that I gather

Speaker 3 and gain from my degree and the one needed for the business.

Speaker 4 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.
We're like, hey, you know, I went to school for computers.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 Was that a hard process for you to pivot through to say, you know what? No, I can do this. I can't continue to do university.
I can continue with my studies, but I also can do this.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 3 I think, you know, probably,

Speaker 3 I think, from an individual, 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 do this, you know, that's not going to work, why this, why that, you know, I almost

Speaker 3 almost blocked that out, even though that may or may not be positive. Certainly, there's some negatives to that.

Speaker 3 But in particular, you know, I had seen

Speaker 3 individuals out there who were able to do different things. And I remember, for example,

Speaker 3 one of the,

Speaker 3 if not maybe the most most influential individual within the streetwear sneakers niche, you know, in Kanye US. And I remember,

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 And I think, you know, I was also looking concurrently at how, you know, the commentary on that often used to be, you know, this man is just out of it.

Speaker 3 And I think, you know, I'm not going to comment on that, but sadly, I did think actually, you know,

Speaker 3 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?

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 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, pick up basketball a lot.
And I used to play also, you know, football with friends.

Speaker 3 And I was, you know, I think decent at both. And again, I always drew the parallel with that.
I think, you know, you don't have to be

Speaker 3 good at one thing. I think, you know, you can be decent at multiple things.
And ultimately, I think to me, it was about, you know, asking, you know, myself, what do I enjoy?

Speaker 3 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,

Speaker 3 you know, do whatever makes me happy.

Speaker 4 I think one of the best sayings I ever heard about this was instruments don't just play one note.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 My little brother picks on me and he's like, what, what are you doing? I wear, I mean, I chapotage. I don't, I am not fashionable in any way, shape, or form.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 Walk me through what, what is it with sneakers? Why did you, you're like, I'm in middle school, cool school. Here's, here's sneaker.
I don't understand. Walk me through that.

Speaker 4 Walk me through that process. How did you know you could monetize it?

Speaker 3 I think let's say, you know, we've got to take a few steps backs in the sense that,

Speaker 3 you know, there was a now is wider, but it's less, I'd say, on the ground. But, you know, imagine we're talking now about, you know, early 2010s and, you know, there's a lot of communities online.

Speaker 3 There's Reddit that is obviously blowing up.

Speaker 3 And Reddit in particular is the type of place where you'd get people who,

Speaker 3 maybe the, I mean, this might sound controversial, but maybe even the loners of the world that are finally finding a place, they can find people like them and things to talk about.

Speaker 3 And there's more and more places like there's Reddit, there's Facebook groups, there's a little bit on Twitter, and

Speaker 3 there's a forum called Kanye Today. In fact,

Speaker 3 it was

Speaker 3 named African Ye West. And then there's another forum called Nike Talk.

Speaker 3 And those are places where people are congregating more and more to discuss the, you know, the latest Nika release and the latest streetwear releases.

Speaker 3 And the reality is that, you know, there was a lot, there was already like a, you know, a...

Speaker 3 significant but probably very sparse and you know varied community of individuals what is interesting 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 um you know mostly online unless you lived you know in a major city like new york or la

Speaker 3 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

Speaker 3 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,

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 And I think we almost foresaw how the trajectory was, you know, know, was going. And we, you know, I think there's certain pivotal moments where collaborations start.
And then, you know,

Speaker 3 Supreme starts collaborating with Louis Vuitton and Nagy start collaborating with of White. And you see how

Speaker 3 now

Speaker 3 the old-fashioned houses that were catering to a public of wealthy,

Speaker 3 you know, maybe unapproachable clientele are 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 the interest in more casual wear compared to formal wear.

Speaker 3 So basically, I think, you know,

Speaker 3 from this evolution online,

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 there's when we saw, we had this chat. I think.
you know, it was very brief. It was almost like, look,

Speaker 3 can you see what I'm seeing? I think where this is going.

Speaker 3 I think that, you know, if we get our name out there, we create a brand within this segment and and we leverage the growth of the sneaker market, we can actually create a sustainable business which will make a mark and

Speaker 3 will be potentially

Speaker 3 known within at least the Italian streetwear community. So Dropout actually starts as that.
It starts as a business that aims to leverage the growth of the sneaker industry, but

Speaker 3 placing itself as a also independent brand, streetwear brand that

Speaker 3 can be associated with again, you know, this wealthy young clientele. So really for us, I think, you know, one of the first steps was about understanding the market.

Speaker 3 And for us, that was somewhat easy, I'm going to say, because we were, you know, our average target consumer.

Speaker 3 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 had a, you know, at the network, who knew how social media worked,

Speaker 3 and who was, you know, a little bit disillusive, this, you know, know disilluded with you know the high-end fashion houses products and wanted to wear something more casual so you know we modeled i think the business base to a market that we knew rather well um and for that really you know a lot of it was about asking okay you know what do i want to see you know what is my problem how am i going to solve the problem that i have uh you know problem being you know i don't find an outlet you know a store that actually uh reflects what I'm looking to buy.

Speaker 3 And I think that's, you know, basically the first questions that we started you know, sort of at the beginning asking ourselves.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 And then from there, being in the environment of going, okay, where are they hanging out? Where is their quote-unquote watering hole?

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 I found a way 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.

Speaker 4 So in this place you've 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 do 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

Speaker 3 I think for us, you know, we had actually created, especially, I think, you know, a key word here is community in the sense that I think, you know, again, you got to, you got gotta remember where where you're playing you know what 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 or right not just fashion but any um you know discretionary purchase really

Speaker 3 we buying generally for for you know only few reasons, which will be for sustainment, you know, such as food or such as, you know, shelter. Or, you know, we buy for,

Speaker 3 you know, for convenience, for example, you know, something to do, you know, something that I would need to do, but whatever I'm purchasing is going to make that thing easier. Or we buy

Speaker 3 to cut it to a social need. And obviously fashion is the social need.
Now, there's an element of, yes, you buy clothes to cover yourself.

Speaker 3 Fair enough, but you also buy clothes to either identify within a certain group or you buy clothes to

Speaker 3 be not identify within a certain group, but to show to a certain group what of a person you are. Or again, you know, you buy to show particular traits of your persona.

Speaker 3 Now, in our case, you know, when we're talking about small communities, you know that you're actually speaking to

Speaker 3 an audience that probably want to identify as part of that.

Speaker 3 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 knows will know.

Speaker 3 It's sort of a, you know, if you know, you know, type of thing.

Speaker 3 And then there's another element which was growing within the street to market, which was because it was a limited, you know, a lot of this was limited edition product.

Speaker 3 It was about, you know, demonstrating that you had access and you demonstrate that exclusivity, because also,

Speaker 3 you know, now you can, you know, you can differentiate your audience in multiple ways, your audience in multiple ways. Sometimes, you know, you do that by price by say, you know, okay,

Speaker 3 you know, Porsche's. 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.

Speaker 3 However, you know, Rich and Mill, 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.

Speaker 3 So brands start to leveraging both of those you know by doing set of very limited edition releases and the person that you know the people that were actually the audience of this were also individuals who um you know may be able to um 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

Speaker 3 The reality was that rather than sort of starting posting online and going the whole, okay, you know, we're going to 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 opened physical stores uh physical store first which we actually opened uh initially in 2018 without posting any pictures of the store online so we only posted the um like one picture of instagram and you know of our social media which said we're opening a store you know we're gonna treat limited uh you know curate limited edition releases.

Speaker 3 We're not even going to show you what it looks like. It will open on this day, at this time.
We post something like three days in advance. And basically, we say, like, you know, you want to be there.

Speaker 3 And I remember,

Speaker 3 you know, that actually Starbucks, the first Starbucks had 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.

Speaker 3 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,

Speaker 3 we actually, you know, I have a picture and a video taken from a drone. The whole road was blocked.

Speaker 3 You know, we had more people to Starbucks that came to look at our store without having even ever seen a picture of it.

Speaker 3 And that was because, again, you know, the message with this community really is about exclusivity, is about, you know, being the coolest and being able to do things other people will not do.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 then obviously you know for commercial leader reasons you know a couple of months after we obviously you know we opened the e-commerce because obviously uh we said initially you know this is also an experience it's an expiring 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 store how are you going to leverage the fact that you're creating a brand and so it was about you know for me was about

Speaker 3 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 um and you know you will see that there's also some pieces that are you know um

Speaker 3 essentially you know just to 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 factory error 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 no ultimately you know if you want to come and see this sneaker you know you gotta come to a store almost like if it was a museum piece and uh you know that 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 few selected people essentially you know will be will be almost invited to.

Speaker 4 And I think it's 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.

Speaker 4 They buy stories, identities, and ways out of pain. And you were selling an identity, which was, hey, the only place in the world, you can see this store.

Speaker 4 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 because I've never seen a $150,000 shoe in my life.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 We're going to go exclusive and we're going to do the experience. So when you have this and you have your physical stories, you mentioned you did a bit of an e-commerce with your own products.

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 4 Because in a physical world, super easy, right? Anybody, not anybody can do it, but it's easier to do.

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 3 I think really, you know, the reality is that for us, it's been pretty,

Speaker 3 you know, because of the way that we were born and the community aspect of it, you know, Japao started to become known in Milan as a place where, okay, you know, this is where the celebrities shop.

Speaker 3 This is where, you know, the wealthy people shop.

Speaker 3 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, no, I'm going to walk into a store where, you know, the football player from, you know, that just played the Champions League final was, or where, you know, someone who's popular in a holiday Milan, you know, they'll pass by.

Speaker 3 So, you know, I want to be associated with that. And in terms of leveraging the online, you know, again, it was sort of similar where, you know, the reality is that

Speaker 3 I think, you know, focusing specifically on the product alone, I think is is quite difficult nowadays, especially with the advent of digital marketing. And ultimately,

Speaker 3 we're all beating against each other for the meta ads and the

Speaker 3 TikTok ads and whatnot. Or

Speaker 3 we are the

Speaker 3 essentially subject to whatever.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 Whatever I'm going to buy there is, you know, something that, you know, has been created for me and it's been,

Speaker 3 you know, and it's in demand, in fact. So, you know, that really was what it was about for us.

Speaker 3 And in order to do that, I think, you know, we really went to look, okay, you know, how much does our average spender spend and where would they be likely to shop and what would their usual shopping habits, you know, be like.

Speaker 3 So, for example, you know, I won't obviously, you know, may make sort of specific names, but, you know, we said, okay, you know, if our average product is 300 euros for a pair of sneakers, then like, you know, what type of person is buying a

Speaker 3 300 euros pair of sneakers and which other shops, you know, would they likely shop at? And, you know, which shops will they probably not shop at?

Speaker 3 So, you know, started looking at those type of things, started seeing what the commonalities were, what the themes were, what type of messaging would be employed.

Speaker 3 And I think we started not necessarily mimicking those, but we started trying to align our messages with those in order to

Speaker 3 leverage the fact that ultimately

Speaker 3 we wanted our consumers to really strongly associate dropout with a cool place where it would be just almost normal for them to shop at.

Speaker 4 Have you ever done cross-partnerships? Like, hey, you know, brand A really is close with us. We want want to kind of have that inherited trust from brand A.

Speaker 4 Have you ever done partnerships or involvements with them?

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 And often the message and the idea is basically the same. You know, say we have,

Speaker 3 you know, there's been a, for example, very strong brand in the UK at the moment, which is called Trapstar,

Speaker 3 which I believe is also, you know, there's some involvement with Rock Nation and JC and the US as well.

Speaker 3 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, you know, in France, in the US.

Speaker 3 We'd like to do the same in Italy. And, you know, Milan and Dropout is an outlet where

Speaker 3 this will be reasonable and logical to do. So we hosted pop-ups with brands such as that.
And we found that they worked really well because people are like, okay,

Speaker 3 and again, it's 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.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 But when they know, okay, you know, a physical experience, a pop-up is coming in Milan, they're like, okay, you know, jump at the opportunity, come to Milan.

Speaker 3 And, you know, dropout serves as the almost aggregator for all of those people to come together.

Speaker 3 And again, so you leverage the community aspect, you leverage the fact that you have a brand, you know, yourself, and you have another brand coming from abroad.

Speaker 3 And all those people are, you know, you reinforce how okay 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 um

Speaker 3 you know we've done every now and then um you know activities sort of uh you know once we took people um to watch a serious game so a football game or rather soccer game you know as you say in the us

Speaker 3 um and we 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 uh 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.

Speaker 3 So there was that element of brand signaling

Speaker 3 that we do every now and then. We've taken people on a yacht in Portofino.
You know, we paid for people to go in a, you know, in a private

Speaker 3 mini bus from Milan to this place, you know, this luxury destination. And we paid, and again, you know, it's just about being able to say, look, you know,

Speaker 3 this is not just about the product that we sell it's about what we stand for is about the type of brand that we are and it's about being associated with us

Speaker 3 you know and i think that that is something that you know ultimately is where the difference happens between you know brands and it's about you know what type of message do you give and you know how will you get people to you know want to associate with your brand because i think again you know we look at the great brands of today you 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 time smaller scale for dropout is, 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.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 4 So I love that it's more about the experience and the identity. And the physical product is almost an after effect, an afterthought, because it's really about the experience and the identity.

Speaker 4 So if, because this is most people aren't doing this, most people are trying to do, as you said, lots of sales. They're trying to do Facebook ads.
They're trying to just be everywhere all at once.

Speaker 4 If someone finally realizes, oh, wow, I should do this differently. And what Cola is talking about makes light years of sense creating this exclusivity.

Speaker 4 What are the steps or the tools that you've used to say, listen, I'm going to sell XYZ product? How do you, how does someone begin in that? If they're like, okay, I get it.

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 3 I think the very first thing always is about, you know, what I guess in the industry, it's probably called an audit, but the reality, I think, you need to know where you stand.

Speaker 3 You need to know the resources that you have. I think you need to know, as I said earlier, the public, very, very important, and the type of message.

Speaker 3 Putting aside the finances, obviously, even though those are clearly key, but I'd say

Speaker 3 you want to know

Speaker 3 how much awareness does your brand have? And

Speaker 3 where are you

Speaker 3 in the

Speaker 3 potential customer's mind at the moment? You know, are you a brand that they'll just buy because you are the cheapest product?

Speaker 3 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?

Speaker 3 And if you really want to create the name, which I think, you know, 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.

Speaker 3 And to us, as I said, we were looking, for example, at

Speaker 3 what do young, wealthy people look like? And I remember, you know, looking at,

Speaker 3 you know, thinking, okay,

Speaker 3 people

Speaker 3 want to go where, you know,

Speaker 3 where often they cannot be or where their favorite people are. And we looked at this luxury destination in Italy, which was Portofino.

Speaker 3 And, you know, we said, okay, you know, what is the most efficient way that we can actually take people

Speaker 3 on a trip there and do something that otherwise they wouldn't be able to do.

Speaker 3 And then obviously capture content that we'd 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 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 we're this type of

Speaker 3 brand so that we become an aspirational brand for them. So that maybe in the future, when they can afford to shop from us, they will come.

Speaker 3 Because maybe some people will grow up thinking, okay, I would love to shop at Dropout to their account. And so it's about targeting both

Speaker 3 who can be your customer now and also who you think can be, maybe able to be your customer tomorrow. For us, really, I think some of this again was about knowing

Speaker 3 the market almost inside out because we are, you know, consumers of it and because we are a strong part of communities from it.

Speaker 3 Otherwise, I would say probably, you know, trying to do, 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, you know, within the niche, or trying to understand or even create, you know, small service actually, you know, at the end of

Speaker 3 you know, at the end of a purchase funnel in your website, I think would be quite useful.

Speaker 3 And there are certain tools, you know, I would say even nowadays, you know, even Google and even Meta Ads actually give you enough data for you to be able to study and understand, you know, where, and analytic, Google Analytics as well, you know, try and understand where your public is coming from and, you know, their shopping habits.

Speaker 3 And that, you know, can give you a start.

Speaker 3 I think, you know, personally, probably the best organic way, in my opinion, is to, if, you know, if whatever product you're selling

Speaker 3 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

Speaker 3 certain certainly you know has been for us um

Speaker 3 And you know, that really

Speaker 3 is where I think it is at really in terms of

Speaker 3 probably immediate practical steps is really, as I said, trying to understand where the community is and how you can get involved and

Speaker 3 understand it from the inside.

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 3 I think

Speaker 3 an element of that will be

Speaker 3 understanding it first of all, being useful answering questions,

Speaker 3 likewise on Quora, I think,

Speaker 3 is a strong part of it.

Speaker 3 Now, if there is a specific pain point that can be addressed and you're about addressing that and you can create answers for that,

Speaker 3 great, even better, you probably might be able to go on with almost direct marketing

Speaker 3 and even write it ads, for example.

Speaker 3 However, I'd say it's more of a almost market research and

Speaker 3 try and understand

Speaker 3 what are the commonalities that people are

Speaker 3 displaying

Speaker 3 in there? And I think

Speaker 3 trying

Speaker 3 asking for

Speaker 3 opinions, for example, and then trying to leverage those on an actual social media platform, which may be TikTok, maybe Instagram, for example, because of very visual platforms.

Speaker 3 I think it's where I will go next. So I would say.

Speaker 3 Ready to market research to understand where you're at,

Speaker 3 TikTok and Instagram for the visuals, to provide the visuals once you figured out, I think, the pain points.

Speaker 3 You can go back to Reddit, you know, asking for direct feedback. I think, you know, that sounds reasonable to me.

Speaker 3 You know, I think you probably do want to do as much organic as possible.

Speaker 3 Nowadays, probably compared to six years ago, it maybe is a little bit easier to go viral in the sense that almost everyone has the same chance. In the sense that

Speaker 3 you don't need to have 100,000 followers, but you need the best content.

Speaker 3 And I think the best content really, because the platforms ultimately, they want you to be able to hook the consumers as much as possible

Speaker 3 to stay

Speaker 3 on their platform. So if you can figure out what type of content actually is going to cook your target

Speaker 3 user on the platform to watch it, then really that's what you want to do. And I think, again, understanding your public is the best thing that you can do for that.

Speaker 3 So I would do that. Now,

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 probably you know i will attach to this something like you know try and understand who's your closest not necessarily competitor but you know similar business and try and see what they are doing.

Speaker 3 And not necessarily copy, but, you know, try and see if there's any specific elements that are recurring in their

Speaker 3 most successful contents. And, you know, again, repropose those.
Because ultimately, you know, the reality is that almost whatever you're doing, someone else is probably thinking at the same time.

Speaker 3 And, you know, maybe even proposing. So, you know, I think.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 4 So when you're doing this and you're doing, how many different market strategies you're doing because 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 for someone else that all makes sense when you're doing your own marketing you're trying to go viral how many things are you testing at the same time what 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 numbers and depending on the revenue.

Speaker 3 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

Speaker 3 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 stuff uh but if you're trying to build brand you know and continue to build brand and community like we are we always we almost often have something going on for awareness, which may be a digital campaign, like you know, it can be meta, google ads.

Speaker 3 I know people say, and you know, there's a lot of controversy that you know, the best awareness is the one that's given by sales.

Speaker 3 Yes, it is, however, equally, if you are 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,

Speaker 3 they'll 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.

Speaker 3 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 digital out of home.

Speaker 3 So we've actually done billboards.

Speaker 3 We've done digital billboards. We've wrapped a trump in Milan once, a huge trump that was going around for a month.
We sponsored

Speaker 3 advertising at football games.

Speaker 3 And a lot of the times,

Speaker 3 obviously, those are things that you are doing

Speaker 3 for a limited amount of people that physically will see those pieces of advertising amongst other hundreds piece of advertising that is every day.

Speaker 3 But it will also allow you to create content for those, which you can then use in your newsletter, you can use

Speaker 3 in your website, you can use your social media, and just to show again that your brand is tangible,

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 And that also increases the trust that the average individual has in yourself.

Speaker 3 Concurrently with this, we usually have something that is a drive-to-store.

Speaker 3 And again, that is something where we do digital advertising, which actually has practical and physical, you know, or rather pictures of and footage of our physical store.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 Definitely, if you have a physical store, I would say 100% leverage the fact that you have that because not everyone has that.

Speaker 3 And then, you know, we run also concurrently, you know, the usual element of conversion ads.

Speaker 3 In there, I think, you know, you need to work on the creatives and try and find, you know, whatever's best.

Speaker 3 And there, you know, you just need to go with the A-B testing.

Speaker 3 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, you know, what works best and double down on that.

Speaker 3 You know, now,

Speaker 3 when you spend, you know, a certain amount, Matt, I think it's quite helpful in giving you you know

Speaker 3 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

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 For example, 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 saying.

Speaker 3 You know, so I think this really is where, you know, I would say conceptually one need to stand.

Speaker 3 Now,

Speaker 3 probably, I think, you know, the biggest challenge really is the...

Speaker 3 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 it or you can do you can hire agencies we serve uh you know we make use of of agencies um that you know with which essentially we give mood board and and uh and um

Speaker 3 um you know sort of a storyline and and our uh 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 my life if i was at my last pennies pennies, you know, and I didn't know where to spend them, you know, that's where I would go, you know, creative, sort of try and create the best possible, you know, creative to leverage, you know, our, our, you know, the assets that we have, which for us, as I said, predominantly is the presence of physical and tangible assets.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 Let's try and do that. Or I'm going to try and, you know, do they're focused, they're product focused, you're community-focused and experience-focused.
And that's a rare thing.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 You're going back to university. You're currently involved in that process.
And it's not a little university.

Speaker 4 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 do this.

Speaker 3 I think, you know, certainly also growing up, you know, for me, a lot of this has been about,

Speaker 3 you know, what do I know? And also

Speaker 3 there's always about the unknown, unknowns.

Speaker 3 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, you know, I could know more, or like, you know, there's something else that I could do better.

Speaker 3 And really, ultimately, it's always about, you know, are you going to go and get someone who can do whatever you can't do? Which, you know, very often is the answer.

Speaker 3 Most of the times, it's certainly the answer. Or, you know, are you going to get that knowledge yourself? Now,

Speaker 3 again, sometimes, obviously, you know, you can do both, but equally, to me, you know, I'm a very, I'm a person that I think is

Speaker 3 thirsty, you know, to for knowledge, and I really like studying as well.

Speaker 3 So, you know, aside medical school, actually, which I studied at King's College London, um, 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.

Speaker 3 That's what I did. Um, I also studied some law courses at the London School of Economics, I studied some business courses at Imperial College London.
Um, after

Speaker 3 starting the business, after graduating from medical school as a medical doctor, I completed an MBA as well.

Speaker 3 So part remote learning, part executive, but as a full MBA in Master of Business Administration, which I did at the University of Birmingham,

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 So really, you know, ideally, you want to know what they're talking about. And there, I think that

Speaker 3 there, I think that. you know, increasing your knowledge in those things is very important.
So for me, doing MBA was about

Speaker 3 not because I'm going to necessarily going to run 100% of my accounting, but knowing, you know, what, 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,

Speaker 3 you know, if you are more stressed, more worried, you know, your decision-making process will suffer

Speaker 3 but you know if you can increase you know your knowledge and and and what you you know and what you you know what you're comfortable with then I think that really helps

Speaker 3 again you know I decided you know some pe last year to 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

Speaker 3 you know practiced I've been accepted into that so I'll be starting that from

Speaker 3 August this year. So I'll be going to King's College, Cambridge.

Speaker 3 And there, you know, again,

Speaker 3 you know, for me. It's huge, man.

Speaker 4 I know you're just, you're, you're passing over it. Like, oh, I've got this degree.
I got this degree. I got this degree.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 Seeing someone else do the same way I do it. Take a second and celebrate, man.
That's huge. Cambridge is.
huge.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 And I want to be able to stand in front of you confidently and understand what you're articulating to me.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 And being able to have that background, that have it in your back pocket is massive.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 I mean, if you go to university of, you know, but fuck no idea where it is, that doesn't matter. You pull Cambridge out of your pocket.

Speaker 4 You pull Harvard, you pull Yale, you pull those things out of your pocket. It matters.

Speaker 4 So it, as much as you're building an identity around and exclusivity around your brand, being able to do that to yourself as well. changes the ball games.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 And it also, as you said, for your confidence, changes how you interact with the people across the table.

Speaker 4 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 years 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 we've both done things that no one else has done Now what's the next step?

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 So, I love that you're going back to school and getting your master's at Cambridge. And just do we have Aaron celebrate the fact that you're going back to Cambridge, man.
That's amazing, dude.

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 3 I'm 30 as of last week.

Speaker 4 Yeah, I'm not talking to you anymore. We're done.
Goodbye.

Speaker 4 I've got 17, 16 years on you. Go away.
I'm not talking anymore. At 30, I wasn't even thinking about doing half of the things you do.

Speaker 4 So you're, you're crushing it and 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.

Speaker 4 I've never interacted with business this way. I didn't even understand the exclusivity of inherited trust, of having the experience of, wow, maybe I should look at school and do all that.

Speaker 4 If you, if someone has never done this, what are the things that you you would tell them? Say, okay, these are the two things you need to read. These are the three things you need to do.

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 And actually, I think, you know, if there's only one thing, you know, that I would,

Speaker 3 you know, I think someone could practically do to me is about, you know, again, trying and, you know, increase your knowledge base.

Speaker 3 You you know 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

Speaker 3 um

Speaker 3 sort of you know i would say

Speaker 3 what is you know

Speaker 3 where you are lacking in confidence and you know what is um you know what actually you know is stopping you from doing that next step and 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 um you know doing the structured courses really helps 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 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 know 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

Speaker 3 you know so you know try and increase your knowledge initially you know try and increase your network 100 you know i think it's one of the most important things um you know and again you know try and connect with people that you think may help you.

Speaker 3 I think ultimately,

Speaker 3 for me, the businesses I did with, well, the business I did with people that I met online, literally, met online. Like,

Speaker 3 you might meet people from all works of life. You never know.
But I think just being open, open-minded, I think really, really, really, really is important, really helps.

Speaker 3 And that, you know, I would say, you know, sort of the concepts at least that I would say.

Speaker 3 you know, you might want to reflect on if you are, you know, thinking about starting a business, but don't know where, where to go.

Speaker 4 Are there certain books that you're like, these are my Bibles?

Speaker 4 I love these more than anything else. Are there certain ones that resonate with you more than anything?

Speaker 3 I think conceptually, again,

Speaker 3 I would say Shoe Dog by Phil Knight, so the creator of Nike. It's very, very, very good book.
I think he expresses,

Speaker 3 actually, I think, I can't remember if it's a biography or an autobiography, nevertheless, probably a biography, in fact. Nevertheless, I think it explores well, I think, the thought process.

Speaker 3 Again, Steve Jobs, you know, biography, I think again, you know, experienced well the thought process.

Speaker 3 Rich that, poor that, I think is an interesting way into

Speaker 3 understanding

Speaker 3 the pitfalls perhaps of how accounting and finance is usually viewed

Speaker 3 from people that don't really necessarily have backgrounds within those disciplines.

Speaker 3 And those I would say probably

Speaker 3 are some.

Speaker 3 I've read 48 Laws of Power, which also I probably would recommend.

Speaker 3 But equally, equally i think the reality is that uh there's no to me one size fit all i think it really depends as you know what really resonates with you you know what type of individuals are you you know what type of you know to me uh you know like shoe dog and those books they're very you know they're very

Speaker 3 almost you know immediate answers because you know you're working in you know in the in streetwear in fashion i mean mike is like the you know the staple of like you know of of you know business really uh you know 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 here amazing 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 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

Speaker 3 so you're going to university you're doing your next round what's next for you what is the next go what do you what are your plans that you know i've got all this knowledge i've got all this experience 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 um 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 um you know if business opportunities you know will come around you know i have obviously experience within different fields retail you know healthcare

Speaker 3 you know, ultra-artificial intelligence and data analysis.

Speaker 3 You know, I will certainly take a look. But, you know, there's nothing specific as such.

Speaker 3 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.

Speaker 3 And ultimately, I live life to be happy. You know, I don't really have the blueprint for happiness, but I think I have the, you know, I know what happiness looks like for me.

Speaker 3 And, you know, that's what really I work towards continuously.

Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 4 What's the best way to get in touch to see what you've done?

Speaker 3 I think for me, the best ways would be probably LinkedIn.

Speaker 3 So, you know, call a title or LinkedIn, so name, surname.

Speaker 3 You know, also really, you know,

Speaker 3 my Instagram profile, I log pretty much every day, you know, which is again at cola titler. So no name, surname, you know, with no spaces.

Speaker 3 And, you know, here also you find, you know, my email contacts, which will be cola at droponmilano.com. And, And, you know, I'm always open to a chat or

Speaker 3 discussing potential opportunities, as well as, you know,

Speaker 3 I mean, but by no means, I'm a wildly successful person, but I think I'm always open to sharing what I did and my thought process and exploring other people's thought processes, you know, and see if there's any synergies or if there's anything that could be done together or explored together.

Speaker 3 And I think really, you know, ultimately, that's what I'm here for. I think,

Speaker 3 you know, we can all help each other. I think, you know, we can all learn from each other.

Speaker 3 So, you know, I'm definitely someone who's who's out there and who's hoping to, you know, to conversation for sure.

Speaker 4 I really appreciate it. You've scaled in a way that most people have never even thought of.

Speaker 4 And the fact that you're continuing to invest in your education and invest in you, I wish more people would do it.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 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.

Speaker 4 Thank you so much for being on the show.

Speaker 3 Thank you for having me.

Speaker 1 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.

Speaker 1 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.

Speaker 1 Your relentless pursuit of learning and innovation is nothing short of inspiring.

Speaker 1 For For those looking to dig deeper into the concepts discussed today, we created the companion guide exclusively for COLA.

Speaker 1 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.

Speaker 1 Until next time, keep experimenting, keep implementing, and keep scaling.