Invest Like the Best with Patrick O’Shaughnessy
Business:Investing
My guest today is Trina Spear, a former investor at Blackstone and the co-founder and CEO of FIGS. FIGS is a multi-billion-dollar public company that built a category-leading brand selling scrubs to healthcare professionals. It was a problem hiding in plain sight and FIGS solved it through vertical integration and customer obsession. Trina shares so many interesting, simple lessons that are often ignored in business. Please enjoy my great conversation with Trina Spear.
For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page here.
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Invest Like the Best is a property of Colossus, LLC. For more episodes of Invest Like the Best, visit joincolossus.com/episodes.
Past guests include Tobi Lutke, Kevin Systrom, Mike Krieger, John Collison, Kat Cole, Marc Andreessen, Matthew Ball, Bill Gurley, Anu Hariharan, Ben Thompson, and many more.
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Show Notes
[00:02:28] - [First question] - The original insight that lead to founding FIGS
[00:04:28] - Why obvious opportunities can go so long before being seized
[00:06:23] - Key dimensions needed to improve the product and the early days
[00:09:02] - Basic overview of a clothing retailer’s financial profile
[00:10:49] - Financing the business and the early stage cash flow cycle
[00:13:04] - Strategies to manage workflow and making sacrifices
[00:14:43] - Advice for people trying to build their brands in a hands-on way
[00:17:14] - The biggest calculated risk she took in the first five years
[00:19:00] - Building a foundation that allowed for such explosive growth
[00:21:44] - The story that allowed FIGS to connect with their customers
[00:24:43] - Painting a picture of the size and scope of healthcare apparel
[00:26:22] - Things lazy companies do and thoughts on product variety
[00:28:54] - Defining SKU productivity and what to do with low productivity products
[00:30:21] - Chip Wilson Book; Lessons learned from reading Chip’s story
[00:31:58] - Balancing a healthy relationship with your CFO
[00:33:59] - Where she sees the most runway to tackle and continue to execute
[00:35:46] - A women-lead industry and her time spent with Meg Whitman
[00:38:13] - The most essential jobs she feels she has and shouldn’t do as the CEO
[00:40:03] - Thoughts about relationships with investors and messaging
[00:42:14] - What she’d be most focus on in founders if she was just an investor
[00:43:57] - The most stressful thing that has ever come across her desk
[00:44:41] - What types of things bring her the most joy in building FIGS
[00:45:27] - Philosophy of hiring given their small team and when it’s okay to hire
[00:46:56] - Whether or not there’s a role for non A players in businesses
[00:47:48] - The kindest thing anyone has ever done for her
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Ron Howard and Brian Grazer - Box Office Business - [Invest Like the Best, EP.305]
Shane Battier - The No-Stats All-Star - [Invest Like the Best, EP.304]
Parker Conrad - Building a Compound Company - [Invest Like the Best, EP.303]
Bob Elliott - A Macro Tour - [Invest Like the Best, EP.302]
Kirsten Green - Investing in Consumer Change - [Invest Like the Best, EP.301]
Jason Droege - Building Uber Eats - [Invest Like the Best, EP.300]
Paul Orfalea - It’s About the Money - [Invest Like the Best, EP.299]
Madhavan Ramanujam - How to Price Products - [Invest Like the Best, EP.298]
Scott Wilson - Non-Traditional Endowment Investing - [Invest Like the Best, EP.297]
Julio Vasconcellos & Mate Pencz - Investing in Latin America - [Invest Like the Best, EP.296]
Gabriel Leydon - How Web3 Onboards a Billion Users - [Web3 Breakdowns, EP.37]
Harley Finkelstein - Building the Entrepreneurship Company - [Invest Like the Best, EP.294]
Mitch Lasky - The Business of Gaming - [Invest Like the Best, EP.293]
David Senra - Passion & Pain - [Invest Like the Best, EP.292]
Robert Smith - Investing in Enterprise Software - [Invest Like the Best, EP.291]
Katherine Boyle - Investing for America - [Invest Like the Best, EP.290]
Ravi Gupta - Focus - [Invest Like the Best, EP.289]
Will Thorndike - The Power of Long Holding Periods - [Invest Like the Best, EP.288]
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