Michael Minter (00:00:00):

And if you're a good guy, you're going to say and do thesecertain things. You're going to try to emulate a Patagonia or what have you onenvironmental issues. You're going to emulate some other brand on socialissues. Brands become an output of sort of moral, political, whatever you wantto call it, convictions of the internal holders versus an objective reflectionof the brand's personality. I'm not here to judge any of that. I'm just sayingone is brand building and one isn't.

Cole Heilborn (00:00:28):

On this podcast, we go behind the scenes with industryexperts as they break down what it takes to produce creative work that works.If you're seeking insights from some of the sharpest minds of the industry,this is your guidebook to producing creative work that actually delivers.Welcome to the Backcountry Marketing Podcast. Today I'm sitting down withMichael Minter. He's the Vice President of Brand at Sorel. Michael, welcome tothe show.

Michael Minter (00:00:49):

Hey, good to be here.

Cole Heilborn (00:00:51):

Yeah, thanks for joining. How are you doing?

Michael Minter (00:00:53):

Good, good. Really good.

Cole Heilborn (00:00:56):

I'm excited to have you on the show and dive into sometopics. Today we're going to be talking about, well, Sorel is going through abit of a rebrand right now. We're going to be talking about that. We're alsogoing to be talking about a few various subtopics, this idea of insight versusinstinct, balancing performance and brands, building an emotional currency withyour brand, and then creative content and how you think about all that in thecontext of this rebrand. So I'd love if you could give us a quick introductionto your role and then share with us what you want to share with us about thisrebrand.

Michael Minter (00:01:30):

Sure. Well, my role technically, as you said, is I'm thevice president of brand. For me, the vast majority of that is overseeing themarketing function for Sorel, which is everything from consumer marketing,channel marketing, all in-house creative. We're building a full, fully capablein-house creative team, but I actually spend probably a almost majority of mytime working closely with the product team on framing out merchandisingstories, seasonal strategies, product positioning, design, DNA, so that thisholistic brand experience is seamless across product marketing and even ourbrand experience at retail. I spend a lot of time with the direct to consumerteam, the sales teams. So my position's somewhat unique and that's worked outpretty well.

Cole Heilborn (00:02:33):

Sorel has had quite the history as a company, and it'sgoing through its next chapter of evolution. What can you share about this nextchange, this next wave of change?

Michael Minter (00:02:42):

Well, just to maybe fully understand that, you have tohave a little bit of a backstory. So certainly for listeners that aren'tfamiliar with the brand, Sorel was a brand born really out of utility inCanada. Like so many great brands are born out of utility in 1962, it wasactually a boot that was the byproduct of the Kaufman Rubber Company that hadbeen around. And so we debate on how to frame our history had been around fordecades prior to that, but created this winter boot using materials just foundin the local factory solutions. So they had rubber, leather felt what we nowthink of as sort of this holy trinity of our brand DNA and the brand for thenext 40 years really became a household, particularly in Canada, but certainlyin all of North America, the kind of the gold standard for winter boots andfootwear. And then it found its way for a variety of reasons, some of which I'mstill learning, found its way to near bankruptcy. And in around 2000 inColumbia Sportswear purchased it really basically purchasing the ip, but thebrand found its way from sort of traditional outdoor onto the shelves atBergdorf Goodman. So it's a very interesting history, and so where we findourselves now is charting the path forward for the brand's sort of nextchapter.

Cole Heilborn (00:04:13):

And in terms of context for the timeline, where are you atin this rebrand? When does it all come live?

Michael Minter (00:04:18):

So we've spent the better part of this past year workingthrough the initial positioning work, rebuilding out our whole brand platform,reframing our target, consumer mapping, distribution, segmentation, all thishard work that's happened behind the scenes that, to be honest with you, a lotof that happened fairly quickly and instinctively, frankly, in the first fewweeks of my time at CSorel, what's taken the most time is getting everyone in across matrix organization aligned, believing, excited, and starting to manifestthat strategy into plans and products that will come to life this fall. So thisSeptember will be the first sort of moment where we see this, for lack of abetter description, Sorel 3.0 if you will kind of lift into the world and thatwill well and run indefinitely. But certainly the big push here will be apulsing of stories and campaigns and content and energy partnerships reallyfrom September through into the spring. And then we'll take a little bit of abreather and then hit it again hard next fall and into the spring again.

Cole Heilborn (00:05:50):

What was the reason for the rebrand?

Michael Minter (00:05:53):

Well, the brand when COVID hit the brand really founditself on its back foot. It had an over-reliance on some home run products thathad become long in the tooth. The brand had, I wasn't there. So I certainlydon't mean to speak ill of any previous leadership, but my generalunderstanding of it is there was some real misalignment between product,between marketing, between sales. The brand had built an over-reliance on morevalue distribution, the sort of dumbing down of DNA, it had ignored global distributionalmost entirely. It had ignored the men's market entirely. It was taboo to evenshow snow or winter heritage in the marketing. Again, I can't speak to therationale of previous leadership, but the brand found its way on its back foot,both both culturally and in terms of the business and had tried some kind ofHail Mary pivots into athleisure and some other things. So where Corey and Icame into the brand, we really found a kind of uncut gem, if you will, that wasjust had all the makings to be just a tremendous brand, but had kind of lostits way.

Cole Heilborn (00:07:16):

So you've got this kind of two polar opposites. You've gotthis deep winter heritage and then you've got this more fashion forward recenthistory where go. How do you go forward between those two extremes?

Michael Minter (00:07:29):

Well, the truth is, and certainly we didn't invent thisplaybook, and if you look at a brand obviously in a little more rarefied airpositioning wise than a brand like sel, but there's actually quite a fewcorrelations. If you look at kind of a case study like Montclair, where foundedactually right around the same time as Sorel founded out of utility sleepingbags, that sort of thing, created puffer jackets and some ubiquity that way,found its way to bankruptcy was purchased in the early two thousands. And theplaybook of really leaning into elevating every single thing you do, lookingfor validating partnerships and collaborations, applying strict discipline tothe way you image the brand, taking even your most mundane and accessibleproducts and treating them like Ferraris. Where we're finding ourselves is asimilar position is to say, Hey, look, there's a playbook we know and believein and that we've done before. We want to use that thinking with ll, but takingadvantage of this very opportune cocktail that is really meaningful heritage,undeniable, iconic product, but also this proven permission and awareness andequity we have on the fashion side and the lifestyle side and go, Hey, let'smerge those plus in terms of a positioning exercise and then apply that to aplaybook that we know quite well and sprinkle a little new thinking andinnovation into that. And you've got yourself a pretty cool and compellingroadmap.

Cole Heilborn (00:09:20):

Interesting. I am excited to see what that looks like onceit all rolls out.

Michael Minter (00:09:25):

Me too.

Cole Heilborn (00:09:27):

I'm curious though, so is there risk that you've lost alot of trust with the consumers and the audiences out there, and are you havingto rebuild a lot of that trust just based on some of the sporadicness of thehistory of the brand? Is that a concern? Is that something you're thinkingabout or is that a non-factor?

Michael Minter (00:09:46):

It's almost a non-factor. I'm sure there's a handful ofpeople out there, and I have no hard study on this, that maybe had purchasedproducts in the recent couple years that were maybe not true to re's promise onquality and design and maybe have some disappointment, but that's more of arecent phenomenon. The truth is that the things that LL is best known for havealmost remained unchanged for 60 years. And so we have this beloved status withmost of our core audience, whether it's people that remember LLS from the earlydays of snowboarding or whether it's people that have been passed down theirlls from their dad or even grandfather. There is a nostalgia, there's a loveaffair, there's a trust. I was just recently in Aspen, Colorado, and I had theprivilege of hanging out in the cabin of the Aspen ski patrol for a littlewhile, just chatting with the guys there, the team there, men and women.

(00:10:53):

And I saw a pair of old LLS sitting above the fireplaceand he said, oh, you're with ll. And we were chatting and they said, oh, yougot to see our closet. And they opened up this closet that was just chockfullof old LL Caribou boots, and they had names written on them and these things.And I said, oh, are these everyone's boots here? He goes, some of these areguys have passed away. These boots have been here for 30 years, and they wereshowing me photos of lifesaving missions in these boots. And it was just like,wow, this is a whole different thing. So to answer your question in a kind oflong-winded way, no, they were, in fact, when we offered to send them all newboots, they were excited. But you also could tell there was a sort of becareful what you wish for thing because these are cherished and they've beenhere all along. Do we really want the new batch that they're sending us? So Idon't know. Sorry for the long answer, but yeah, super cool.

Cole Heilborn (00:11:55):

I mean, yeah, I think that highlights the story and thelegacy of them for sure. I mean, I found my purse. I think I found my CI railson eBay. That's where I bought them first, those old caribou boots.

Michael Minter (00:12:06):

Totally. And I'm guessing they still hold up.

Cole Heilborn (00:12:10):

They do. Yeah, they do. As you think about this concept ofhomogenization amongst brands in the outdoor and kind of greater outdoor world,what's your first thought when that word pops up?

Michael Minter (00:12:23):

Well, I see it beyond the outdoor world. It's funny, I waslistening to your podcast with Chris Burkart, who I've crossed paths with acouple of times in my career. I was listening to it yesterday on a hike, and hementioned that too. And I think there's a handful of things that happen there.I mean, the outdoors is innately homogenized to the extent that it's apractical domain where if you make hiking boots, the creative tends to beshowing a person hiking on a hiking trail and hiking boots. And so there's aninnate literalness to that. And it's something we talk a lot about at Sorelbecause even outside of that homogenization, we are not, yes, we're born fromutility. Yes, we make some of the world's best winter boots, but the vastmajority of our products and the vast majority of our position is far moreromantic than it is literal or practical.

(00:13:21):

And so the brands we look to as examples are things likeif you look at Ralph Lauren, Ralph Lauren has built one of the mostsustainingly relevant brands in history, and he taps into all these amazingromantic domains, the American West, the Ivy League, the nautical culture, allthese different worlds that all ladder up to this attainable luxury Americansportswear position. But the point is he didn't care about selling polo shirtsto polo players. So his imaging, it doesn't become homogenized because he's notconstrained by that practical, literal interpretation. A lot of outdoor brandsjust are because the nature of their consumer. So in their defense, some ofthat homogenization is necessary. In re's case, we don't feel that constraintbecause yes, to some extent we will show some things relative to theirpractical usage, but by and large, we're able to sell a broader and biggerdream.

(00:14:28):

And so now for me, on a more critical level, when I usethat word homogenization, beyond sort of that maybe necessary outdoor take isas I just think brands at large over the last call it 15 years have becomehomogenized for probably two or three main reasons. One being a broadercultural force that there are sort of good guys and bad guys. And if you're agood guy, you're going to say and do these certain things. You're going to beas particularly outdoor world, you're going to try to emulate a Patagonia orwhat have you on environmental issues. You're going to emulate some other brandon social issues. And it becomes this sort of internal brands become an outputof the sort of moral, political, whatever you want call it, convictions of theinternal stakeholders versus an objective reflection of the brand'spersonality. I'm not here to judge any of that.

(00:15:42):

I'm just saying one is brand building and one isn't. I amdead set in the brand building camp. And so that's one piece of homogenization.The other I would say is just that you've got marketing departments that,actually Chris touched on this yesterday, that are increasingly, and I thinkfor good reason, distancing themselves from big agencies and trying to be asefficient and nimble as they can inside. What happens is, it's a tough thing totalk about without sounding arrogant or unselfaware, but what you have is a lotof marketing executives who are not, the best analogy I can think of is it'sone thing to be the Beatles. It's another thing to be a studio musician thatcan emulate the Beatles. And it's another thing to be a critic who can't do anyof it, but can talk about the Beatles. And what happens is you build theseinternal teams, or even with agencies, I see this happen too, that because theyhaven't hired the right people that actually can generate original thoughts andcreate the new album from their own instincts and their own vision and theirown passion, what happens is they emulate others so they become the studiomusician, or they even worse become the critic.

(00:17:07):

And so there's a homogenization that happens just by themiddling effect of talent limitations, frankly. And again, that sounds arrogantbecause clearly I'm implying like, oh, I'm part of the, but to be fair, that isthe passion, and that is why I got into this business, and it is why I've triedto build teams where I hire less for pedigree and more for passion. Thatsounded pretty cool.

(00:17:39):

So when I'm interviewing people, I want to know, I want toknow what poetry they write on the side. I want to know what pictures they takeon their vacation that I want to know if they have a passion for how theydesign their living room. I want to know, you know what I mean? I want to hiremultidimensional creators that are not emulators and full of shit. And so sorryfor the long question or long answer, but coming back to the homogenizationthing, it's just like that's what I see happen, and I can give you case studyafter case study of examples of where I've seen that happen. But anyway, sorryfor the filibuster.

Cole Heilborn (00:18:29):

Fascinating. So this is something that we talked about onthe show. If I asked you to imagine a classic outdoor short film, you and Icould both agree on at least 50% of what we're going to

Michael Minter (00:18:40):

Do. Totally. It's almost AI now,

Cole Heilborn (00:18:44):

Maybe one day, but it's going to be someone getting readyto go on a hike. It's going to be someone on a hike with their friends.

Michael Minter (00:18:53):

Don't forget seeing them lace up their shoes shot

Cole Heilborn (00:18:57):

The goggle shot if you're filming mountain biking,

Michael Minter (00:18:59):

Zipping the rack. Yep.

Cole Heilborn (00:19:02):

And then it's going to be someone trying to stitchtogether a story and drawing personal experience and dovetailing that with abeautiful emotional revelation.

Michael Minter (00:19:12):

And

Cole Heilborn (00:19:13):

There's nothing wrong with that, but it's everywhere. It'sexpected, it's the norm. There's nothing new, there's nothing fresh. That's awhole nother piece of the equation is finding talent who truly have a storyversus just, I mean, everyone has a story, but not everyone can present a storyand actually tell you a

Michael Minter (00:19:32):

Story. So

Cole Heilborn (00:19:33):

That's one piece of it. All that I see. I want to comeback to this concept though, that you're talking about brand building from anobjective perspective versus the leadership's perspective. Why can't they bethe same thing?

Michael Minter (00:19:45):

Maybe I want to make sure I understand your question.Brand building from the,

Cole Heilborn (00:19:48):

So you were making the distinction between brand buildinghappening from leadership and their moral perspectives versus an objectiveperspective based on the brand's voice?

Michael Minter (00:20:00):

Well, I don't think it's just leadership. I mean, it couldbe your social media person, it could be, I mean, it's across an organization.I'm saying that let's pick a topic like something that's sort of benign theenvironment or something that maybe for the most part, Chris Burkhart talkedabout this yesterday with, I think it was I was at Arteric doing somerepurposing or kind of helping extend the life of products and whatnot. It's agreat thing. Yeah, no shade on that. All I'm saying is that if I was to contrastthat with a ll, it's not that us doing an initiative that would be bad. It'snot that, Hey, that's noble. I'm just saying that's not the question I askinternally is whether we should, oh, oh, that looks good. Should we do that?No, it's sort of like what would we do? So if you really understand yourpersonality and you really understand the position you are going for, my pointis that's a higher authority to serve. Then the one that is saying that is sortof keeping up with the Joneses, whether it's in terms of the environment,whether it's in terms of social issues, whether it's in terms of I don't care,I don't care. What I care about is what's this brand? And maybe there are thosethings, but what's this brand's obligation to its position? I look at a brandthat I was privileged to be part of years ago called Ook, which now sadly is atrivia question and a shell of its former self.

(00:21:40):

But back when we were in the peak of that brand, which wasrooted in irreverence and humor and just over the top silliness, my point isthat, and maybe that's an extreme example. Any sort of sort of thinking thatwould've been of the moment or of the trend would've been a direct liability toour smart lic positioning. And so it's an extreme example, but it's to say, no,the highest good we can do to make this brand resonate and mean something andbe polarizing, and there's going to be people that hate it and there's going tobe people that love it and get tattoos of it, which happened crazy amount oftimes is to say, that's the position we're serving. And so a lot of the workwe've been doing at Sorel is going, look, I get it. If Billy in HR or Susie inaccounting is passionate about dog rescue, great, not our position.

(00:22:44):

I get it. If Jim in design or Karen in marketing caresdeeply about saving children from drowning, sorry, I sound like such a jerk. Mypoint is, what's our position? You know what I mean? And so what you've seen isjust this, just malaise of, and it's going, man, I do not, I just want a sharppoint. I just want a sharp point. If I think about iconic brands outside of ourspace, I think about old Porsche ads. I referenced that a second ago. You thinkabout, you look at a brand right now, like a liquid death or some kind of moreobvious or cliche example. It's like the reason they resonate is there's asharp point. I don't know what liquid death stance on dog rescue is. You knowwhat I mean? And that's okay. I guess that's the point I'm trying to make, butthe outdoor industry in particular is just moths to a flame. It's like, oh, ifPatagonia tomorrow did a dog rescue program, I'm just making picking. Iguarantee you 10 other brands would suddenly care deeply about dogs. I'm not,that's the point I'm trying to make. Sorry if it's clumsy.

Cole Heilborn (00:24:03):

Yeah, no, I track what you're saying. And you're notsaying that the result or the impact isn't worthy or good, it's that we tend tolook at what other brands are doing and then do the same thing. Totally. We seeYeti put out an amazing film series, and then everyone goes out and produces avery similar film series. It's hard to be original. It's hard to think outsidethe box, in part because we're such an insular community, we don't look outsidethe box very often. And when we do, oftentimes that's seen as a risk andtherefore we should avoid that and play it safe. Is that sounds like whatyou're saying.

Michael Minter (00:24:41):

Totally. And what I try to do to mitigate that is, and Italked about this literally my first week at Sorel, and I probably lost somepeople with how, maybe absurd this sounds, but to me it's like, don't evenworry about the rule book for a second. Don't worry about, don't worry about,just absolutely obsess on this abstract dream. What it tastes like, smellslike, feels like this abstract dream of what you think this brand could be. Anddon't even think about just product. Don't even just think about this essencein the distance. And the analogy I give is I was actually working this out withmy dad who was a naval officer for many years. It was like if you leave LosAngeles Harbor and your destination is Sydney, Australia, and you have a fleetof ships, inevitably there's just like an organization, there's going to bedetours and pit stops, and one ship might have to get distracted in Hawaii fora minute and whatever.

(00:25:45):

But if we all know that's what we are all trying to get toSydney, Australia, not only does that help make the decisions, so suddenly thatdetour that would otherwise take you to homogenization is reduced. We just knowtry to make, remember that's where we're going. That's why we're going to makethis choice in social media. That's why we're going to not do this piece ofcontent or that's why any decision you're making is somewhat relative to thisdream that you've posted. And what's interesting too is yes, if you leave LAHarbor and you're even a degree off course, you're going to miss Sydney by Ithink it's like two or 300 miles, right? And so the point is, when you'releaving that harbor, you're never going to have that level of precision. And alot of brands will stagnate and go, we can't do anything until we've goteverything figured out, every identity thing, every, and it's like, no, no, yougot to get momentum out of the harbor.

(00:26:46):

You got to know where you're going, right? You can alwayscourse correct. You're going to have new people, you're going to lose people.You've got to have a shared vision of where you're going because, and reallystart to paint that picture. And so that, to answer your earlier question isthat's what we obsess on at Sorel is creating this dream that feels so big andimpossible and wonderful and every single day going, how are we starting tomake decisions? It's not going to be perfect. I can go on our website right nowand find a vast majority of our current brand expression, not getting me toSydney, Australia, but it's coming and the team can see it and taste it, andwe're working on the things that will get us there. And that's where you start.And then you know what I mean? And it makes it easy season over season to go,Hey, cool, I get that someone in the design team had this cool idea for a merchstory based on, actually this just happened based on baseball. Okay, greatidea. How's it get us where we said we wanted to go reshape the idea becausethat isn't it. You know what I mean? That that's the kind of discussions wehave every day. And it just makes it so much easier because it's not aboutMichael's opinion, it's not about Cole's opinion. It's us having collectivelygone, no, remember that's where we're going. And sorry for the rant.

Cole Heilborn (00:28:14):

So the rebrand is this fall.

Michael Minter (00:28:17):

Yeah.

Cole Heilborn (00:28:19):

What's the minimum percentage of people like collectivepeople out there that you want to feel agitated and frustrated by this newbrand launch? How many people do you want to support it? How many people do youwant to be critical of it? What's the right ratio for you?

Michael Minter (00:28:35):

Because everyone says, well, I want a hundred percentpeople to love it,

Cole Heilborn (00:28:39):

But you can't say,

Michael Minter (00:28:41):

Course not.

Cole Heilborn (00:28:42):

You can't say that. I want people to dislike it becausethat creates edge, that creates something to be sharp and then have everyonelove it. I guess that's, I theoretically, maybe it's possible not,

Michael Minter (00:28:51):

You're saying that polarization fallout is inevitable forsomething worth

Cole Heilborn (00:28:56):

Doing, right? Yes.

Michael Minter (00:28:57):

Yeah,

Cole Heilborn (00:28:58):

That's a much better way of saying it than I just tried tosay.

Michael Minter (00:29:00):

Yeah, I don't know what that ratio is. Obviously you wantit, let's put it this way, of the people that will ultimately influence andshape the trickle down of culture to the wider audience that even if they hateit, might love it in six months. I want my core constituency of targetconsumers. I want that ratio to be high in my favor. And the irony is thatthose people that are actually shaping decisions embrace polarity and embracethe controversial and embrace the newness and the freshness and as almost adefault setting. And so that's a case to be made for doing decisive things isbecause the very people that shape and influence the broader culture findmiddling an offense. And so that's the strategic case to be made for it is tosay, I get that this might be risky holistically, but it's actually not riskyin winning the people that I need to win.

Cole Heilborn (00:30:10):

So there's this study that came out, and I did a soloepisode on this, and Chris and I talked about this in the episode you've beenreferencing, the Kings Lion organization put out a study that was talking aboutthe appetite for creative risk amongst creative departments. And it wassomething like 13% of brands would say that their brands are willing to takecreative risks. Chris had a really interesting anecdote about the creative riskbeing creative is risky. So the word creative risk is actually a terrible labelto put on it.

Michael Minter (00:30:41):

Yeah,

Cole Heilborn (00:30:41):

I like that. But I thought that 13% was a reallyintriguing takeaway from that study. And you're talking about this idea ofmiddle Miss, and then we're talking about the idea of risk taking 13% doesn'tmake it sound like there's a lot of brands that are willing to actually takerisks out.

Michael Minter (00:30:56):

There's not, especially in the private equity world, Imean, so many brands now are owned by companies whose their entire existence ison risk mitigation. Their highest ideal is to take risk out of things. So theseare, why would you expect them to support bold creative visions? It just goesagainst everything in their worldview.

(00:31:26):

And that's a business model. I mean, look, what's happenedto the surfing industry. I mean, you think you're going to see anythingexciting and risk taking come out of surf anytime soon. And the whole industryhas sold itself to private equity. And so you think about Michael Thompson'swork with Gotcha in the eighties and nineties, and it was, I mean, crazy andbold and exciting and daring, and it's like there's not a chance. There's not achance that's coming out of a brand owned by authentic brands group or it'sjust not their business model. It's just not how it's going to work.

Cole Heilborn (00:32:08):

Something you talked about on our intro call was this ideaof instinct versus insight or insight versus instinct. Tell me more about thatand does it relate to what we're talking about?

Michael Minter (00:32:18):

Yeah, absolutely. Because I think another thing thathappens, and this is across all organizations, is we live in a world wherethere's tremendous amount of data at our fingertips. There's tremendous amountof insight. There's from political campaigns to ad campaigns is that we havethe luxury of making fact-based decisions. And that's an incredible tool and anincredible asset, and it's an incredible addiction. And it's like everything inlife, there's sort of too much good can become a bad. And so what you have isorganizations where it's like, well, we can't do that unless we have theinsight that makes sure that's going to work. And the problem with that, Imean, I go back to that Beatles analogy is there was no insight that told youSergeant Peppers was going to work, right? They just knew. They just made it.They made something truly special.

(00:33:20):

As Rick Rubin would say, the audience came last. Thiswasn't about pleasing an audience, it was about pleasing themselves. And thebalance is what's so key because unless you have crazy batting a thousandtalented people in your organization, you're going to have to create thatbalancing act where you let the people that have those skills run a bit amuckand do some things and take some risks and create some magic, but you also haveto offset that and eat your vegetables and do those performance ads and do. SoI think the new marketing model is finding that balance. And also we have toreport up to bosses and shareholders. And if it's all risk all the time, unlessyou're Paul McCartney and John Lennon, that's a tough road.

Cole Heilborn (00:34:18):

So when you say insight, it sounds like you're talkingabout insights derived from data. You're not necessarily talking aboutemotionally human

Michael Minter (00:34:24):

Led insight. Well, both. I'll give you an example. So I goback to that brand that I was fortunate to be a part of ook, and we had a 10year run where we were just the founder, Jeff Kelly and myself, just like, Imean, he'd call me every day and go, Hey, what if we did this? And it was justcompletely instinct driven and we were winning off instincts. It was a magicaltime, and we just had hit this sort of zeitgeist and had cool this thing going.And then when we were purchased by Deckers, a massive corporation, they broughtin, and these are great people, I learned a ton from them. But suddenly we havethe insights team, and now we we're testing every ad and we're bringing infocus groups to see how they really feel when they step in our shoes and we'reflying all over the country and doing focus groups on whether that humor pushedit too hard or whether women found it funny. And overnight, almost overnightthe brand based on insight. Now you can frame it culturally or data, it was aspectrum of insights. I'm not picking just one lane. And the insights killedthe instincts and the brand found itself middling and basic and boring and bad,and it hasn't stopped since. And it's trusting people to come in and go, Hey, Iwant to make an ad where our top surfer looks like Moses parting the Red Sea.Guess what? Not a lot of appetite for that. And yet that's what we did before.

Cole Heilborn (00:36:06):

I want to press deeper on that to better understand. Soyou're saying that there's a golden period where instinct was just, you guyswere in tune, everything was, you're coming up with great ideas and it wasworking. Is that though, because you had a great understanding and a greatinsight about your audience and your customer to then infer your instincts offof

Michael Minter (00:36:26):

Probably a implicit one. I mean,

(00:36:30):

A brand that I find interesting right now that I think iskind of threading this needle quite well is the hat company Mellon. And I'vechatted with folks over there a few times, but they are an extremelydata-driven, insight-driven organization. They're highly effective on how theylook at their performance marketing, but they also really have a layer ofinstinct on it where particularly driven by their passionate founder, that'soften the case where there's a, Hey, this is right for us, this is wrong for us,sixth sense, and that's what you want. You want that balance. It's just tough.

Cole Heilborn (00:37:12):

It's tough to find. Yeah. I'm just thinking about what isthe minimum level of insight you need in order to develop instinct, and when doyou go too far?

Michael Minter (00:37:20):

I don't know. I think you,

Cole Heilborn (00:37:22):

I keep trying to put you in a box and want you to quantifyeverything.

Michael Minter (00:37:26):

I'll look at it this way because I've spent my life as afish out of water. I grew up overseas. I grew up in a very quite lonelysituation growing up in a remote jungle tribe in Papua New Guinea, where reallywas my sister, was my friend, and I lived in a, I didn't grow up as part of askateboarding culture. I didn't grow up in punk rock. I didn't grow up as partof the outdoor culture. And so part of the reason I've loved this career isthat I am forced to have the humility of an outsider and to be an anthropologist.So I had the distinct privilege of working with surfers, with working with rockclimbers, with working with skateboarders. That's a really interesting and funone where you have to go in and ask questions and be curious and just bewilling to be the kook and be willing to be the person that doesn't actuallyknow.

(00:38:21):

And so it takes a while to have good instincts. So if Ilook at my time at DC shoes, when I started there, I remember sitting down withskateboarders and they were probably thinking, man, we are screwed. How is thisguy going to run our brand? I mean, he's never set foot on a skateboard, but ittakes time and it takes questions and it takes, by the end of my tenure there,I would say my instincts got so much sharper. And some of that just takes time.And if I had just gone in with a sledgehammer swinging because I have goodinstincts, I would've been screwed. And so I dunno if that makes sense, but itjust takes a little time.

Cole Heilborn (00:39:06):

I read this not too long ago. Sometimes the best expertsare the ones who ask the best questions.

Michael Minter (00:39:11):

Yeah, the non-expert. Yeah. Yeah, that's a beautifulthing. It's funny, I often think about there's topics and things in my lifethat I'm actually passionate about and maybe have a little more expertise on.And the irony is I've never worked on those in my career. I often wonder, wouldI have been better or worse if I had had the luxury of working in something? Iactually find that I've actually, I'm curious. It's an interesting thing tospeculate on. Anyway,

Cole Heilborn (00:39:41):

I've wondered that too. I've wondered, would I be betteroff if my passion for filmmaking and content wasn't my profession? Becausesometimes it is a joy and it's an absolute, it's a gift. Other times it's anabsolute curse.

Michael Minter (00:39:56):

Right, right, right. Well, that's like Chris was saying,he was saying it's become a tool, not a paintbrush. Right. That's interesting.

Cole Heilborn (00:40:05):

Yeah. Let's talk about brand and performance. Andsometimes people describe them as a pendulum. Performance is on one side, brandis on the other, and over time, this pendulum swings and either it's allperformance or it's all brand or some mix of the both. I don't know if I reallylike that visual because it assumes that brands and performance have to becompeting with each other, which is simply not true. How are you seeing brandand performance working really well together?

Michael Minter (00:40:40):

I couldn't agree more. I think if you're saying we can'tdo good creative because it has to perform well, then you've lost sight of whatgood creative is. The mediums are going to change. I mean, I dunno what theanalogies, I mean, yes, there's things that yes, there are things you wouldn'tdo even if you knew they'd performed. The analogy I always give is if we'rejust looking for clicks or likes, well, we just pump out pornography or puppydogs. So clearly there are some limitations on where you don't just succumb toperformance for performance sake. You're going to have brand integrity. But thebest stuff in the sweet spot is when you're able to prove that something thatis on brand and is elevating actually outperforms. And that's for me,creatively, there's no sweeter I told you. Or then being able to do that in anorganization where there's pressure to middle something and sometimes you loseand you have to eat a little crow, but when you can do something that'selevated and it works better, oh man, watch people's faith change. And that'sthe bet we're about to do at Sorel is we have developed out some creative, andthat is, I feel passionate about, and it's art, it's beautiful, and I need itto perform, but I really do believe it will, but I need it to outperform thecringey influencer content or the whatever else that the brand may have builtsome addictions to.

Cole Heilborn (00:42:34):

Tell me more about how are you hedging your bets? Whatsort of process, what sort of approach are you taking to try ensure that thatcreative works?

Michael Minter (00:42:43):

The way is instead of having an either or, is to try to acreative engine that can trickle down and be modular and flexible. So where youhave the alpha creative units, whether it's the short film, the 32nd spot thatyou're so proud of, whether there's a handful of things that are the catalyticpieces where you compromise zero, but doing those in a way, creating those in away where they are innately modular, whether it's on a video level, aphotography level, a copywriting level where you can still, okay, you go, okay,I've got my master pizza, or I'm trying to think of what a good analogy wouldbe this meal. But if push comes to shove, I know I can take that pepperoni offand make it perform as an isolated unit or as a cut down or a more targetedpiece for a specific audience.

(00:43:47):

And so that's how you're hedging your bet versus saying,but it's all still of the brand. It's all still Italian food in this analogy,as opposed to saying, well, we're going to make this pizza we're proud of, butjust in case we've got some chow main in the back, no, that isn't how to do it.And so the point is to get off the thing that's not on brand for yourrestaurant in this analogy. And so if I look at say, cringey influencercontent, that's not going to be my alternative. My alternative is going to behow am I addressing what that was fulfilling for the brand, but in a way thatnow aligns with the restaurant and the cuisine we've decided to cook.

(00:44:32):

It takes some time, and you might lose a bit. You may haveto absorb a little pain and financially or culturally with your team until youget that mojo. And again, that momentum out of the harbor, we said we're goingto Sydney, right? And it takes a thick skin and a stubbornness and aconviction, an infectious conviction to where people keep believing that Sydneyis worth trying to get to and that it exists. Yeah, we might be in a rowboatfor a stretch of it, but don't hop in that speedboat that's heading to Alaska.That's not the spot.

Cole Heilborn (00:45:20):

So you're talking about one way to mitigate the risk isobviously by building out your content, having more than just the hero piece.That makes a lot of sense. It's a pretty common practice as far as the creativeitself and the concept that's driving the creative. How are you thinking thatthrough and ensuring that that in itself will hopefully be a slam dunk?

Michael Minter (00:45:41):

Great question. I think I wish I could just show you someof what we got cooking. I can kind of speak to it. We've made the decisivechoice to really tap into some timeless archetypes and emotions and things thatI think defy cultural moment or defy trend. And we've also, if I look to theoutdoor industry to our left, and I look to fashion to our right, what we'vetried to do is develop creative that differentiates in both directions, butthat there is this sort of Venn diagram overlap that also gives us permissionboth ways. So relative to our outdoor peers, this will feel far more romanticand ethereal and beautiful and artistic and abstract than the literal worldthat they exist in that we were just talking about. And to the fashion brands,to our right, it'll feel far more rooted in heritage and in an authenticity ofspirit than maybe they play in. And so we're trying to own this really uniquejuxtaposition, and so I don't know if it'll work, but my career was built off.I don't know if it'll work, so I don't know. We'll see.

Cole Heilborn (00:47:19):

There's an interesting relationship that the outdoorindustry has when core outdoor brands turn and do collaborations with fashion.Obviously Sorel people probably wouldn't put Sorel in the same category as acore outdoor brand like the North Face, but that campaign, the North Face didwith

Michael Minter (00:47:40):

Skims

Cole Heilborn (00:47:41):

Skims, yeah, that created some friction. Some peopleweren't stoked about that. Now, if polarizing is part of the goal, then maybethat was success. How concerned are you about outdoor accepting Sorel with thisnew blend of fashion and outdoor

Michael Minter (00:47:59):

Zero? That's the beauty of Sorel is I don't have, I spenta lot of time in surfing and skateboarding where if you lose your courtconstituency, you make that even that one step out, you step out of line oncewith skateboarders, they'll never forgive you. You have to keep your base on board.You have to make decisions that are not in a affront to them. Sorel doesn'thave, okay, maybe we don't have that type of restriction or constraint. Andit's quite liberating, actually. I mean, don't get me wrong. I love the beautyof subculture and the truth and of a core constituency and the passion thatcomes with that, but it's also a man for a marketer, it can be a realconstraint. I referenced the Ralph Lauren example earlier. The polo players ofthe world don't turn their backs on Ralph Lauren when he starts making cowboyhats because it's a different beast. I think Sorel, the best analogy I can giveis the Land Rover brand. There are people that have owned defenders from thesixties and they're hardcore Land Rover purists, but they're not going to giveup their Land Rover because they saw Victoria Beckham driving a brand new evokethrough London. So that's a bit more like the Sorel analogy. I don't think wehave that hardcore rock climber type of constituency.

(00:49:36):

I mean, that genie left the bottle long ago with ll, Imean, so I dunno if that answers the question, but

Cole Heilborn (00:49:45):

Yeah, it does. Yeah. Do you think the outdoor industrycould be more forgiving when outdoor brands try and step outside of thetraditions and do something different? Are they overly critical when TNF does acollaboration with Skims or is there merit to that?

Michael Minter (00:50:02):

I don't know. I think the criticism's part of the energy,right? It's part of the, I mean, I'm fairly confident whatever your opinion ormy opinion would be on that. The North Face willfully stepped into that debateand created Buzz and Stir and probably lost some fans and won some fans, butNet did something. Now, I can make an argument both ways with that one forsure, but I guess, I don't know. I mean, you can stay pure and stay small, soit's really what your goals are. What's Sydney look like for you? I mean,there's brands that have done it both ways. I look at Columbia Sportswear whoowns ll, and that's a brand that has achieved massive scale by doing the exactopposite of what I'm saying by being totally accessible, by being the friendly,anyone can get it outdoor brand. Yeah, I guess it has a core constituency, notreally, and I don't mean that critically. They're a multi-billion dollar brandthat you can buy almost anywhere. So how do you shit on that? You can't. But atthe same time, the purest in me kind of does.

(00:51:28):

I don't know, there's just different paths. It justdepends. I don't know that there's one, right one. The brands I look to emulatefor just because my personal passion and conviction, I'm not built for thatplaybook. I'm not built for the let's sell fishing gear at Costco Playbook. Ireally am not hating on that. If you can make billions of dollars doing that,have at it, man. I'm built for, I like the Richard Branson playbook of going,wow, how do I have a brand that is so distinct that I can put it on recordcompany chocolate bars and airline because I have this personality that can maponto everything. That's the dream with Sorel is to go, man, obviously we're notgoing to do this anytime soon, but I want to dream about what a re restaurantwould be. I want to dream about what a hotel experience would be. That's whenyou get the good stuff. Anyway.

Cole Heilborn (00:52:33):

How are you investing so much into the top of the funnelwithout destabilizing day-to-day performance of the company?

Michael Minter (00:52:42):

Well, we looked at the day-to-day spends as you put it,and right away we're able to identify things that were massive expenditures,but that were just carry over. Well, that's what we've always done. The resultsweren't even there. That's the easy cuts. And you're going, cool, I get that.We've always done end caps at this massive retailer. Our sales have gone down,so don't tell me the end caps are a great spend right away. I'm taking thatmoney, right? And yes, it makes it painful for the sales rep who has to gobreak it to the account who counts on that money for those end caps? It'salmost a revenue thing for them, and that's an awkward conversation. There'srelationship currency and I care about that, but the conversation has to be,look, we're going to make this brand hot again. We're going to spend money, andyou might not feel it season one, but you're going to feel this.

(00:53:44):

Trust us. That's why I said we spent a year selling thisdream, turning atheists into believers because I don't want to have to debateabout the end caps. I want to create undeniable heat and hey, we'll revisitthat in a few years. And so it's been a lot of that, but where it's trickier ismore on the direct to consumer, put $1 in, get $2 out ATM machine that isperformance. And that's where we've been much more cautious to go, Hey, let'smake sure we're, let's make sure we're not stupidly turning off a revenue valvethat needs to stay on. And just figuring out that balance. But ultimately, andalso looking at things, sorry, looking at costs with traditional agency modelsand looking at things where we're going. I get it. I get that. We've been withthat PR agency for 17 years that has ballooned in investment, not in results.We're going to take a look at that, and that's a big part of the exercise.

Cole Heilborn (00:54:53):

Yeah. You mentioned relationship currency. Tell me moreabout emotional currency with your audience. How do you think about that? Isthat important? Is that a key piece of this rebrand?

Michael Minter (00:55:04):

Oh, I think it's the whole thing. I think, and it'scliche. I mean, this isn't new news, but even Burkhardt was talking about it onhis pod is, I mean, how you make people feel is so much more important thananything else you can do. I mean, that's why religion works. Politicalmovements work. It's why timeless. It's why hip hop, hip hop didn't start on aPowerPoint slide. It made people feel a way. And so that's what it's all aboutis going, how are we going to make you feel? And so our whole campaign thatwe're about to launch is based on a poem I wrote Flying to Portland one day.And my point isn't to make it sound silly or trivial, my point is to say thegoal is emotive. The goal is to where we want to sweep people away to feel likeSorel is a brand that helps them live boldly and live. And where nature is notsomething to be conquered. It is an art moment. It is to be drank in it. It isTom Hardy in the woods reading Shakespeare, right? That's the feeling I want isthat sense of grandeur mixed with a bit of grit, but not that that's who wewant to sweep people away too. And yeah,

Cole Heilborn (00:56:45):

Tom Hardy reading Shakespeare in the Woods. That's the newdirection for Sorel, huh?

Michael Minter (00:56:48):

Bingo.

Cole Heilborn (00:56:50):

I can see it now. Something that I talk about a lot orthat we've recently been talking about is our company has been going through arebrand, is this idea that the audience doesn't care. They don't care aboutyour content, they don't care about your brand inherently. And one of the waysto make them care is to give them some form of feeling, however you deliverthat, whether it's through a short film, educational series, just somethingfunny on Instagram, feeling is such a powerful tool, but it gets so nebulousbecause it gets classified as one of those, well, we can't measure it,therefore it's hard to spend, therefore it's hard to invest. But I would argueit's like table stakes these days when everyone is the same. Coming back tothis idea of homogenization amongst brands and content,

Michael Minter (00:57:38):

How do you mean though? What do you mean they're all thesame when it comes to feeling?

Cole Heilborn (00:57:44):

Well, I'm talking about if you were to survey, so let'ssay you pulled an audience, they all watched 10 short films from 10 differentbrands. How many of those audience members would actually feel something fromwatching that piece of content? I would speculate and say it's a fairly lowamount that actually have a deep visceral connection, because feeling is hard.It's hard to craft, it's hard to present, it's hard to manufacture. That's whatI mean.

Michael Minter (00:58:16):

But there's layers of the feeling. So if I look at afeeling of inspiration or a feeling of humor or a feeling of, there's aspectrum of things that a brand based on its personality might cause people tofeel, but ultimately those feelings have to layer back to something more, moreprimeval or carnal or I don't dunno what the word I'm looking for is here. Andthose have to do with vanity fear. There's a handful of things that are thethings that actually make you make a decision. So if I speak about a brand likeSorel, when I talk about, oh, I want them to feel swept away, I want them tofeel all these things, that's the icing layer, the less sexy or almost moremanipulative layer, which sounds terrible to say, but that's what we're in thebusiness of is the feeling of vanity.

(00:59:09):

In Shell's case, I want them to feel like, well, if I getthat, then I've got the right thing, and there's different vanity triggerswe're pulling on, and that's whereas a true core outdoor brand might makesomeone feel a certain way, but ultimately wants to pull them into maybe, andthis is where brands like North Face might flex toward vanity. Oh, I've got aNorth Face jacket on. But a lot of the real core outdoor brands are moreflexing toward, and I don't mean this in a negative way, it might be fear like,oh, I won't survive on that rock if I don't have these ropes or I won't.

(00:59:48):

It's a much more base feeling that I need that one. Howcould I possibly trust these other ropes or whatever, you know what I mean? Andso it's not because people want the, and maybe I've lost touch with theclimbing world. It's not because someone wants the vanity of the designerropes, whereas in this current world mean that is a factor, right? Is I'mtrying to, the person driving that Land Rover, whether they want to admit it ornot, is far more motivated by vanity than they are by a technical trust or allthe things the brand would market itself on. So there's two layers of theemotion. One is to go, oh, I want you to be inspired by our heritage and theoutdoors, but the real lever I'm pulling is you're going to look damn good inthis when you pull up to soccer practice in your new Range Rover Sport. Youknow what I mean? And that's a different thing.

Cole Heilborn (01:00:48):

So vanity is one of those kind of sub-tier emotionallevers. What are other ones that you're pulling?

Michael Minter (01:00:56):

Well, for LL trust. Yeah, for trust. I mean, when you buyour boots, they don't break down they last generations. There's a deep trustthere, and that often goes hand in hand with luxury and with quality andcraftsmanship. I mean, an Hermes Birkin bag is hand stitched by mastercraftsmen, and it's an incredible process, but so you have quality and vanityrunning on parallel paths in the greater world. I see though, I think ofcomfort and I think of the warm hug of a shearling boot. I think that perfect pufferjacket in the outdoor world or what have you, where there's things that areease. Ease is a big one. People, and look how many brands were built on ease ofgoing, God ook was built on that of going, I want to be the easiest.

(01:01:55):

We're not going to talk about traction, we're not going totalk about waterproofing, we're not going to talk about any of that, but thesetake point, 0, 0, 0 1 seconds to put on, and you don't have to think, and youcould be drunk or stoned. So that's a whole different lane. But anyway, it'sjust kind of distilling that essence down and being honest about it with yourbrand and going, look, I went through this with Snook all the time with people,especially in Europe. Well, tell me about the compression rate of your EVA.It's like, dude, you lost the plot here. This is not that. This is a differentthing. And so you got to know what your brand essence is.

Cole Heilborn (01:02:45):

I asked Chris a similar question, and I'm curious to hearyour evaluation. So if you had to evaluate the outdoor industry for its abilityto conjure emotion, to share emotion with its audience, how is the industrydoing in terms of that metric?

Michael Minter (01:03:01):

I'd say terrible overall. If I line up, you can almosttake logos off ads. And it's funny because it's such a great opportunity to bedisruptive. It's such a gold mine creatively. But the outdoor brands are also,I mean, you talk about brands that have a lot of bureaucracy and tradition andfear, and I mean, you see some of the brands that are making noise in theoutdoors, and they're almost all coming at it from an outsider shakeupperspective. Yeah, it's a very boring industry in my opinion.

Cole Heilborn (01:03:48):

Okay, well that makes you, me and Chris, we all agree. Sothat means something.

Michael Minter (01:03:51):

I remember I used to walk through the outdoor retailershow and just sort of in my mind's eye picture that logos were taken off ofbooths and stuff and just go, oh, yeah, okay.

Cole Heilborn (01:04:01):

Well, I think that metric is a really great metric to aimfor. If you can remove the logo from something and someone can still identifyyour piece of creative is your creative, you're doing something right.

Michael Minter (01:04:12):

Totally.

Cole Heilborn (01:04:14):

But that's

Michael Minter (01:04:15):

Hard to do. It's so hard to do. It takes conviction anddiscipline though. But sometimes it's simplicity. I just gave a presentation toour entire team at il, and I went through a bunch of examples where withoutshowing, so first showed a slide of logos where you couldn't see, you just sawthe shape and everyone knew it, right? It was like, oh, well, a logo must beyour brand, right? Well, no. Then I showed up a collage of Calvin Kleinphotography for the last 30 years, but I photoshopped all the logos out and Isaid, can you name this brand? And everyone was like, Calvin Klein. Why?Because Calvin Klein has a disciplined visual language, and it's always thosegray tones and the black and white and the six pack abs on marking mark orwhoever, you know what I mean? It's a very distinct world they've built andthen you go, okay, so it's visual language. Then you shift gears to a brand.

(01:05:08):

I'm trying to think of an example where you're all overthe place visually, but we know the wit or we know the sense of humor and so itcan be all these, there's a lot of different threads you can pull on and youhave to decide as a brand which ones, so the outdoor industry has just notpulled very hard on the visual differentiation thread. That said, they mightsay, well, Patagonia is the eco guys or North Faces, the Styley guys. There'sother threads they've pulled on, but I would argue when it comes to visuals andemotion, they haven't pulled very

Cole Heilborn (01:05:45):

Differently. People talk about this, right? The idea thatyour logo isn't a brand, and I'm honestly still surprised that we're talkingabout this, aren't we past that point? Don't people know that a logo, but thispops up on, I see this on LinkedIn all the time. People are talking about, it'slike this new profound idea like, oh, your logo isn't your brand. Is that justbecause we're in it and we know it?

Michael Minter (01:06:07):

Or Well, for some brands maybe it is though, and forbecause they've just achieved a certain scale and ubiquity that. It's more of alabel, right? I mean, if I look at a plaid shirt from Columbia and a plaidshirt from Field Raven, or I'm just picking outdoor brands, the logo is thedifferentiator nine times out of 10 on that short sleeve plaid for

Cole Heilborn (01:06:31):

$59,

Michael Minter (01:06:32):

Right?

Cole Heilborn (01:06:33):

It's a label, but it's a, it's not what creates yourbrand.

Michael Minter (01:06:36):

Totally, totally.

Cole Heilborn (01:06:37):

Yes. That's what I mean by that.

Michael Minter (01:06:38):

Oh, I agree with you. I'm just saying, but to a lot ofconsumers out there, that is still, we should be past it as brand builders, butI don't know that you're ever, so when you have an organization of people,accounting, sales, all different folks, sometimes there's a need for that kindof education because they're wondering, wait, why is the marketing departmentdoing X, Y, or Z? And I want them to understand why it's more than a logo, andso that's the need for it. Yes, we're past it, but your whole organizationmight not be past it, and that's okay. I don't understand accounting.

Cole Heilborn (01:07:22):

I frequently need people to remind me about all theintricacies of accounting and how you balance things.

Michael Minter (01:07:28):

Right.

Cole Heilborn (01:07:29):

Okay. One of the last things I want to talk you aboutbefore we start to wrap up here again in our intro call, you talked about thedistinction between cotton candy contents versus real nutritional content. Whatdo you mean by that? I think that's a really interesting way to describe whatI'm assuming you're talking about.

Michael Minter (01:07:44):

I get that it works for some brands and I have to, it'sfunny because I'm contradicting myself where I say, Hey, you got to do what'sright for your brand regardless of your personal convictions and what yourtaste or whatever. You've got to be a servant of the position you've alignedon. That said, I'm also kind of full of shit here because I do have a personalaversion that infects my thinking. I happen to be at a brand where I can defendthis strategically a version to cotton. The stuff you see on Instagram orTikTok or certainly the kind of nonsensical influencer stuff that is just, Imean, it's calling it cotton candy is probably being generous where it's justthe least common denominator, creativity. It is just soulless. It is so justkills me. It is bad art. And I think even on the internal stuff where it's likewe're going to do the video of our favorite dogs at the office or whatever, Ijust stop. No one wants to see the dogs at the office, and maybe I'm beingrarely unfair. Maybe that works for some brands and stuff, and I see it all thetime.

Cole Heilborn (01:09:12):

That's only every agency out

Michael Minter (01:09:13):

There. Yeah, but

Cole Heilborn (01:09:21):

If you had to wrap that concept into a thesis, what areyou saying? Only go after the real and nutritional content and get rid of thecotton candy.

Michael Minter (01:09:29):

Yes. That's what I'm saying. I saw this funny, I forgethis name, the guy on the Instagram who does the subway takes, but this womangot on and she said, I think you should have to, her hot take was you shouldhave to have a degree to be a dj. And I loved that comic because her point wasthere was a time where to create music, you had to have put in the work to havelearned the guitar, and you have earned the right to be a creator by thepainstaking process of proving that you have a talent in hand and a passionthat is worth hearing out. And then through technology, suddenly every kid's adj. And not to say there aren't talented DJs, but the point is we made themusic, the creativity of music so easily accessible that it got really dumbeddown. And I think the same thing's true of content and advertising is we madeit so accessible where every 18-year-old with a camera is a creative director,and not to say there aren't brilliant, talented ones out there that'll kick myass every day, but 99% of them terrible. And that's the cotton candy I'mtalking about.

Cole Heilborn (01:10:50):

Yeah, we've shortcutted the system so you don't have toput in the 10,000 hours to become an

Michael Minter (01:10:55):

Expert. Exactly. Try 10 hours they aren't putting in.Yeah, sure. Yeah. I love that you referenced that. That's exactly it.

Cole Heilborn (01:11:04):

Yeah. There's a great book about, not that, but about the10,000 hours towards working towards Mastery by Malcolm Gladwell calledOutliers. Totally. Have you read that? Oh, I've read it six times. Okay. I'mlistening to it now and it's top of mind for me.

Michael Minter (01:11:17):

It's fascinating. His underrated book in my opinion isDavid and Goliath, and I wish more brands.

Cole Heilborn (01:11:24):

Okay. I listen to his

Michael Minter (01:11:25):

TED

Cole Heilborn (01:11:25):

Talk on that one. That's good.

Michael Minter (01:11:27):

It's a way that brands need to think is, and I see thathappen a lot, is we look a lot to the Goliaths and instead of going, Hey,what's the armor we need to put on based on our internal skills, based on our,it's funny you referenced humor a few times, and humor is a particularlyinteresting one. Being pretentious. Being high fashion is actually pretty damneasy. There's a lot of people that masquerade as brilliant creatives in fashionbecause it's not that hard. Humor is hard, and so when you have a brand thatwants to be funny, if you don't have people inside your building that arefunny, don't do it. The point is, don't put on the armor. Don't put onGoliath's armor. If you're David, use your slingshot and if you're not, behonest with yourself. If you're not a funny organization, don't make that yourposition and you have to.

(01:12:26):

These are some things where you have to be honest, andthat's one of the things that Sorel I think about is going, look, I know I wantto get to Sydney using that analogy. I know what we want to be, but I have todo an honest assessment of the idiosyncrasies, the talent, the culture of whatI'm working with to go, oh, what are the levers I can and should pull, and whatare the ones I'm not even going to waste time on because the time to become aGoliath in that it's not realistic. I dunno if that makes sense, but I got tocome in and go, what are the tools and resources and skills that I can doubledown on instead of trying to force fit something that isn't even there?

Cole Heilborn (01:13:11):

Right? Yeah. How do you leverage your strength to createsomething that's distinct, but without stepping outside the lines too much intoa realm that's not even, I

Michael Minter (01:13:19):

Had this possible for you. I've had the luxury of havingreally great mentors and bosses in my career with one exception. I had thisjust absolutely terrible boss, and one of his obsessions was organizationallywas just constantly what people needed to work on. So doing these evaluationsof your skills, oh, you need to work on this. So in my case, I'm not a numbersguy, I'm not a math guy. I'm a creative first, and it was like, oh, we need towork on your budget skills or different things. It's like, man, you missed theplot. Triple down on the things that people are good at. I'm not sayingoverlook bad behavior or something. I'm saying when I look at my team, I don'tlook at each person as a Swiss Army knife and go, Hey, what's the smallest toolin their Swiss army knife? I'm going, what's the big blade? What's the, oh,they have a big corkscrew. I'm going to use that. I want to triple down on theplaces people over index and have great skills. That's what sports does. Youdon't turn a point guard into a center just that's not what he's, you know whatI mean? But in business, for some reason that's this thing, and I just thinkpeople get that all wrong. So anyways, man, I'm going to shut up now,

Cole Heilborn (01:14:35):

Michael, if you had to summarize our conversation, if youhad to give some practical applications and next steps for folks who arelistening who are like, yeah, this guy's onto something now what do I do withall this information? If you could do your best to distill this into specifictakeaways, what might you share?

Michael Minter (01:14:53):

Well, give me, who am I speaking to? Someone trying to decidehow to go into their career? A leader?

Cole Heilborn (01:14:59):

Yeah. Let's say you're speaking to folks on the brand sitewho want to shake things up, who are like, okay, we need to do somethingdifferent. Let's say that's one, and then your second is a creative director ata brand who's like, we need to make something fresh, something interesting.Those are your two audiences.

Michael Minter (01:15:17):

Yeah. Well, I'll steal a line that I think that someonetold me once, a mentor in my life, and I think he stole it, but he said to me,he said, Michael, culture eats strategy for breakfast. I truly believe that'sthe biggest thing people need to realize is to go, look, if you're trying toget your team, your brand to the next level, and whether it's going, Hey, wewant to be more risk taking in our creative or whatever it is, you first haveto look and go, do I have a culture? Do I have a culture that can sustain that?Do I have people that you can't just show up in Italy and tell them to beGerman? If you want be a more rigorous and disciplined culture, no, you got tohire Germans or whatever.

(01:16:08):

My point is going, Hey, if you want your brand and thecreative engine or the marketing engine to have a certain persuasion, build theteam and the culture that reflects that, and culture has to be innate. It's amixture of the individuals you bring in. It's not a laminated card you put ontheir desk, which by the way really happened in my life once where it was like,from now on, we're going to be innovative. And you're like, yeah, but what ifwe don't have innovative people? You've got to build the culture that you wantto do that. So if you want in the example you're giving, if you want to takemore risks as a brand and you believe that's a strategic imperative and youwant to have more creative and out of the box thinking, go find the people.Don't hire the critic. Don't hire the studio musician. Go find your JohnLennon. Go find them. Go find it's worth it. Go find the people. If that's whatyou want to do. If you want to be a brand that's really good at emulating andreally then go hire those people, both plans can have tremendous success. I'mjust biased for one.

Cole Heilborn (01:17:22):

Incredible. Michael, well, you've shared some awesomeinsights, some awesome behind the scenes. I think everyone is probably by nowquite excited to see what Elle is rolling out. I suppose you've kind got theluxury. Maybe it's a luxury of being able to talk about brand building withoutactually revealing what you have working, so I guess we'll find out once thingscome out and I'm excited for you. Where can folks follow along with you? Wherecan they see the launch when it all comes out?

Michael Minter (01:17:50):

Well, no shocking places here. Our website, our Instagram,all the usual social outlets. We have a few kind of unexpected, I think tricksup our sleeve. We have some really exciting energy partnerships on deck andyeah, just stay tuned.

Cole Heilborn (01:18:13):

Incredible. Well, Michael, I want to thank you for yourtime. Thanks for the thoughts and we will be in touch.

Michael Minter (01:18:17):

Thanks, man. That was great. Appreciate it.

Cole Heilborn (01:18:19):

See you.

Michael Minter (01:18:20):

Alright.

Cole Heilborn (01:18:21):

Thank you for listening to this episode. If you enjoyedit, please consider sharing it with a friend or leaving us a review on Apple.And remember, as you're working on that next piece of creative, the differencebetween creative that works and doesn't work often comes down to the hardquestions that you ask while you're shaping it.

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