Transcripts For MSNBCW Your Business 20180429

Msnbcs your business is brought to you by american express. Dont do business without it. Your business is sponsored by american express. Dont do business without. Hi, everyone. Im jj ramberg. And welcome to your business, the show dedicated to help your growing business. Who you are as a person and your own Life Experiences have a lot to do with shaping you as a leader. One illinois Business Owner we met runs an auto care Company Based on the principles of authenticity, equality and respect. And he says that this in large part was influenced by his decision to come out and channel his experiences from when he was in the closet to better understand his customers. It was a different industry back in the day. And i grew up in the old school way. Glenn remembers repeating conversation about his auto business with his son brian. I called him home from college, ahei had no idea. Thats what went on in this business. But he didnt know is the jokes to brian were not so funny. When i realized that, i started crying, i was so mad at what i was putting my son through. Brian came out to his parents when he was 21 and a junior in college. Up until then, he spent countless hours at his fathers business. Its in any blood. Basically, since i was 2 i would come into work with my dad. He made a playyard out of tires and i would hang out with him all year long. His plan was to take over the family business, but as an openly gay man, it was tough. I am not the man i was 15 years ago. So that set me up on a mission to open up the environment. Brian now owns the same family owned auto repair business. But he changed the name and company culture. I love the business that im in. I love the fact that i can be who i am and then i wont settle for less. It was a culmination of the journey that i had been on. Heart certified auto care is shaking up the field while shattering stereotypes. I get a sholot of fun out of shocking people. The road to the heart of today hasnt been easy. Brian remembers what it was like to return to the shop after his father told the staff he was gay. I was a nervous wreck walking in the first time after that. It was an icky feeling, if you will. I called a Company Meeting and said, in the meeting, brian was home over the weekend and this is what happened. And i want it out there. I want all of you to know. Glenn was admittedly worried. He couldnt help but wonder if his son would be a good fit for the business. A fathers job is to protect their child. And, you know, its not an easy industry for an openly gay man to be in. I still look at this as a mechanics business. To be in this business, you have to be a mechanic first. If you werent a good mechanic, you wouldnt be good at the business. Brian was not a mechanic. But what brian could bring to the table is a fresh set of eyes and a personal journey willing to translate into a business one. Any individual that goes through a coming out process at some point in their life hears things to keep them in the closet. Anybody that knows me knows i dont take no for an answer. And that when someone says, you know, you shouldnt do this, i say, watch me. Some of the feedback glenn got was troubling, but he calls brian one of the toughest guys he knows. And i had loyal employees that said to me, i feel so sorry for you because you only have one boy. Now you have none. And these are guys who are paying. They are working for me. And hes going to work with them. Even after catching a group of employees early on mocking him behind his back, brian wouldnt be stopped. He realized what strengths he brought to the company. When you are in the closet and grow up that way, you learn how to kind of be a chameleon and learn how to judge the situation, figure out who is a friend and a foe and who to trust and who you cant. That enabled me to create a new approach with how we deal with people. Doing something that felt unique in an industry that is not about feelings. That approach centers on the understanding that everyone, each employee, each customer, counts. And the foundation of the relationship is respect. The heart of who we are is acceptance. So everybody is welcome here. How do we make someone feel good about something that isnt a feelgood. We looked at this to say, we are in the hospitality business, we just happen to fix cars. Brian practicing vulnerability as a closeted gay man and compared it to the feelings of someone who walked into his shop. The connecting point was fear. It was not gay or straight or whatever it may be, but the vulnerability of coming in, being told they need something, not understanding, being kind of afraid. The solution was to remove that fear by pulling the customers more fully into the process and taking time to explain everything. That starts with taking pictures of potential repairs and talking through the images. People dont know what were talking about. So thats the big uncertainty they are worried about. The pictures help to show more transparency. We are trying to be more open, i guess. In addition to setting the bar high for customers, brian does the same for employees offering competitive salaries, health care and fun extra curricular activities like family day. Brian honestly, every time he sees you, hes going to greet you and ask you, how is your family . How are things . And it is sincere. I love that i feel like i have a voice, that i matter. Areally feel like i matter. In the job that i do. He cares about the customer and the employees. As much as brian committed himself to being authenticated in the employee. The number of lgbt employees is at an alltime high. I like they are not going it in a fake way. Brian says there are stumbling blocks but he wouldnt change it. Sometimes it is their loss and a great opportunity to change someones belief system. The business couldnt be the same without the leader. If i was still in the closet, i dont think i would do anything today the way i do it now. Not a single thing. Because it is stifling, suffocating. I wouldnt be someone that cherishes the freedom of being who i am. Im here in florida at the campus of hsn, the original Television Shopping network. And im here for our elevator pitch segment. And this is a big deal because the stakes are huge. And our pitcher is going to show their product to two executives from hsn. One runs the American Dreams program, which finds entrepreneurs from all over the country and brings them onto the show. The second one is the head of qc, quality control. And if theres something wrong with the product, hes going to know about it. If they get the onair sign from the executives, that means they get to pitch the products on hsn for the 91 million households. This could be lifechanging. Christy, it is so good to see you. Thank you. Congratulations on making it this far. What is the name of your product . It is the go with me chair. Its a portable instyle and outside highchair for babies. Youre going to be talking to two people. And what does it mean to you to get to come be potentially on hsn . It is every Consumer Product persons to be on the platform, but i have five girls that can see what i have accomplished with the product. You have five girls. One thing you didnt say was youre a grandmother. Which is so crazy, i cant believe that. We get a lot of use out of the chair. The five girls will watch you on tv. Good luck. Thank you. Hello, dara and matt. Im kristy from atlanta. Welcome. Thank you. Im here to show you the go with me chair. We are a family on the go. And with five kids, im completely outnumbered. Oftentimes i just needed a safe place to set the baby down. And that is why i created the go with me chair. Its the perfect parking spot for your baby or big kid wherever life takes you. The soccer field, the beach, vacation, camping, grandmas house or your kitchen. This indoor outdoor campstyle chair was designed so your baby could safely sit and relax using the five point harness. But my favorite teach is the standing option. You pull back the seat cover exposing the leg holes and baby can stand and relax safely. And for your big kids, up to 8 years old, you just take off the harness completely and it becomes a big kid chair. Also comes with a removable plastic tray and sun bonnet. Its the perfect parking spot for your baby or big kid. And even i can sit in the chair. Im coming in as you sit down. Wow, thats a strong chair. It is. By the way, this was spoken as a true mom. You start this thing out by saying, its a place to park your kid. Right, absolutely. Who doesnt want to park their kid . Congratulations. You did a good job. Thank you. Lets hear the feedback. Speakle personally, i have two kids. This would have been fantastic for the kids growing up. I do think it is very innovative. It is different and unique. So, you know what . I think its a really great portable solution that is out there for the mom and the family on the go. Theres as you probably know, a lot of heavy regulation on childrens products. So we would just want to make sure that we have all the testing in place for deciding to make sure it meets the requirements. Im holding on to you as you wait to hear what happens. Congratulations on the fabulous pitch. Now is the moment where we get to find out, do you have the chance to sell this in front of millions of people on hsn . You talk to each other for a second and then we will find out. Okay. Now we have the chance if you could look over here for a second. And we will see, do you have the chance to be on hsn . Oh, not this time. But it is okay, just go with me, not grow with me for a moment. Okay. So, i really like your product. And i think we were just talking, matt can probably help us get this through the qa and the test phase. I think i want to try to do something we have never done before on hsn. So for American Dreams, what we have never done is we have never done a test, just to see what our audience says. So what i would like to do is i would like to create a promo, put the product on air, see if our customers like it, drive them to digital, and were going to let our customers tell us if they like the product. And if they do, im going to have you back on air showcasing your product. I appreciate it. Will you help me with the test . Absolutely. Okay. Can we get there . Well get there. This is not a no. This is were going to wait and see. Were going to test. All of you watching should go if you think this is a good product. Go to dot com. I appreciate the opportunity, thank you. This is a first. Thank you for testing something. We are here to make dreams happen. Thats what were doing. You did a fantastic be joe. Thank you for coming along. I think this is such a neat product. Well head on out here. All right. So that must have been a little bit of a roller coaster. It was. But they are going to give me the chance, you know . Once in a lifetime test opportunity. So thats better than a no. Oh, my god, so much better than a no. And your product, as any mother or father knows, that product is great. So the question is, is it good for hsn . The audience will let them know. Thats perfect. Congratulations. Good job. Happy National Small business week. This annual celebration kicks off with a number of workshops around the country held jointly by the Small Business administration and the score organization. Joining me from the white house is linda mcmahon. It is so nice to see you, administrator. Thank you. Thank you for having me today. Absolutely. It is an exciting week for everyone, particularly in your office. Tell us more about what you are doing today . It is National Small business week. We are going to kick off our ceremonies on sunday at the institute for peace. Well be welcoming a District Attorney from around the country for the Small Business award. And i believe on friday, the president will sign the proclamation, the declaration of National Small business week. And so well have ceremonies on sunday and an monday. And then monday evening, i fly down to jacksonville, florida. Well meet with our District Office there and visit a Small Business, the Sunshine Peanut Company where they make peanut butter. And then well come up the coast, well two to georgia, to south carolina, winding up in North Carolina on friday. And ill have a lot of personal fun on friday. Ill get to give the commencement address at my alma mater, east carolina university. Thats fantastic. So were going to be on a bus tour coming from florida. So lookout for the spa bus celebrating National Business week. Its going to be fun. For the first time, well have a Virtual Conference where well be giving seminars, different instructional videos, so it will be great. Well be doing live stream while we are on the road. So that would be fun. When you talk about small busine business, what do you see out there . The number one issue was tax cuts. They wanted to see tax cuts come through with the president s assurance come through to cut taxes. We started to see the Optimism Level rise in the country. All throughout last year, when tax cuts were passed, the businesses ive talked to said, boy, they are taking that money. They are reinvesting it in their businesses or their opening of another branch or producing more goods and services, increasing wages, all of those good things. This is a fantastic week. And good luck with everything youre doing that weekend on behalf of all small Business Owners. Thank you for recognizing what they do. Thank you so much. For more than two decades, iconic designer Nicole Miller has remained an instoppable force in the fashion world. She recently took us behind the scenes of her new york headquarters and opened up about the staying power in this learning from the pros. I want the brand to always stay young. And i dont want it to ever look like a tired brand. Because i think some brands get tired and its their end. The longer youre in business, you have to always reinvent yourself and get tide cast. For example, a lot of people think i do brides dresses, i have in the deone a social medi site or a show, but they all help our image. We like to turn things upsidedown and change things. When we have meetings, it is more of a powwow. And maybe not always just talking about problems or ideas, you might just be talking about fun things or things that happened last night. But it is just food to talk about a new restaurant you went to or something you saw last week. It is just good to have communication and make everybody comfortable and have storytelling. After that, you can accomplish what you have to accomplish. But i think meetings sometimes are so stiff and formulaic. And our meetings are not like that. I have great bonds with so many girls that worked here. At least once a month i meet some exemployees for a meal. A lot of employees have come here and worked here for a while and they moved on to other companies. Sometimes they come back. There was a girl that left and got us all pedicures when she came back. Sometimes i hire people that i have fired. So a lot of times, people leave, situations change and i come back here. We started having design lunches maybe 20 years ago. And then pretty soon, everybody wanted in on the lunch. Before we knew it, we were making lunch for everybody. Very often, thats a good place to congregate and have a casual conversation. Its great because it puts everyone on the same level, like they are a sewor or cutter or sales team or design team, line up for lunch. Im the only person that can cut the line. It just evolved and its something everybody looks forward to on fridays, their big lunch. Ive done Fashion Shows for like 20 years or so and we used to go crazy and stay up all night, didnt have the right shoe size or gloves and everybody in a panic. And we just dont do that anymore. Stress is a waste of time. We dont get stressed here. I think this company, dz a fun place to work with a lot of energy, everybody is like gung ho, team player. I think weve been in business so long because weve managed to maintain this for all of this time. I just love coming to the Office Every Day and some of my friends go, do you really like work every day . I go, yeah. I love coming to work every day. I feel like im coming to a candy store. Theres like fabrics and colors and theres fun things to do all the time. Its great. Its i have the best time here. We have launched the Second Season of our podcast and this week were talking to andy dunne, he tells me what it was like to build a company when everyone was telling him it couldnt work and he talks to me about this really interesting moment when he gave his team a big pep talk at an all hands meeting and it completely fell flat and had to rethink the way he generated excitement with his team. It is a really good listen and i hope you all get a chance to listen to it. If you do, please give us feedback, the podcast is still pretty new and i would love to hear what you think. Listen for free, its been there, built that you can find that on Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. When we come back, as ceo, how do you handle customers who only want to work with you, not anyone else on your team . Why being told no can actually be a good thing. baby crying dont juggle your home life and work life without it. And dont forget who youre really working for without it. Funding to help grow your business. Another way we have your back. The powerful backing of american express. Dont do business without it. How do i continue to provide Customer Service and at the same time be the ceo of my company where still the customers want me personally . Three steps here, get somebody who actually will be the Customer Service point of contact if you havent all right got somebody, you need to find someone, nominate someone. Secondly, you need to start with new incoming clients and customers, set aside existing ones, they have a method of working with you that grew and will be hard to disturb them but everybody from here on in you got to start from day one by saying this is joanna or whoever its going to be and shes going to be your point of contact for all of your customer client education and something weve all got to engage in. The third step is to slowly wean yourself away from the existing customers who are currently depending on you and you want to do that quietly, one customer at a time, get a little busy, defer one are two issues to jenny or whoever your new person is and let her take over from there. Look at it as a six month to one year process and youll get there. Here are tips to help you grow your business. Lets introduce our panel, karen sideman becker, ceo of clear, that helps you get through airports and stadiums fast. And nick martel of market snacks, good to see you both. I love to have you two together. Its entirely different paths and kinds of companies, you bought a company out of bankruptcy and had scaled it and you started yours as a side project in school and have grown it. Lets start with you, karen. One tip. One tip is that innovation is about bringing people what they did not know they want, you get a lot of nos and have to turn those into yeses. Times to pivot. How do you know that no you started your company or bought clear and got a lot of nos from airports not wanting to work with you. Yes. You didnt have to pivot the idea of the company. Right, but you have to pivot how youre presenting and sharing information, you know, better to meet in person than on the phone and send them data and something that makes them know more about you, better to bring customer in. What did i do i didnt express the opportunity to you. One thing i also think, when you get a no, people might be interested in what you have to offer later but they forget about you, right . Having a newsletter or checking in with people often to say hey, im here again is really smart. Also, most importantly, knowing whats important to you. Whats important to me may be not important to you. Its about Customer Experience and what are your priorities and how do i better bring our story to you and what matters to you. Then can share the broader concept with you. Put yourself in the shoes of the person youre talking to and talk to them. Everyone is busy, no one wants to hear about you, they want to hear what you can do for them. Our thing is always ask for one more. We found we have incredible interactions with the people thousands of read market snacks every day and get testimonials. When we ask for feedback, feedback is a gift. When we push for more details that led us to develop features now some of the noemost popular items. How do you continue the conversation . People tend to think just because they sent one email theres a disconnect, you dont see the person, thats it, the relationship ends. Very openly and honestly as a cofounder, you have a commitment to your reader and customer and simply writing back an email and saying we would love your thoughts on other things we can be doing, seems simple and very few actually do it. When weve done that, weve ended up developing features like our fact of the day, new job postings and focusing on interNational Businesses and those are new feet youres that basically came from pushing back to get more info. Free brain storming for you. Youre almost crowd sourcing. And karen, you also have this thing with email about getting emails from people and then calling them, which i think follows up on this. Theres two pieces, were obsessed with the Customer Experience so asking customers their feedback gives you a big view into whats going on in reality in your business. You used to get one persons perspective, now you can get who will wholistic. People can say anything in a faceless nameless way in writing. When you call them on the phone and weve got emails when we relaunched clear and people were rightfully upset about how the company went away. I called them and called all of them and getting them on the phone and hearing my voice created constructive dialogues were incredibly value. And trust. You know theres somebody on the other side that cares. So good to see both of you, thank you. This weeks your biz selfie comes from clarence rod well who owns llewdor gardens, hes delivering his hydroponically greens to a local restaurant. I think i see basal in there, maybe kale. Take a selfie of and send it to us at your business msnbc. Com. Include your name, name of your company and its location and use the yourbizselfie. Thank you for joining us. We love hearing from you, if you have questions or comments, want to say hi, send us an email at your business at msnbc. Com. Check out our website, msnbc. Com your business. We put up everything from the show today and a whole lot more from you and dont forget to connect on your digital and social media platforms as well. Check out our podcast, been there, built that. You can find it on tune in or wherever you get your podcast for free. We look forward to seeing you next time. Until then, im j. J. Ramberg, we make your business our business. Dont make a first impression. Or a lasting impression without it. Dont turn your house into a home without it. Dont go live. Or even share a moment without it. And dont watch her dance like nobodys watching without it. Whatever you do, dont forget that the more you live forward, the more you need someone at your back. The powerful backing of american express. Dont live life without it. Welcome to politics nation. Coming to you this morning from washington, d. C. Where last night i attended the white house correspondents dinner. The room was full of dignitaries from the world of politics, media, academia and hollywood. Real news is sometimes happy and sometimes funny and hartd warming and often its heartbreaking or critical and makes you