When Rebecca Minkoff first moved to New York City, the then-18-year-old was making $4.75 an hour.
“I just kept working for this designer and someone was telling me what to do every day. I just didn’t like that. And I thought if I’m going to work as hard, it’s going to be for myself and I want to call my own shots,” she said. “I didn’t want to be told what to do, frankly.”
Self-employment for Minkoff turned out just fine; in 2001, she redesigned the iconic “I Love New York” shirt and it appeared on The Tonight Show. After a shout-out from Jay Leno, Minkoff spent the next eight months making T-shirts on the floor of her apartment and quit her job to start designing full time.
We caught up with Minkoff to learn more about how she grew her brand into a global fashion company with the help of her brother, her problem with the unicorn mentality and why she thinks the “invisible barrier” is the future of retail tech.
This interview was edited for brevity and clarity.
TechCrunch: What gave you the energy and drive to become an entrepreneur?
Rebecca Minkoff: Long story. My mom would sell these cast covers, like decorative covers for people with broken arms at the flea market. And I was like, I am going to have a booth here. So I made all these tie-dye shirts and no one bought anything but it was just this idea of like, I can make something I can sell. My mom always taught that. When I wanted a dress, she taught me how to sew a dress instead of buying the dress. And so, I just got this bug for creating things out of nothing.
The constant thread was, “I’m not going to pay for this. You’re going to learn how to do it.”
At what point did you decide to become an entrepreneur? When did you first hear the word “entrepreneur?”
It wasn’t a word that I heard. I think if anything, maybe we heard like “business owner,” or “small business owner” or “I run my own business.” My dad both worked for himself and worked outside the office and sold it and then my mom started several companies. So for me, it just seemed kind of normal that you know, one parent could go to work every day at an office and one could work from home.
There was no founder, no entrepreneur, I don’t think was in the cultural zeitgeist.
You’ve often been recognized for integrating tech early on in the fashion industry. Where did that interest come from?
I think the initial impetus was when my co-founder, my brother [Uri] and I realized that technology was something that could break down barriers and allow us to get in touch with our consumers. So that’s when we first began to use it before anyone in fashion. We would talk to our customers to crowdsource information. Also, he had a software company, so I think he was just always tuned into what was happening. He wanted to take that and see how we could apply it to fashion.
And so I think once we also then became known as a company that wasn’t afraid to test and try things, then those opportunities just started doubling and tripling because people knew like, oh, Rebecca Minkoff, she’ll try, you know, all these emerging technologies. As we began looking at our stores we began thinking about how does technology ease customer pain points in a store and what are the friction points that she doesn’t have online. So that was the genesis of that.
How has it been working with your brother?
I mean, it’s been 15 years. So I think in the beginning, we both had very specific lanes. And we relied on each other’s expertise to sort of do that. And then as we began to get more familiar with each other’s areas of responsibility, we started having opinions.
Comments, criticisms made for a lot of fireworks. We then hired a business counselor. With any co-founder, there’s always a hard time. Maybe if you’re not brother and sister, you’re a little bit more filtered in how you deliver communication. But when you’re brother and sister you can just be like ‘that’s ugly’ or ‘you’re stupid’ or ‘that’s a bad decision,’ instead of like how some people would behave towards each other. So we worked really hard to sort of fix that and we’ve been good and haven’t had a fight in like two years. I count that as a win.
I thought it was interesting how you use tech to bring people into what would usually be an exclusive event like a fashion show. I was also naturally wondering if there was any pushback from fellow entrepreneurs in the fashion space or people in general thinking this inclusivity wasn’t a good idea.
Lots of people thought it wasn’t a good idea. I remember when we sat bloggers in the front row or had a blogger section, we had others in the seats scoff at us. When we live-streamed a show, people just thought that that was like letting in the customer too much and giving the customer too much access. And so I think the people that wanted to stay holy and exclusive just really had a hard time with it. And we just decided, let’s double down on our consumer and she’s gonna see these images everywhere and why not be the brand to break that and usher in what this could look like.
Let’s talk about your community for other women in business: Female Founder Collective. How has it grown over the past year?
When I launched, there was no way I could have ever known the organic desire and need. Like, I knew what was lacking for me and other founders I knew personally, but to know that, you know, over 7,000 women also were having a desire to connect to share resources.
Things that were lacking when I started a business were was questions sometimes around investors and how to begin fundraising. Customer acquisition. How do you grow a loyalty program? How do you launch an ambassador program? Those are some things that I personally was reaching out to a bunch of women about that had done it successfully. How do you not use Facebook and Instagram to market well, and I just think I was getting much more valuable information from these other founders than I was anywhere else. Articles are great and helpful, but I think someone who’s like been through the war can like speak in some of these instances much more intelligently. So I was very relieved and grateful that I had the discourse. And I just knew, if we could tap into this on a larger scale, it would be a lot more women.
What’s a glitch e-commerce startups should avoid?
In the beginning, it was like, you know, iPads in store seemed like “whoa, that’s so technology forward,” but now, it’s like, “no, do you use dynamic yield in your e-commerce experience?”
Do you have any advice for e-commerce startups that are trying to grow during this economic downturn and the pandemic?
I think that we’ve all seen the trend of these startups that don’t know how to make money. That it’s just grow at all costs. You’re seeing the fall out left and right.
And so I just am telling any, any founder that I talk to, like, you know, a long time ago, people just grew healthy businesses and they lived a great life, and they had a business that made money. And I don’t know why that changed. And suddenly everyone needs to be a startup that raises a ton of money that loses a ton of money. And that just seems crazy.
Have an e-commerce business. Figure out how to make some money. Get traction, get desirability. Get product-market fit. And then if you need to raise money, great, but let’s not look at unicorns as the only way to do this.
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