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Respect isnt a buzzword or a line in a mission statement. Its a strategy, and one that I used to build an empire during my time leading Syms, the first truly off-price retail chain in America. When my father, Sy Syms, and I grew our business from a single store in lower Manhattan into a 50-location national retailer, we werent just selling clothes. We were proving that dignity could be a competitive advantage. We respected customers’ time by color-coding tags by size and keeping every store layout identical. Walk into one Syms, and youd know how to navigate them all. We respected their intelligence by refusing to hard-sell. Our employees werent sales associatesthey were educators, trained to answer questions about fiber content, tailoring, and fit. We respected their wallets with no-frills décor that kept prices down. It wasnt fancy. But it worked. Because people remember how you make them feeland respect is unforgettable. Below I’ve outlined how you can infuse respect into every aspect of your business. The 10 (or 13) Commandments of Customer Respect As the company scaled, we codified these behaviors into what became known internally as our Ten Commandments of customer service. These werent optional. They were embedded into onboarding, posted in every break room, and upheld from the stockroom to the C-suite. Here they are: 1. Treat every customer with the respect you yourself expect to receive. They are the reason we stay in business. (Note: Respect is rule Number One, sort of like the First Amendment.) 2. Greet each customer with a smile, direct eye contact, and a good morning, afternoon or evening as soon as they enter our store. Your expression, body stance, and tone of voice should say, Welcome, Were Glad You Came To Shop. 3. Determine the customers need once youve said hello. 4. If a customer requests a certain item or specific size, never point or give directions; escort the customer to the proper area. 5. Always look up while doing stock to say hello to shoppers in your area. Smile to show that you are available for any questions they might have. 6. Be aware of suggestive selling opportunities. Let the customer know we have tops to match the bottoms theyve selected. Escort them to the tops and excuse yourself to let them look through the merchandise. 7. Be knowledgeable about the various brand names, fiber contents, and sizes throughout your area. 8. Remember to remain cool and levelheaded. Be extra kind and respectful to customers. Management presence is of the utmost importance. 9. Help a customer with a zipper or the buttons on the back of an outfit in the dressing room. 10. Be honest to customers. If the suit doesnt fit, suggest another manufacturer or size; dont tell the customer what you think he/she wants to hear. Id add only a few more: 11. Be aware of the competition, including online sellers, but never disparage anyone else. 12. People are always in a hurry. Save them as much time as possible with clear and relevant advice that helps them find what they want quickly. 13. When in doubt, see rule 1. But respect isnt just a checklist. Its a mindset. And in one moment, that mindset saved a store opening from disaster. When Permits Fell Through, a Car Hood Became Our Checkout Counter One of our new suburban New Jersey locations was set to open on a Saturday morning. Hundreds of people lined up outside. But due to a last-minute paperwork error, we didnt have the permits to legally open our doors. Most companies would have sent everyone home. We didnt. My father and I grabbed a pen and set up shop on the hood of a car in the parking lot. We handwrote $10 discount coupons for every person who showed up. That gesture turned disappointment into goodwilland when we officially opened the following week, the turnout shattered expectations. That wasnt marketing. It was respect in action. How I Interviewed for Respect And Screened for Selfishness Respect also defined our hiring practices. During interviews, Id ask each candidate: What eight questions do you need answered before deciding to work here? I wasnt just listening to the questions. I was evaluating why they asked them. If more than one question was self-servingHow soon can I be promoted? or Do you reward employees when they get compliment letters?they didnt get a callback. Sometimes even one red flag was enough. The best candidates showed curiosity, not entitlement. They asked about our values, our stores, our customers. And the biggest red flag? Never visiting a store before applying. To me, that showed a fundamental lack of respect for the brand, the customer, and the opportunity. Hiring for respect helped us build a workforce that embodied our culture from day one. When Respect Isnt Returned Respect cant be a one-way street. And not every boardroom I entered treated me the way I treated them. As the youngest woman to ever lead an NYSE-listed company, I spent many years as the only female voice at the table. During Syms reorganization, I negotiated with hedge funds that spoke over me, questioned my competence, and ignored my insight. Was it ageism? Sexism? Maybe both. But I kept showing up with respect. Not because I felt it, but because I believed in it. It became a strategy to disarm ego and move the conversation forward. I refused to mirror their dismissiveness, because doing so would only validate it. Eventually, that approach gave me leverage. You can’t lead people you look down on. And you can’t win partnerships without mutual respect. Why Respect Still Matters Todays business leaders spend a lot of time chasing engagement, culture, and retention. Heres a shortcut: build respect into everything. From how you onboard to how you communicate. From how you acknowledge work to how you handle missteps. From how you treat employees behind closed doors to how you show up in the market. Respect isnt “soft.” It drives loyalty, innovation, and performance. Companies that lack it bleed talent and trust. Companies that live it turn employees into advocates and customers into evangelists. And most importantly: respect scales. It works whether youre running one store or 50. Whether youre selling suits or software. As leaders, we often search for the next breakthrough. But sometimes the most powerful ideas are the oldest ones. Respect is one of them.
Category:
E-Commerce
As I illustrate in my forthcoming book, we live in an age of authenticity worship. From corporate mission statements urging employees to bring their whole selves to work to self-help gurus insisting that being real is the only path to fulfillment, weve elevated authenticity to near-spiritual status. But our obsession has a curious twist: we tend to grant a special premium to negative authenticity. A leaders blunt criticism, antisocial rant, public sulk, or contrarian tirade is often praised as refreshingly honest, while their polite diplomacy is dismissed as fake. Somewhere along the way, we started believing that authentic displays of antisocial emotion (e.g., anger, contempt, derision) are somehow more real, and thus more valuable, than well-mannered restraint. As if telling a colleague their idea is idiotic is more admirable than smiling politely and redirecting the conversation. In reality, antagonizing people doesnt make you authentic; it just makes you antagonistic. Moreover, between fake politeness or honest rudeness, most people will typically prefer the former, especially if they are on the receiving end. Genuine social skill is not the absence of self-censorship, but rather the mastery of it. The real work of emotional intelligence, which is basically a form of social desirability or strategic self-presentation, lies in resisting the urge to broadcast every feeling and thought, especially those that would derail relationships, alienate others, or erode trust. High-stakes environments, such as boardrooms, negotiations, and crisis situations, reward those who can keep a poker face, not those who turn every meeting into an open mic night for their grievances. The EQauthenticity paradox If authenticity were the sole measure of leadership quality, then every temperamental, impulsive boss would be a management guru. Instead, such characters make toxic workers who destroy team morale and impair organizational effectiveness, not to mention harm the culture. Indeed, the data show quite clearly that emotional intelligence (EQ), the ability to recognize, regulate, and influence emotions, is one of the most consistent predictors of career success, managerial effectiveness, and leadership competence. Some unpopular news: EQ is negatively correlated with unfiltered authenticity. The leaders who score highest on EQ arent known for wearing their hearts on their sleeves, broadcasting their unsolicited political views or divisive opinions, or expecting others to tune into their feelings and put up with their emotional tantrums: instead, theyre known for playing their cards close to their chest. Like skilled poker players, they control the game by controlling their tells. Fundamentally, they dont assume that others must adjust to their feelings or moods but rather make an effort to understand and adapt to other peoples preferences, views, and emotions (as in, they dont believe they are the center of the universe, which, in normal child development patterns, humans tend to comprehend at the age of 6). The best leaders understand that the right to be yourself ends where your responsibility to others begins. Venting in public, rolling your eyes in meetings, or delivering a scathing tweetstorm about your teams shortcomings may feel cathartic, but its rarely productive. In most cases, a leader who cant filter themselves is less a truth-teller and more a low-EQ liability. Think of Winston Churchill, famous for his wartime resolvenot for publicly berating his generals. Or Angela Merkel, who built influence not through Twitter rants, but through disciplined understatement. Contrast that with the modern crop of leaders whose personal brand doubles as a rolling PR crisis, and the EQauthenticity paradox becomes painfully clear. Authenticity as a luxury good Ironically, some leaders deploy rudeness and rebellion precisely because it makes them appear authentic. Theres a certain seductive quality to the CEO who says what everyone is thinking but no one dares to say, never mind that everyone is actually just their own reflection in a $2,000 conference table. But, just like disagreeing with everyone doesnt make you right, violating social norms doesnt make you authentic, let alone creative, virtuous, or courageous. Social psychology offers a clue: norm violation by powerful people often gets reframed as charisma. When you have the status and resources to survive the fallout, you can break etiquette with impunity. Its not that youre braver than everyone else; its that youre insulated from consequences. In this sense, authenticity is less a moral virtue than a status symbol. The freedom to be unapologetically rude is a perk of the privileged elite, whose power shields them from the accountability that constrains the rest of us. For them, telling it like it is isnt a courageous act, its a performance of dominance, namely boasting or showing off for having the freedom to offend without any major consequences, and many people cheering you! Needless to say, this is a terrible model for leadership. When leaders flaunt their disregard for civility, they legitimize those behaviors in others. What begins as a performative show of realness trickles down into the culture, corroding trust, cooperation, and psychological safety. And while anger, bullying, and public belittling may unite a few sycophants, they alienate far more people than they rally. The leadership that actually works Leadership, at its core, is about uniting people toward a shared goal. History offers plenty of examples of leaders who inspired loyalty not through shock value, but through steady, respectful, and measured behavior. Jacinda Arderns calm empathy after the Christchurch mosque shootings. Barack Obamas disciplined cool in moments of crisis. Indra Nooyis blend of strategic rigor and personal warmth at PepsiCo. These leaders didnt let it all out in public, they exercised judgment over what to share, when, and how. Thats not inauthenticity; its responsibility. They understood that the role of a leader is not to model emotional indulgence, but to model emotional discipline. By contrast, the authentic tantrums of some celebrity executives resemble less a leaders rallying cry than a toddlers supermarket meltdown. If you cant imagine a behavior being effective in a kindergarten classroom, its probably not great in a company boardroom either. AsJennifer Jason Leighs character, Lorraine Lyon, alludes in one of the most iconic scenes of Fargo season 5, in which she confronts the tyrannic, megalomaniac and self-centered Sheriff Roy Tillman played by John Hamm, the only people who can rightly aspire to having absolute freedom without any responsibilities are babies. Sadly, there are many examples of adults, including those in very powerful positions, who appear to behave like babies in this precise way, but just because they may use their power and status to get away with such behaviors doesnt mean they are a role model to emulate. Warning signs If you are interested in knowing whether seemingly contrarian and nonconformist leaders are being authentic or just rude, obnoxious, or toxic, consider these five red flags: 1. Authenticity is one-directionalThey insist on radical honesty from their teams but treat dissent as betrayal. You can tell them exactly what you think, provided what you think is flattering. The moment feedback points upward, the mood shifts from openness to insubordination. True authenticity goes both ways; selective authenticity is just control in disguise. 2. The truth is always negativeTheir so-called candor has a narrow emotional range: somewhere between irritated and outraged. Praise is rare, appreciation rarer still. These leaders wear bluntness like a badge, but in reality, theyre simply defaulting to criticism because its easier than building people up. Its not that they tell it like it is, its that they only tell the parts that sting. 3. Accountability is for everyone elseWhen theyre late, its because theyre busy. When they miss a target, its because the market shifted. But when you slip up, its a character flaw, a cultural fit issue, or a sign youre not fully committed. They frame their own outbursts as passion and others as unprofessionalism. In other words, the rules are flexible, just not for you. 4. They confuse disruption with visionTheir proudest leadership moments are breaking rules, ignoring norms, or defying expectations, regardless of whether the outcome is useful. Disruption, for them, is not a strategy but an identity. The problem is that true visionaries break rules to create something better; these leaders break them because the chaos keeps them in the spotlight. 5. The audience is the pointTheir most authentic moments always seem to have a convenient audience: an all-hands meeting, a media interview, or a viral LinkedIn post. When theres no crowd, the grand moral stands tend to vanish. This isnt about honestyits about performance. Like reality TV contestants, they thrive on the optics of being real, even if the script is as calculated as any PR campaign. Weakness vs. wisdom In short, we should be careful not to confuse the absence of manners with the presence of truth. The value of authenticity isnt in broadcasting your inner monologue, its in aligning your actions with your values in a way that strengthens your relationships and your organization. A leader who controls their impulses is not being fake; theyre being strategic. A leader who spares you their worst thoughts isnt hiding the truth, theyre prioritizing the relationship over their ego. Thats not weakness; thats wisdom. So next time you see a leader praised for their refreshing honesty because theyve insulted a colleague, bullied a journalist, or turned a shareholder meeting into a personal grievance session, ask yourself: is this authenticity, or is it just power dressed up as courage? Because while anyone can be authentic, only the truly skilled know when not to be. And in leadership (as in poker) sometimes the smartest move is the one you dont show.
Category:
E-Commerce
Over the course of a decade at Amazon, Vikas Enti helped lead the retail giants deployment of robots in its fulfillment centers. Then he started thinking about how the same skills could be applied to one of the worlds biggest challenges: how to build low-carbon, affordable housing. The biggest catalyst was me becoming a dad of twin daughters, he says. My kids being born prompted introspection on where else I could be applying my skills that had greater benefits to society. He knew that the U.S. has a shortage of millions of homes, and a shortage of hundreds of thousands of construction workers. He also knew that buildings, which are responsible for around 40% of global emissions, are a key part of tackling climate change. And he realized that the approach his team had taken at Amazon could translate to the construction industry. Vikas Enti [Photo: courtesy Reframe Systems] In 2022, along with two other former Amazon employees, Enti cofounded Reframe Systems, a startup thats using software and robotic microfactories to drive down the cost of building housing. Today the company announced that it raised $20 million in a Series A round of funding led by Eclipse and VoLo Earth Ventures. [Image: courtesy Reframe Systems] Rethinking factory-built housing The construction industry has been relatively slow to embrace new tech. Its been a function of how fragmented the industry is,” Enti says. A home might be built with 25 subcontractors, and each subcontractor is typically a small business. “Construction as an industry has chronically underinvested in R&D because there have actually been very few players that have grown large enough to be able to afford an R&D budget,” he says. In theory, modular construction in factories could help bring down costs and build more housing faster. But of the handful of companies that have tried to scale up factory-built homes, some have struggled, like Katerra, which raised more than $2 billion before eventually filing for bankruptcy in 2021. Reframe’s founders started by talking to 18 different housing factories around the world to understand what worked and what didn’t. Some, particularly in Europe and Japan, had succeeded. Others had failed. Reframe also talked to developers to understand what it would take for them to consider switching to a new method of construction. [Photo: courtesy Reframe Systems] Before jumping to the step of designing robots, “we really obsessed over the problem,” Enti says. “What does it look like for us to build millions of residential homes that are great for the planet but also great for people’s wallets?” They landed on three main requirements. If they were going to build factories, they needed to be very cost-efficient and fast to buildless than $5 million and possible to deploy within 100 days. (By contrast, one of Katerra’s factories reportedly cost $150 million to build.) Additionally, each home needed to be cost-efficient to build, with at least 35% gross margins. And the factories needed to be easily adaptable to local zoning requirements that change from city to city. [Image: courtesy Reframe Systems] Mass customization Most factory-built housing takes an assembly-line approach. But Enti argues that it doesn’t work. “People say if you could only mass-produce homes the way you mass-produce cars, everything would be better,” he says. “The reality is when you look at the nuances of site conditions with 30,000 zoning jurisdictions in the country and with different state codes, it’s very hard to get one product that actually fits all these constraints.” Instead, he says, Reframe Systems embraces the idea that construction is highly local and diverse. “We’re not going to fight it,” he says. “So what technology do we need to develop so we can actually build snowflakes at scale?” [Image: courtesy Reframe Systems] It’s not unlike the challenge they faced in Amazon’s fulfillment centers, where each order was unpredictable. “You let the customer pick and choose anything they wanta red pen, blue pen, and teddy bear in the same orderand the job of the software and the robotics in the background was to make sure that the marginal cost to deliver this variability was zero,” Enti says. For housing, that meant developing custom software that can adapt to zoning codes, site requirements, or the architectural style that the property owner prefers. (Cosmic, another startup, is taking a similar approach.) The system also needed the ability to easily switch between housing types, from accessory dwelling units to single-family homes to apartment buildings. Reframe is particularly focused on missing middle housing, like duplexes and other small multifamily buildings. [Image: courtesy Reframe Systems] “We effectively have to invent what we call a high-mix, high-volume manufacturing process, which breaks the assembly line,” Enti says. In two of its first projects, currently under construction in Somerville, a suburb of Boston, the company is building two three-story triplexes. The designs are similar, but because one building sits on a corner, it has different requirements, including additional windows on one side. It’s the type of change that could be complex in traditional construction, but it took Reframe only a day to adjust and produce new plans. [Photo: courtesy Reframe Systems] How the system works At the company’s first microfactory, near Boston, it builds modules that are as fully finished as possible, such as kitchens complete with appliances. Then the modules can be delivered nearby and assembled on a building site. So far the company’s robot performs only a tiny fraction of the work: A robotic arm frames walls and ceilings. Reframe Systems aims to eventually automate around 60% of building tasks. Wiring and plumbing is installed in walls and floors by workers at the factory. Parts are precut and printed with instructions. The company’s goal is to make it feel more like assembling Ikea furniture or a Lego kit, in an industrialized way. Enti says even workers who are new to construction can handle complex steps through the process. The company’s approach can cut costs in a few different ways. First, Enti says, by eliminating subcontractors, it can reduce the markups that get passed on to customers. Building in a systematic way in a factory helps cut the use of materials, another major source of cost. The process is more efficient for workers, cutting the cost of labor. It’s also two to three times faster than traditional construction, so if a building is constructed for a developer, they can start getting returns more quickly. The houses are also ultra-efficient and wired for solar power and batteries, so residents can save money on electric bills. A network of microfactories The first microfactory is around 18,000 square feet, but later factories will be 50,000 square feet, or roughly the size of the garden center at a Home Depot. Reframe envisions running a network of factories across the country. The next location will be in Southern California, where the company plans to help rebuild homes in Altadena that were destroyed by the wildfire in January. The team is currently getting feedback from residents on single-family bungalows designed to fit into the neighborhood, from a Spanish-style house to a Craftsman cottage. [Image: courtesy Reframe Systems] At first, the company plans to build a handful of homes at its Massachusetts factory and ship them to California. Then, as it proves the demand is there, it plans to build a second microfactory in Los Angeles. “This is going to be our playbook to enter new markets,” Enti says. “We will always try to have demand precede capacity because we can launch our factory in 100 days. So the goal is that we ship product from existing factories to a new market, use that product to drum up demand, and then we convert that to go set up a new microfactory.” [Image: courtesy Reframe Systems] Reframe wants to build a million homes by 2045. (For reference, it took D.R. Horton, the largest builder in the U.S., about twice as long to build a million homes.) That would require around 800 microfactories to be up and running. [Image: courtesy Reframe Systems] “They might seem like large, scary numbers,” Enti says, but he points to Amazon, where the robotics team built only 300 robots in its first year a decade ago, but recently built its millionth robot. “It’s very hard to forecast exponential growth and scale,” he says. “My message to the team is it’s always going to be one home at a time, one microfactory at a time. But every microfactory that we build will be responsible for seeding the team that’s going to build five more microfactories. The demand is therethe need for housing is there.”
Category:
E-Commerce
I really dont want to do this. Im on my porch, holding a $300 glass-and-aluminum water bottle high in the airand I close my eyes as I drop a decade of a mans work straight onto the concrete to see if itll shatter. Hardy Steinmann is the creator of the Okapa water bottle, which the design firm Ideo and others helped him bring to life. He has spent the past 10 years on a quixotic quest to create the perfect luxury water bottle, and in the process he says he has overseen 10,000 prototypes. He has traversed factories around the globe. He has secured 71 patents. And now his creation is out in the worldand, as it turns out, in my front yard. Hardy Steinmann [Photo: Okapa] Theres a clang. Theres a bounce or two. But when I squint my eyes open and pick it up, the bottle is still in one piece. Sure, there are a couple of decent dents in the fancy anodized aluminum housing. But the custom German borosilicate glass within is undamaged, as are the medical-grade components throughout the design. It has passed the drop test. Can it take on the bigger hurdle: the unforgiving, competitive water bottle marketplace of 2025? [Photo: Okapa] HYDRATION AS STATUS SYMBOL Steinmann soft-launched the bottle earlier this year, and it is not a modest bottle. The packaging proclaims it is a technical feat of engineering beyond reason. It comes in colorways like Googie Silverline, Goldie Samba, and Fetische Noir developed by designer Beatrice Santicciolli. Steinmann never wanted to put an average water bottle out on the market. The 69-year-old Swiss-born creative has worked a kaleidoscopic array of jobs, including being the director of marketing and sales at the luxury watchmaker Hublot, EVP of Swatch Group USA, and CEO of the Swiss kitchenware brand Zyliss. He says he had a bit of an epiphany about water bottles around 20 years ago. [Photo: Okapa] I said, This is going to be a status symbol. And people looked at me and said, There’s no way. I said, You will absolutely see. You will have this with you, like a watch, sunglasses . . . And, well, he was right. From Nalgenes early-aughts domination to current hits like Stanley and Owala, the reusable water bottle market hit $9.7 billion in 2024, and its estimated to rise to $15.24 billion by 2034. [Photo: Okapa] The thing is, Steinmann says, unlike cars, sunglasses, watches, jeans, and other goods, there is no market segmentationand notably, a lack of high-end offerings. A self-described hydration fanatic, he believed that the bottles on the market were prone to odor and bacteria, they were made with cheap components, and they often leaked. So in 2015, he considered buying an existing company to fix the issues and create a better bottle. Ultimately, though, he decided, I’m just going to do it myself and align myself with some wild, great companies, he recalls. I wanted to create something really different, high-level across every touchpoint. [Photo: Okapa] HARDY ON TURBO One of those companies was Ideo. Thomas Overthun, Ideos executive director of industrial design, had worked with Steinmann on a line of Zyliss kitchen tools some 25 years ago. This time around, Steinmann explained what he wanted to create, ad Overthun asked: Why? Why a water bottle? Steinmann eventually showed up to an Ideo conference room with 300 water bottles and a challenge for Overthun: Find the one that you love. If you cant, you have to take on the project. [Photo: Okapa] Being a designer, of course you hate everything, Overthun says. It’s your job to be very critical. Maybe overly so. And I was like, I can’t find a good bottle. One additional thing Steinmann brought with him was a small Japanese perfume bottle, which was made of glass housed within aluminum. It formed the core for what Steinmann wanted Ideos help in creating. At the time, Steinmann says, he assumed the whole project would take three to five years. Now, a decade later, he attributes the extended timeframe partly to the pandemic. But with his animated passion, Steinmann comes off as the type of person who does not like to compromise. Hardy is not easy to please, Overthun says. And, you know, this was his own company, so it was Hardy on turbo with his very meticulous attitude. Or, as Steinmann puts it, I’m focusing on the challenge, and the more impossible it is, the more I’m going to try to do it. . . . I want to really push everything to the absolute limit. That’s in my nature. [Photo: Okapa] MEDICAL-GRADE H20 The Okapa project (so named because Steinmann worked in marketing and sales in Okapa, Papua New Guinea, early in his career) is unusual in its material. Microplastics are a constant talking point these days, but Steinmann says steel bottles can have issues of their own, as they can develop slight porousness when cleaned and bacteria can develop there. So for Okapa, he opted for medical-grade borosilicate glass for its lack of porosity, along with its high shock absorbance. To develop the bottle and its housing, he says he spent nearly every other week at Ideo in San Francisco for a year. Overthun says the team decided early on to use aluminum for the protective housing because it wouldnt be too heavy, and it would take to various quality finishes. [Photo: Okapa] The bottle within that housing is suspended between two silicon bumpers at the top and bottom, allowing it to float in between without touching anything else. Steinmann likens it to a high-end watch movement. While the glass can keep a drink cool or hot for a bit, it lacks the impressive insulation capabilities that many contemporary bottles boast. Steinmann counters, You can actually drink boiling coffee [in an Okapa], but to be fair, you have to drink it within two to three hours. If you don’t drink coffee within two to three hours, then you don’t need coffee. [Photo: Okapa] Instead, the Okapa doubles down on hygiene. The eight modular pieces of the bottle, all of which are fully recyclable, can be quickly disassembled Lego-style and cleaned. The cap is made from food-grade Swiss-engineered Grilamid TR90; the button to pop the lid open, the lock, and other mechanisms are made with corrosion-resistant Nitronic 60 stainless steel, which Okapa notes is used in the medical field. To improve on lids that wear out over time in general, Okapas feature an inner titanium pin and a hinge that springs open at the push of a button, stays back while drinking rather than collapsing into your nose, and glides closed with a (likely painstakingly scrutinized) click. Steinmann also wanted the entire unit to fit into a cars cupholder and provide seamless one-handed operation, which, indeed, it does. Finally, Overthun says the team spent significant time crafting a mouthpiece that feels organically good to use, and which also clicks out for easy cleaning (naturally, it boasts an Easter egg hologram inside, too). We had to touch on every point which is faulty and improve it by miles, Steinmann says. After hashing out the initial form factor with Ideo, Steinmann traveled literal miles farther to realize the rest of the bottle. He worked with factories in Switzerland, Germany, Portugal, and Japan, calling on metallurgists and other specialists. Overthun says Okapa was basically a startup with a full-time staff of one, and Steinmann managed to find manufacturers to help with the finer points of engineering, testing, and production. [Hardy and I] would talk a couple of times every year, and I was like, Is he really gonna pull this off? Overthun says. I aways just really admired his tenacity, and we all believed in the project. We wanted to see it, but it was really Hardys tenacity that brought it there. [Photo: Okapa] THE QUEST FOR CULT Steinmann soft-launched the bottle earlier this year without much fanfare. It was both a strategic and logistical decision. With the glass bottle being made in Germany and the other components in various other places, he says the quiet launch was partly due to the fluctuating tariffs rolled out by the Trump administration. But, to be perfectly honest, I wanted to also launch it like the best-kept secretcarefully, he says. I believe [with a price of] $295, you cannot hit people over the head. You let them marinate. There’s an educational process. He adds that the bottle is currently selling well, and that the companys next step is going to be showcasing the intricate nature of how its made, with a focus on social media, influencers, and so on. [Photo: Okapa] Im no influencer, but when I was testing the bottle a friend asked what, exactly, justifies the price. Theres the hygiene aspect, the long R&D road, the materials. But when it comes down to it, luxury doesnt always mean better. Often, it just means luxury. And a brand name. Time will tell whether Okapa can become one. Overthun sees the bottle as falling into the category of small luxuries, akin to how fashion brands capitalize on accessories. He believes Steinmann needs to foster a cult following around it, and that it will be a slow build. But hey, if anyone has a shot at playing the long game, it may as well be Hardy Steinmann. Hes a crazy man, Overthun says. In a good way.
Category:
E-Commerce
On August 21, customers of the luxury shoe brand Larroudé received an email urging them to stock up, refresh your wardrobe, and secure timeless pieces before tariffs drive up prices. The brand, like many others, is preparing for a new wave of President Trumps tariff policies to take effect by August 29and theyre relying on email marketing to keep their customers in the loop. Brands that ship product into the U.S. are currently anticipating the end of the de minimis exception, a loophole that previously allowed imports with values of less than $800 to enter the country tax-free. Trump nixed the de minimis exception for Chinese imports back in May, but on August 29, every other country is expected to be cut off from the loophole. The move will have major repercussions across industries. In an interview with CNN in May, Customs and Border Protection said that it processes nearly 4 million duty-free de minimis shipments a day. Already, some mail carriers are pausing U.S. shipments due to uncertainty around the upcoming changes. Marina Larroudé, cofounder of her eponymous company, says she expects pricing to rise substantially across the brands SKUs after August 29. So Larroudé is having a site-wide sale this week and using email to keep customers up to date. According to a new study from email marketing company Constant Contact, Larroudés strategy reflects a broader trend of brands turning to email marketing over the past several months to connect with customers in an unpredictable market. How Larroudé is prepping for August 29 Larroudé manufactures all of its shoes in Brazil before shipping either directly to clients homes or to a warehouse in the U.S. When the de minimis exception is lifted, every Larroudé shipment worth more than $800 will be subject to the 50% tariff that is currently levied on Brazilian imports. Larroudé says that the company does plan to absorb much of these new costs, but some of it will need to be offset by the consumerbetween 5% and 20%, depending on the product. Most of Larroudé’s inventory ranges from $200 to $500. The intention with the sale right now and offering like 30% on in-stock items is we wanted to offer the client a chance, if they’re thinking, Oh, I’m gonna shop this ballerina [flat] on September 1, it’s probably best if you shop it right now, Larroudé says. We want to be able to ship as many shoes out of Brazil as we can. After starting the sale and announcing the impending price hikes over email, Larroudé says the brand has seen a definite sales spikeespecially considering that at this time of year customers would normally wait for Labor Day sales to make purchases. Over the past several months, numerous other brands have relied on email marketing to loop in their biggest fans on impending tariff-related changes. In April, stocking brand Rachel informed customers over email that it would be removing a number of SKUs that relied on materials sourced or produced in China due to the scrapping of the de minimis exception and the then-145% tariffs on China. To put that into perspective: Our Tulip Ease Knit OTK Skirt, which currently retails for $78, would need to be priced at $191 just to cover the tariffs, the email read. Today, that skirt is no longer available on Rachels website. In May, pizza oven maker Ooni sent several emails to customers alerting them to upcoming price hikes. Let’s get straight to the point: The prices of Ooni products will be increasing starting June 2nd, one such message read. And on August 14, activewear company Girlfriend contacted customers to announce a major site-wide sale before price hikes related to the de minimis exception, similar to Larroudé. Since Girlfriend began, weve been proud to offer sustainable, earth-friendly clothing at comparable prices to nonsustainable brands, the message read. Unfortunately, on August 29th, the exemption on tariffs that made this possible is being removed, meaning we have to raise our prices to keep delivering the same quality our customers have come to love. Its sad and frustrating. Why brands are turning to email marketing in 2025 According to an upcoming report from Constant Contact, email marketing has become a much more essential tool for small to midsize businesses (SMBs) in 2025. Per the report, 44% of SMBs polled said email was their most effective marketing channelnearly double the response from 2024. Further, 39% of businesses reported being negatively impacted by tariffs, with 75% of those noting that theyve made some sort of change to their marketing tone in response, whether it’s focusing on stability and transparency (34%), showing more caution (15%), or using humor/fun to connect with customers (12%). Despite these shifts, in July and August only 1% of nearly 2 million emails analyzed by Constant Contact mentioned tariffs directly. Still, according to Michael Wood, Constant Contacts manager of North American communications, email marketing has clearly served a more central role this year as businesses navigate customer transparency in the era of constant economic whiplash. Overall, we’re seeing SMBs double down on marketing, especially email, as they navigate external pressures this year, Wood says. They’re using it to stay close to customers and keep communication lines open. For Larroudé, which ships more than 1,000 units per day, email messaging is an important way to make sure that repeat customers understand the corner that her business has been backed into by rising tariffs. We don’t want to raise prices, but we will have to, she says. So we try to be as transparent as we can. We have a lot of very loyal clients, and very high repeat clients, and this is our way to be like, Listen, shop at a better price while you can. It’s just a reality that not only Larroudé but all brands globally will face.
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E-Commerce
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