Inspiring Business Leaders

Description: Mycoskie looks to Richard Branson and the Virgin brand for inspiration.

Question: What business leaders inspire you?

Transcript: For the past five years, I’ve really just been inspired and kind of modeled a lot of the decisions I make off Richard Branson and Virgin. You know, what I love about what Richard Branson’s done, you know, specifically early in his career, was he took a brand that was counterculture, sarcasm, irreverent and he applied it to all these different industries that really weren’t connected at all. But he gave the same customer kind of this loyalty or this ability to be loyal to a cell phone or an airline or record label. And I think that is really cool. And I think it shows that it is possible for brands to kind of transcend their specific category.

Question: What did you have in mind when you designed TOMS shoes?

Transcript: The main thing with TOMS Shoes was I wanted to create a very comfortable, lightweight slip-on that you could wear anytime. So Vans and Converse have kind of owned that category. But Vans or Converse have a very thick, kind of heavy bottom. And so TOMS has a very thin, light rubber bottom. So it almost feels like a house slipper, but you can wear it outside. And really the design is inspired by the traditional Argentine shoe called the alpargata. And the alpargata has a rope sole, which looks really cool. But it isn’t very comfortable, and it falls apart whenever it gets wet. So by changing it to the rubber sole, now I gave it more comfort. It’s a little bit more urban, and it lasts a lot longer. And so, for me, TOMS is a shoe that’s all about travel. It’s about comfort. It’s about leisure. They squeeze up, and you can put them in, you know, in a laptop bag and carry them with you, you know, on a trip. There is no metal in them. So you can wear them through airport security. There’s a lot of good reasons why TOMS are perfect for traveling. But they’re also perfect for just walking in the park on a Saturday afternoon.

Question: Do people call you Tom a lot?

Transcript: People call me Tom every day. And if they don’t call me Tom, they want to meet Tom. And they’re always disappointed when they meet me. First question is I thought Tom was coming. So TOM stands for tomorrow. And that’s really where our focus is. I mean, the whole business model is based on making a better tomorrow. And so there is no Tom. But I kind of feel like, everyone who gets behind this movement, whether it be an employee, a journalist, you know, a store owner, all together we’re kind of Tom. And that’s really, you know, kind of our focus is on tomorrow.

Recorded on: 3/28/08