00:00When you guys are embarking on creating a business, I always urge you to take it slow.
00:07Take what's at your hand.
00:09Like Dak did, Dak took what was at his hand.
00:12He had gangsters as friends that became customers.
00:16He knew they liked designer luxury goods.
00:19He took those ideas, he learned how to print designer logos onto fabric, and then he sold
00:27it to them.
00:28He took what was at his hand.
00:29I want to answer that as well.
00:31When you get investors, there are investors who are sprinters, and then there are investors
00:38who are marathons.
00:40If you engage your friend or people who are not familiar with the struggle involved in fashion,
00:47they're going to want to know why they can't make no money.
00:50Why we ain't making no money.
00:52If they're not in for the long haul, you're going to end up having to close your brand down.
00:57When I started my brand, and I walked away from the hustle life, I had my hustle friends say,
01:01man, I want to get down with you.
01:02I said, no, I ain't down.
01:03No, I'm not.
01:04No, I'll do this one.
01:08I'll do this one.
01:09Because I know that they weren't in for the end.
01:13Look, it's 30 years, 35 years it took me to get away.
01:16They might have wanted to kill me, man.
01:17Where's that money at?
01:18Where's that money at?
01:19Where's that money at?
01:21So I knew I wasn't going to get involved with them.
01:24And so, but this is what I caution people to do.
01:28When you start a brand, and you put your name behind a brand, that's a big gamble.
01:34I would advise young people to start a brand, a secondary brand, before they start their primary brand.
01:41Because your secondary brand will give you the opportunity to learn the pitfalls of what fashion is about.
01:48You know?
01:49Because then.
01:50You're another named app?
01:51Fashion is like, if you're a fashion designer, right, it's like you say something.
01:56And when you say something, you can't unsay it.
01:58Right.
01:59That's why the brands can't come back.
02:01All those brands had trash, you know?
02:04They my friends.
02:05I don't want to call their names out.
02:06But all those brands that crashed, they said, you going up there and want it out?
02:09Oh no, I ain't wearing that.
02:11You understand?
02:12Nobody want to be seen with that because they already fell down.
02:15They didn't have the right structure to keep them afloat.
02:19And what that structure is, if you start at the top, there's always room at the bottom.
02:24But if you start at the bottom, it's hard to get to the top.
02:28And so all those brands that came in, when they shut me down, they tried to cater to everybody.
02:35And then they would date it.
02:37And then they made no luxury lines.
02:40So they passed on.
02:41And this is a big problem because in the interim of the time that I went underground and all these brands failed,
02:49that gave the luxury brands in Europe time to restructure and understand what our culture was doing.
02:56zeroing in on that, create the same things that we were creating, elevated the price and the quality, and that's what we're wearing today.
03:06And then you have, I don't know whether it was a shout, or a band, or a little board, what happened.
03:13I don't know what to do.
03:15Jesus Christ, wasn't good dealing with you.
03:17Amen.
03:21Oh my goodness.
03:22Amen.
03:23Amen.
03:24Amen
03:27Amen.
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