BETA
This is a BETA experience. You may opt-out by clicking here

More From Forbes

Edit Story

What The Vineyard Vines Founders Know About Success That Thousands Of Entrepreneurs Don't

Following
This article is more than 10 years old.

Last Spring, I was more than surprised when my 15-year-old son came home from high school and began talking about clothes. Not just any clothes – Vineyard Vines apparel specifically -- including belts, ties, shirts, shorts, and more.  When my teen son mentions clothes, it’s something to pay attention to.

So I decided to check out Vineyard Vines, and found that it’s all the rage in my home state (Connecticut) and a popular and highly successful brand around the country.  The founders, Shep and Ian Murray  (ages 43  and 39), created the Vineyard Vines brand 15 years ago, and since, it has grown from a handful of island-vacation inspired silk ties sold on Martha’s Vineyard and Cape Cod, to a wide array of “exclusive yet attainable” men’s, women’s and children’s clothes sold online and in over 30 retail stores as well as in 600 specialty, boutique and department stores nationwide.  The company employs 125 people at the corporate office in Stamford, CT, and 500+ in the Vineyard Vines 30 national stores.  With annual sales over $100 million, Ian and Shep possess knowledge of the special ingredients required for amazing entrepreneurial success that thousands of would-be entrepreneurs would die for. (Read more about their journey from corporate employees to successful entrepreneurs, and their initial goal of “making neckties so we don’t have to wear them.”).

I caught up with Shep and Ian in August, when both were on vacation, living the “good life” that their brand embodies. (Their mantra: “Every day should feel this good.”)

I asked Ian and Shep a few probing questions about their success:

What did it take for you to make the leap and quit your corporate jobs to start Vineyard Vines?

Shep shared, “The hard part was just quitting – taking the risk.  We know that today, it would be much harder for us, with our children and family responsibilities.  At the time we were young – and we knew we weren’t happy doing our corporate jobs. We thought that the worst thing that could happen would be that we’d have to go back to work at a job.”

Ian added, “Our parents were travel writers and we grew up traveling the world and seeing amazing things,” Ian explained.  “Our grandmother owned a talent agency too, so we came from a long line of people who worked for themselves.  Our parents always supported us in everything that we’ve done, never pushed too hard, always encouraged us to follow things we liked to do and gave us whatever reasonable means they could to make it happen.  But at the same time there was a part of them that also said, ‘You went to great schools, got great educations, you have respectable jobs and are on solid career paths – are you sure this is the right thing?’

Shep continued, “But we just didn’t see ourselves on this corporate path - going in for reviews twice a year, making small leaps – it just wasn’t for us.   We are more hands-on and wanted to see the results of work that we created and built on our own.

“Our parents were cautiously optimistic and once we made the plunge they were fully supportive and our biggest ambassadors.  Up until the point we did it, however, there was NOT a lot of love or support of the idea.  Once we did it, all that changed, and we never looked back. 

 “So many people worry about quitting their jobs and taking the leap, but guess what? No matter what happens, you’re still going to be the same person.  Your whole world doesn’t have to fall apart if you make the leap and it doesn’t work out.”

What’s the key to your brand’s success?

“We sell an experience,“ Shep revealed.  “You can sell a bad product once to anyone.  The key is to success is generating repeat customers.  We’re not selling clothes – we’re selling a lifestyle. And we personally live this lifestyle and believe in it.  We’re proud and amazed at how we’ve become a staple and are compared to great brands that have been around much longer.

“The key to our success, we think, is the amazing team we’ve assembled, and our stores – we work really hard to provide a warm, gracious, helpful and inviting experience.  We do whatever it takes to make the customer happy.  Someone wrote about us recently that Vineyard Vines is ‘The American Dream Dreamt.’  I’d say we are living out our version of the American dream.”

What are your top five success lessons you’d like to share with other entrepreneurs?

Ian and Shep took turns sharing about the top 5 lessons they’ve learned:

1. Everyone has great ideas, but not everyone has the ability to follow through.

We’ve helped each other with follow through, because we realized there’s nobody here to tell us what we have to do.  In the beginning, every morning, we’d wake up and make a list of things we had to do.  This helped us stay motivated and on track.  You have to find a way to motivate yourself to do what’s required to build success.  It won’t just happen.

2. Have fun – just love it and believe in it. 

We’ve always believed this - if you don’t have fun at it, it’s not worth it.  We believe in what we’re doing.  We’ve seen that people who start businesses just to make money don’t have the staying power to do what’s necessary and get through the hard times.  We’ve found that when it’s something you absolutely love, you don’t easily walk away from it or do less than an outstanding job at it. We are also dedicated to giving back.  In addition to supporting the causes we believe in, we feel strongly about contributing to the charitable efforts of our customers and their communities. As a dear friend once told us: "Give back more to the community than you receive." We live by this philosophy, and we’ve built our entire company around it, too.

3. Empower your people. You can’t do everything yourself.

We’ve been blessed to build an amazing team full of creative, loyal and enthusiastic people who love the work and the brand.  We like to do things ourselves, but know we can’t do everything.  If a team member does something that we ask, it may not be 100% what we want, but it’s 90%.  We live in an imperfect world, and it’s essential to empower the people around you -- your team, customers, partners, vendors -- believing in them 100%

Loyalty is crucial.  Our people work WITH us not for us.  It’s the team attitude that propels us – that you’re only as strong as your weakest member.  We couldn’t do anything without their help.  We respect them, they respect us.  Teamwork is big part of our organization.

4. Be truthful.

It may sound cliché, but if you always tell the truth, you never have to remember what you’ve said. In business and in life, cutting corners catches up with you, always.  Integrity and honesty are very important and have critical ramifications.

5. Creative thought matters.

When we first started out with our hand-made silk ties, we had a clear vision of what we wanted on them.  We’d take pictures of street signs we liked on the Vineyard, and we hired freelance designers to lay out exactly what we wanted.  We taught ourselves how to use the software programs too so we could design ourselves.

We know it can be frustrating for the people who work with us to get our vision out of our heads and onto paper.  We were creative growing up, mostly focused on music (we both played jazz band in high school), and we believe that creativity matters in our business.  For instance, last month, our chief creative person helped us hold a four-day Creative Exploration retreat.  We called it our “Brand therapy” and it was powerful.  We want to push ourselves not to just keep going through the motions, but to think outside the box and evolve the brand.  Creativity and creative thought are vital to us.

Finally, Ian and Shep shared about the impact of brotherhood on their business.

“Being brothers makes it easier and more challenging. Too many businesses go under before they get off the ground, with the founders arguing about who’s doing what, and who’s going to sell, how they’re going to end it.  Knowing each other very well, we can tell what the other is thinking, and we can stand in for each other.  Sure, we drive each other crazy, and we sometimes settle things with our hands, reverting to when we were 8 years old (that’s very entertaining for the team).

“To that point, at the end of the day we’re always going to be brothers.  We may not always be business partners, but we can’t be ex-brothers.  Tom Scott of Nantucket Nectars told us that thing he underestimated in his business was the importance of the dynamic of his relationship with Tom First -- how special that relationship was, and how hard it is to duplicate.  There’s a magical chemistry between us that we are very fortunate to have.”

* * * * * *

In the end, Ian and Shep shared that, contrary to the advice of many entrepreneurial success pundits, they don’t have a master plan for the next five years.  They don’t want to just get bigger, they want to get better.  “We want the customer experience of buying our products to continue to be better today than the day before.”

Are you having fun in your startup?  Do you have a vision and mission that you believe in 100% and can empower others to support? Is every day at your business feeling as good as it could?

For more information on Vineyard Vines and Shep and Ian Murray, visit www.vineyardvines.com.

To build a more rewarding, successful career, visit KathyCaprino.com and The Amazing Career Project.