Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Uncensored Renegades. This is the 20-minute podcast where Kory Marchisotto and myself tackle one big question every week. I hope you enjoy this. Now, if you are enjoying it, I got one request to make. We're putting this out on the current Uncensored feed for a limited time only. So, if you're enjoying it, go over to Uncensored Renegades, hit subscribe, and never miss an episode. Anyway, without further ado, let's get into it. Okay, boss.
What's up? We're back. Hi.
We're back at it. I feel like we need one of those tour t-shirts that they have. You know the bands when you go and see them. We're like London, Milan, Paris, New York. Here we are in New York.
I think so. I've stopped counting now. I don't know where I am or what time zone it is. But something struck me the other day actually thinking about E.L.F. as I do quite a lot now because you've introduced me to this whole new world. Your mission about being bold disruptors with kind hearts. It struck me because I don't think I've seen a brand declare themselves as kind. Was that a conscious thing that you decided to do?
It was a very conscious thing. When I started the company almost seven years ago now, there wasn't a codified ethos. There was a set of principles, practices, beliefs. It wasn't codified. And what I wanted to do was take all the magic I was seeing around me and work together with a team that could put that into words that could become a shared language that could be repeatable, that could be a magnetic attraction for others, whether it's shoppers or employees or partners that we were going to force multiply with. And the magic that I was finding right at the top was really more about a persona. If I had to describe the company in a persona, what would that persona be? And what we came down to is E.L.F. is a bold disruptor with a kind heart. The bold disruptor part is actually not unique. There are other companies that are bold disruptors. What we were finding though is that they were fearless, which is a key part of being a bold disruptor, but they were also heartless. And we on the other hand were heart-full. So putting the two together was critical because the way in which we are doing the bold disruption is with kindness. And it was a really interesting conversation because when you actually boil that down and you say, okay, make a list of companies or people that are bold disruptors, you're going to have a short list. Then you say, okay, well, make a list of companies or people that are kind hearts. The list gets a little bit longer. But then you say, show me the intersection between those things, bold disruptors with kind hearts. And that's where you find the unicorns.
Because it's a very, very unusual combination. I mean, when you think about disruption, you tend to think about kind of breaking things, moving at speed, being aggressive, undermining the competition. It's quite sort of aggressive and challenging, cutthroat, difficult environment to be in. Kind isn't a word that I would kind of drop into that scenario. So, I just wonder how do you define kind in that context? Because kindness in, you know, we're not talking about kind of being slow or like making everyone feel good, but we actually, because you've had 25, 26 quarters now.
26 quarters. Congratulations. And you were ringing the bell, weren't you, down at the stock exchange just last week, weren't you? Celebrating your success. So, it doesn't mean compromising and being nice to everyone, does it?
So, I love that you just brought up the word nice because I think this is actually a really important point of distinction. There is a very big difference between being nice and being kind. So, when you think about being nice, very often times that means leaving things out. People think that being nice is not telling somebody they have a stain on their shirt or broccoli in their teeth or a smear on. You're being nice, you don't want to say anything. The kind thing to do is to tell somebody you have broccoli in your teeth. And even when you bring this into the business world, being nice is actually having somebody who's not in the right role stay in that role, which is not good for them or good for the company. Being kind is letting them go. So this is a really important distinction. Kindness can't just be about a single gesture. It has to be a habit. It has to be a practice, a principle, something that people are engaging with on a regular basis. And when you think about what E.L.F. does, everything that we're doing is purpose-driven. And it comes from a place of trying to make the world a better place for every eye, lip, and face. And that's where the kindness part is. What are the games that we need to change to make them more fair and equitable? Whether it's the boardroom or the playing fields or access to equity. That's kindness. Kindness is saying there is a game here that many people are being excluded from. What if we change the game to make it inclusive, accessible, and positive for everyone?
I love the way you frame that as a competitive advantage because you understand and care about your customer more deeply than your competitors do, and therefore unearths lots of insight. A book I'm obsessed with at the moment, I don't know if you read it, Unreasonable Hospitality, Will Guidara. He and his partner created the world's number one Michelin-starred restaurant. And what was fascinating about their story is they were trained chefs and they got to number 50. And Will, as he tells the story, went along to the celebration, the top 50 restaurants in the world, and what he realized is he looked around and everyone was doing the same thing in terms of food. And he worked out he could not beat them based on the food. So he said, I'm going to beat them based on the service. And what he decided to do was double down on understanding what every individual customer was there for. So, for example, and there are loads of amazing stories in the book, but there's a couple on their wedding anniversary and they've come to the restaurant and they suddenly remember they left the champagne in the freezer. They were going to chill it down. So he's like, hand me your keys. And he sends someone around to take it out the freezer. But it didn't stop there. That's the obvious thing. You know what he did is he bought a hamper round to leave in their house to wish them a very happy anniversary. When they woke up the next day, they had a breakfast already prepared for them. And the whole book is about going above and beyond, really understanding and caring for your customer. And they broke a lot of the rules of restauranting in terms of the way they dress and the way they serve and all the kind of pomp and circumstance and really, really cared about the individual. I thought it's really because in that context kindness actually is a way of delivering better customer service and understanding your customer.
Yeah, for sure. And it takes courage to care, as my friend Billie Jean King says so eloquently, because you're setting yourself up when you actually care. You could be setting yourself up for letdown. So it really takes a lot of courage to put your heart into the thing that you're doing, right? Because now you're making it emotional. You're making it a personal connection with people and their stories and their experiences and their moments. So there is a bravery required in putting yourself out there which by definition becomes an act of vulnerability. That gentleman who went to that person's house had to be thinking about what are they going to love and he has to change the way he sees the world right now to put himself in the shoes of empathetically with what it is that would make these two individuals very happy in this moment. And you brought up competition before, which I think is really interesting because the widely held belief is that we have to be at war with our competitors. And actually, our kind heart takes us in the opposite direction. We actually force multiply with people in our orbit. And I don't see why more people can't do that. So for example, there is a brand called Beekman 1802 that is actually selling kindness. And when you ask the founders about the business that they're in, they'll tell you, we're not selling products. We're selling kindness. And everything in their brand starts from the point of kindness. So much so that they actually created a kindness curriculum.
So, as a company that is a bold disruptor with a kind heart, I wanted to do my leadership offsite. So, I called them up. I called Josh and Brent. Those are the founders of Beekman 1802. And I said, I know you have a kindness curriculum. Kindness is a huge part of what we're doing, of who we are. I'd love to bring my team to your kindness curriculum. So, here we are at the house of a quote-unquote competitor learning from them how to exercise kindness, how to increase our kindness gestures. And what I found really fascinating is people think kindness is this soft skill. It's this idea of just using these heartful gestures. There's actually a science to kindness. And I'm actually going to look at my notes because I could never say this without what came from Dr. Brent. And Dr. Brent said that more exposure to kindness creates epigenetic differences and inherent changes to our DNA. So in fact kindness changes you and it changes you in meaningful ways and the kindness has to start with you. So if you think about if I am kind to myself in the morning before I leave the house, if I pour kindness into myself, if I pour kindness into my space, then when I get to the office or whatever environment that I'm in for the day, then I'm going to be able to also pour kindness into others. So that ripple effect then transpires. So if I'm kind to you, then now you're going to be kind to others. And you can see how that ripples.
The thought you just put in my head actually as you said that was when you give things away like that and you're kind to others, you do feel better yourself, don't you? There's something about that, you know, that actually it does change you, that brings a certain satisfaction and happiness and destress and so on with it. So you probably live a better life yourself even though you're kind of giving, focusing on giving things away. There's probably some truth to that, isn't there?
Yeah. And the other thing that they taught us which I thought was fascinating is that there's one thing that is standing between people and acts of kindness. What do you think that one thing is?
