Being seen worn by the weekend post Malone Justin Bieber I've spent the last 12 years learning everything it is to know about the fashion industry like I've done everything from customer support to production to building the brand to content and I'd start again everyone would be able to trust me because I built represent already I guess it wouldn't be anywhere near as hard as starting again do you think um You know your brand popped off I guess like you know how many garments do you sell in a day a thousand plus don't think you're born
with ambition month you you learn that through your upbringing you see things and it makes you either girl [ __ ] that guy oh I want to be that guy and if you're the guy that thinks I want to be that guy that's ambition would you sell represent for 400 million pounds My dad would never stop never showed emotion and then I had my mum that would sit on the end of my bed at night and be like Oh George I believe you're gonna make it something about you that I know that you're gonna make
like do successful get great get great results and do things so I had both of them elements telling me these different things and then I really like is that look today we are with one of the Masters of The fashion industry what we hope for this podcast is to bring as much value as as possible saying both his experience and also our experience from from growing new project so yeah what he said one of the most special broadcasts today the man we have in front of us has been 11 years in the game he turned
a college project and went to one of the greatest brands in Europe the brand kind of blew up in 2019 and went from 8 to 80 million pounds and this this 2024 it's Been seen worn by the weekend post Malone Justin Bieber and man the guy is George Heaton from represent himself let's go thanks for having me boys [Music] okay [Music] thank you [Music] I just want to be really honest from the start we were able to catch up yesterday but is we told you we came all the way To Manchester right now when you're
we're in your new offices are amazing by the way and we just told you first this was a proper like special experience because from Spain when we started the brand the only real reference we we had when starting the clothing brand was like Ben Francis and everything he did because he documented everything and then the next person we found was you we saw a podcast where you were with Rich robara which also has a Brandon and Louis Morgan who started gymshark and I remember it added so much value to our lives where it kind of
also inspired us to start the podcast and everything we're doing now so being able to sit with you yesterday and stuff it was like [ __ ] yeah that's that's probably real that's so Dopeman it's cool that like I get to change people's lives as well and even though it's you guys that are putting so much work into it yourself like we still give off a little bit of Inspiration through what we show on social media or podcasts or whatever it is so that's so that's so cool so my first question yards is as I
want to make it as relatable as possible to the people that are watching us I would like you to imagine that tomorrow me and Bruno take your Rolls Royce we you lose the 90 kilos of muscle that you've gained throughout these years and we just and you just appear in the center of of Manchester uh basically with the 150 pounds that you started your bandwidth what would be everything that you would do to try to get back to where you're at in today's environment I guess my question back to you is do I get to
keep the same skill set that I have now um [Music] yes you can keep okay well the thing is man I've been I've spent the last 12 years learning everything it is to know about the fashion industry like I've Done everything from customer support to production to building the brand to content to designing the clothes so I kind of know what I need to do um I would go back to the same connections that I have have made through the brand and I'd start again everyone would be able to trust me because I've built represent
already they know what I'm capable of they know the team that I can build and they know the mindset that I've got to create Whatever it is that I need to create so I guess it wouldn't be anywhere near as hard as starting again with nothing so being able to talk up with you we were like how do we do this podcast how do we make it special and we're like [ __ ] there's so many kids that are going to be watching this their dream is to start a clothing brand or maybe might not
even be to start a clothing brand but to be in the industry or to somehow work as a designer and represent whatever it could Be we wanted to be like a super graphic thing of step by step how to start a clothing brand you know because we know your story and I want the world to know too but it's like how does it start you know first step let's say it's the idea in the early days yeah like where does the idea come from and how is it born I think it's small steps I think
writing down a list of too many things that you need to do and thinking about all Different product categories and who you need to employ is something much further down the line I think you got to take everything one percent at a time right so first establish your name I think a name the name is number one right that's that's your brand make sure you get a name make sure you get that trademarked um just for the record we both had issues for yesterday crazy issues bro and I don't know if you can tell your
story because you have a crazy story Yeah I mean I can tell it to some extent we fought for many years to try and get our name back because we hadn't done the right things in the right areas and um that led to such a like a bad place in the business that eventually when it finished that we'd put so much work in into that one thing that we it made the business flourish because we knew what we wanted to do after that and we were we were stuck there so yeah that's I'd always say
that's number one number one Establish your name create the brand IP get up get lawyers to to sort out what it is where you want to grow make sure you've got the names in the right places yeah some people think that the name is having the username on Instagram right it's not it's way more than that right it's a business it's not like we had we also had an issue where it's like we had a name beforehand of the one we have right now and we had we already had 50 000 followers it's me and
Alex we're Like 20 at that point bro we might really live off this there's like because being able to live off the brand seemed like such a yeah a long time and then we we're finally getting a tiny bit of a taste of like bro we financially independent you have to change your name because there's already a brand that has a similar name right so like you've gone through that process now so you know that's happened you know you won't make that mistake Again and if you can tell the kids that are listening to this
this is what I did this is how it happened they're not gonna they're not gonna go through that so they're learning so much easy detail that you don't learn in school or college or no one tells you about that stuff so to listen to us guys talk about it that we've been through it firsthand we've been through those struggles it's so much better and it means it means that they don't need to do it so I'd say That's number one um I'd say there's probably three fundamentals I'd say your name and the name sorry didn't
interrupt but the name where does it come from in your case represent actually I was in college I wrote a list of names on a piece of paper and decided that represent would be the one that's right so yeah and I guess you've created that through having that name like really yeah like your name is a representation of yourself Excuse the pun but like nude project is a representation of you so like you said a blank canvas like that's the brand ethos it's about like how can I represent my whole self and it works with
the brand name so I guess you build that around the name what are the other two fundamentals first is the name yeah I'd say the name I'd say your brand DNA so the Aesthetics how it looks how you want it to show up how you want those kids to see it what Is your storefront what is your Instagram page like what what is that look if you can continue that look and not have to swap and change and go for different directions and follow other brands like if you could if you can keep that strong
solid image of your brand and people can buy into it they know it's always there I think that's that's a very strong one even with you guys you're so good at that yeah like the way the brand comes across you know boom That's new project straight away before you even see anything come up about your name or the brand like you see their videos you put out there I know it's you that's cool so like DNA definitely is number two and a question to that uh you open a little bracket is at the same time
I think they represent from four years ago or from when I started seeing it to the representatives today is I wouldn't say it's a different band but it's just involved so much yeah how how Do you do like keep like the okay I want to be solid to my Foundation but at the same time I evolve as a human yeah if I'm changing and for example say you don't like Rock tomorrow anymore yeah you can't keep making Rock t-shirts because yeah of course so I think like with how we mature as humans should be displayed
in your brand especially if it's something personal to you and you use yourself as influencers of the brand like the way you grow up Should be should be given off in the brand because it's your brand right I'm not going to be wearing the same clothes I was wearing 10 years ago but the evolution of them clothes is the same as the evolution of my mindset and how I want to dress where I am like what I earn like the whole brand can continue with that story and I think that's that's the beauty of like
personal Brands yeah and if you look historically and we were watching the other day for Example the documentary of Ralph Lauren yeah or when we watch the documentary of Playboy both of the founders are an exact representation of what do you see today and that's what brings us the I guess the the responsibility of growing ourselves as as a person as much as we possibly can every single day you know and probably just let me say I'm kind of pissed off a little bit because we we don't stop saying represent you know it's a Representation
that was a good choice there has to be some magic with the name yeah but but like going back to the question it's like imagine having the new project right and this is how it looks and you decide that's it forever and you grow as people and you change and you get older and you're still creating that same thing it's not going to be enjoyable for you you want to be creating things that get you excited that you want to wear That you want to be a part of this your lifestyle so just let it
mature with yourself so yesterday when we arrived to the to the hotel I was talking to Bruno and I was thinking man like something that I find is very similar between what you're doing and what we're doing is that we have a super super strong purpose and and a huge passion for what we do and for me that would be like my biggest ingredient in any type of of whereas to become a successful brand you Know and I think it shows every single day and it's it's crazy to see how there's so many people that
have literally millions of dollars and I see them unhappy in comparison to for example what could be Jake Paul who literally he made millions of dollars and now he's getting punched in the face every day and he's literally working every day yeah so I think that's Supreme yeah it Makes you think doesn't it like even if you went and got offered a lot of money for your brand like what are you gonna do next I guess you can go and find the next thing that you'll be inspired by that will become your mission like Jake's
now fighting but like if your brand is so personal to you want it you want it forever right [ __ ] it's a it's a big question you know because I think constantly in life we kind of as you grow up and you're very stuck up on this One thing for first it could be the brand yeah you kind of question like why am I doing this like why am I sacrificing why is uh George tahiran waking up every day at 4am to go train and go work and then go sleep and work and sleep
and work and I think we all every once in a while ask yourselves why the [ __ ] are we doing this you know and I think for us it's always been like what would I be doing if I wasn't doing this yeah I'd be [ __ ] a lot like we started this I told you yesterday it's our first job and we're super blessed to be able to say that but this was 18 it was our first job yeah so it's like I literally have no idea of what I would do and when we've
ever thought or like or we've gotten offered to buy the brand or anything or just even remotely thought about it we've always said why would we do something outside of this if we can do everything inside of this in the Sense of like we told you yesterday we started the brand then we started the podcast and we're like let's do that under the brand yeah because we want to talk about the progresses and we want to talk about everything this means to us and hopefully that helps some kids and it literally has you know it's
become very big friends it's it's not part of the brand it's part of the lifestyle like that's why even with me with 247 so many people say why is it not a separate Brand because represent is my life like why would it be why would I want to separate things out when it can all be under the same thing like we live in a Time and Time know where everything can be the same every like you don't you're not you don't like constrained to just being a clothing brand like you guys are not just I
just sell t-shirts no like you run the podcast under the brand they're doing Footwear now with the brand you're doing collaborations with The brand you're doing other homework with the brand you can make this thing like more than just fashion right yeah we literally just started a beer which is the most random thing we use exactly but it proves that you can do anything yeah yeah and I wanted to touch like at the point I just want to say we're not drinking the beer but it was the most amazing beer I've had in my life
but it's George made us wake up at 9am today and I don't know 10 a.m beer is the Thing you know like George you're more than welcome to go I've taste this esta yeah it's very nice I wanted to touch like going back to what we're speaking about this whole passion thing this whole purpose thing because is that the the issue that you see among the many kids that are starting right now that they they might start because of the money the fame and the success and maybe not focusing on that inner purpose or Yeah
I think so but at the same time like you can build it into your purpose you can make it your mission dude I went through many years where I hated doing it I didn't want to do it for a long time didn't enjoy it didn't enjoy coming to the to the office the brand wasn't doing well the way I was designing things wasn't the right way and I didn't enjoy the brand and it was it kind of fell out of purpose to me and you just build it your bit it's like a it's like A
muscle you build it you do it more and more and more you get more interested in it you get more love back from it and it becomes like more of a purpose a purpose-driven thing because like the more you do something the better you get it's like anything like if you decided today I'm going to start running you can run one mile in three weeks you can run three miles in two years you can run an ultra marathon like you just get better at it and better at it and you start Enjoying it it's the
same with building a brand and that can be in any industry in any type of brand like you don't have to come and follow us and just do the same thing that we've done like you're in the same stages as what I was in a couple years ago like we're doing the exact same thing there's guys out there that probably aren't too interested in fashion but they still want to build their own brand like you can do it with anything it doesn't have to be Purposeful at the start and also just looping back to the
initial question which was like the three pillars to start the brand you said the name brand DNA and then the last one last one for me is like the product what are you selling like what is the mission like is it the price point is it the quality like what is that product that you want like make sure everything aligns to that like the sole purpose behind represent is to be able to supply the best quality Products the best fit product the best delivery next day mostly all over the world like before even get the
tracking I want that thing delivered to that guy's house wow and I want them to be so happy that when they receive it it's way better than what they imagined because of what they paid for it so for me that's like the third element is like deciding on what that product is is it quality are you doing it for a profit are you doing it for a purpose Like what what is that element and make sure that's number one I think it's like one of the maybe might be the toughest thing like what what is
the product I'm doing how are the margins like it's a very important part of the business that many people don't look at as much um and I have two debates which is one is pricing and one is volume versus exclusivity yeah the thing of um we all know in a world where everything is so vastly Um accessible like you can go on Amazon and you can have a package the next day right you can go in any website and look at the information like I can search up George heat and now you just get a
Wikipedia of you and I can kind of basically know your life just for one tap uh now you can ask him anything you can write crazy things for you you know it's everything super accessible and I think in a world where everything's super accessible what people value and Stay more is exclusivity so like oh I'll put an example I go to Chrome hearts in Miami I'm trying to we go to the store because we're just looking at different stores and [ __ ] I knock on the store it's empty I knock and I'm like yo
can I come in I want to buy something the guys I know you can't I'm like what do you mean like yeah how am I not gonna be here and he's like oh you need an appointment I'm like okay can I get an appointment for like in 30 minutes no no There's not an appointment for the next four days like bro I'm leaving Miami like what do you [ __ ] want you know you want to fight no but I thought it was is very interesting of like oh this is the the culture this is
this is the exclusivity and we've all we've had an ongoing debate in urban too of like how exclusive do we want to eat how much do we want to grow and I kind of just wanted to ask how you see it and how you deal with it and represent I like to sit On the fence so I like to do both say exclusivity and hype is on this side and a real strong business that is able to deliver on this side I like to sit right in the middle that's cool I will will push our
basic product and our entry level product through every day you can buy it in the stores you can buy it online we'll always make sure we've got that in stock take an example that could be like the owner's club right owner's Club collection great quality product Very entry level basic colors for the guy that's new to represent and then on the other side we'll have a high product so that is super exclusive for my only run 50 pieces or 300 pieces we might only launch it for one hour we might launch it for 24 hours
we might only launch it in one store in London or a different store in New York like we'll do both so some weekends will be launching with a store other weekends will be put in full continuity out there I liked it I like to bring the essence of both yeah balance them both because we've got both customers we've got guys that want to just quickly chop online get it the next day they want to wear it on the weekend they need to buy it on a Thursday night and then we've got the guys that are
super into the brand where it's like their Die Hard funds where they know they need that one of 50 pieces especially I'm curious about how Cortez for example is going to play out Like this you know they're super super hot right now super exclusive super exclusive you literally can go on the website and buy something and we've seen and we have seen in the past how Supreme uh taking that super exclusive route and they ended up getting a 1 billion dollar valuation yeah I think it depends who you are as a person like how what
what is it what is the status you're going for do you want to be able to supply goods for everyone Do you want to be able to supply goods for just the top one percent do you want to give it to just exclusive people do you how much money do you want to make like how how well off do you your family to be do you want the team to succeed like there's so many different elements that you can go down and think about but for me a solid business and what we're trying to do
is become great for everybody have some exclusivity have some Continuity and create a great brand of course I mean that's what you see across the biggest runs in the world you think about La Costa or atomical figure or Nike they have they have the product Matrix super super well yeah the sneakers Travis Scott they'll release those exclusive 30 000 pairs super exclusive sellout but they'll also have the exact same shoe slightly different material mix that goes into all the bottom stores That are selling it at 80 90 Euros whatever and they're selling thousands every single
day but the guys that are buying the Travis Scott are so blind to the guys that are going in the store picking up the same shoe so I'm talking about Nike they just did for example they're very good at doing like Niche collaborations they just did they did knock the note with Drake they did Cortez which was like inner think about it in the macro it's not massive because Cortez is is growing slowly but in with the like seven billion people there is in the world that probably a lot of them but a lot of
people buy Nike they might not know Cortez but in the street world world in the realm yeah it's like the biggest thing that's existed in history like him [ __ ] in the billboard boom like I couldn't do that just because you know we're not like that incredible brand incredible it was massive man and I really I want to hear your opinion About Cortez because I think it's very interesting people yeah look I think that he's come into a space where Supreme was kind of that air that that in that space like so was Palace
there was these brands that are now quite old and quite established like yeah someone had to come in and take that Spotlight yeah he's come in and he took that Spotlight and he's running with it and I think he's doing amazing and why do you think it's so like what is special about Cortez what made it [ __ ] because it it got a heart I think some people just do the right thing at the right time and I think that was him and the way he's gone about the press and who he shot for
and like even like Emily on door using them him as their model and then now Supreme last week using him like he knows what he's doing he's doing it extremely well probably has a really good team behind him Supreme used him as a man Like think about this we've all been saying for the past year like oh Clint is the new supreme and then maybe that'll be a collab as well like that's the ultimate he's an attainable do most that is that's surprised that police are all for sure and uh for example like I remember
you saying I want to make a clothes that they are premium they are luxury but they are still affordable to a 25 year old are they still affordable for a 25 year old For me yeah they just about like it's what I see it as is like the 25 year old that's working a normal job that sees it as an inspiring brand he can just about afford to represent it's not like I'm putting prices out there at least 700 for a hoodie like it's 200 it is Affordable like for our Market it's affordable for your
marketing but at the same time I bought the shoes and I bought the best yeah It's like earlier when we said about sitting on the fence I feel like I sit on the fence there because I'm I'm delivering the quality of the brands that are 10 times the price of me but I'm also attainable just about yeah I think at the end of the day the way I see it is you have to be honest and when I mean honest is the client no one is stupid you know the client gets your hoodies paid 200
Euros if he doesn't feel it's worth 200 Euros he's gonna be Like yo this guy's robbed me in a way you know yeah or it's like the guy when the guy buys Zara for example um a fast fashion for the people to know it they spend four years on the T-shirt yeah and maybe in three weeks it's already in the garbage because it's not a good quality t-shirt but you know what you're paying for you know it's the value for money so I think that's the most important thing the value you're giving is according to
that and that's not only quality but It's the brand the values the packaging even like it's the whole experience the whole experience exactly I think it's very fair you know and the client decides at the end of the day because the client decides but the most important thing is that client coming back you know it's way more important than even getting new clients exactly it's way more easy and we're a servant to that client so if you can deliver them well if you can over deliver for What you're actually giving them then you've got them
bro they're coming back with this I wanted to ask you right now you're in a moment where it's like rocket ship no you're going you're you're doing you did 50 million last year this year you're bound to do 80 million I'm not mistaken yeah yeah 80 million I saw a press article that said in 2025 we're gonna do 250 million so that's that is numbers you know that is numbers and that is speed do you see in This rocket similar where you just get new office everything is incrementally better do you see like oh this
could possibly also go down and like what do I do if that happens yeah I'm not gonna lie and say no like I still think about that every day I'm sure every leader does this in a business it's growing so fast and like maybe you're going to make a lot of wrong decisions and look we're bound to make a lot of wrong decisions but it's like how we show up how we like We go back to talking about the quality of the product if I can maintain the quality of the product and I can build
a great team that can sustain this business for way longer than what I can myself then we're going to be fine like I don't see I don't see too many issues that are going to trip us up so much because we're showing up we have brand guidelines we know what we're going to do we know how we're going to do it especially you have this this customer That is the maybe you're telling us yesterday you know that the average British guy that bought one t-shirt and right started getting addicted yeah wardrobe if I can sustain
that loyal customer that really loves the brand then it can't go down like the loyal customer is mean and my team we're all so bought into the brand like everything we do everything I touch everything that I fit every day it's like I make sure it's perfect and I can get it better and Better every season every time the brand can't stop we'll get now to the Target customer is something I want to to go deeper on but also I feel like you're super strong in product yeah it's something that we need to work more
on and something that they see many of the of the young kids that are starting closing Brands they they don't have the experience they don't have the team but it's important that when your brand has this first traction to invest on your Product and invest in your team of products right you you'll have how many designers you have for example here and in the product team we have around 20 people 20 people between designers and designers developers garment tax graphic designers and then apart from that there's the like the buyers yeah there's buyers merchandise production
all that yeah so how did you started growing that team I like your brother took Mike was always really really really good with Graphics like the guy can sit down for 14 hours and just design not even look at his phone so naturally like when we took our paths he stayed in that path like we both come from graphic backgrounds he took that path of Designing the graphics that go on the clubs I took the off of Designing the clothes okay and because there was no blueprint there like the reason why I'm doing this the
reason why we're doing the YouTube the reason why we're showing Everyone everything is because there was no blueprint for me I didn't know how to build a team I didn't even know what a Garmin Tech was I didn't know what a production manager was when either well nothing so like we just built the team by saying okay we're doing too much on this let's get someone else to help with this and then bring someone in who's gonna make the patterns for the clothes yeah so I just built it over like I've been doing this now
for 12 years for Eight nine of them years it wasn't a success it was just a hard learning that this is how we've got to do it and building a team and building such a structure that then we know okay we have the ability to do this now let's go out and we're also trying to create a blueprint with a podcast and I think today is like a pivotal moment where we can really go step by step so I want to say okay team you just talked about a whole thing of like all hiring people
Designers everything but I remember when I was starting first of all is finding a partner now for example example you your business partner is your brother and tell me about that but Alex and I we met each other through social media and I was living in Bali when that back then he was living in budokush which is like it's like Manchester but way stronger and it's in the middle of Spain but and it was like we were the furthest apart but we had this look with social media We had very similar interests we started following
each other talked to each other met up and then a month after that we we started the brand well that's so special not many people have that one like I see so many Brands fall apart because the the owners the relationship yeah because we literally say it like our relationship might even be more important than the one with their wife when we find her you know and so it should be bro It sounds like a bro moment you know but it's the truth because new projects my life with our relationship not being solid nude project
wouldn't exist no it wasn't literally because he has something that adds to the Brand Avenue the other part and it's like a perfect Dynamic but it wouldn't work with either both imagine if you both were the exact same it wouldn't work that's why it works with me and my brother we're so different in so many ways even though we Have the exact same vision of where we want to see the brand Mike is so different to me I'm so different to Mike that like it works perfectly we say it constantly like we're fully yin yang
you know like he likes late nights I like early mornings he likes maybe more parts of the business I like maybe some more creative points and it's like that with everything you know like literally everything it's so good that you two map like how unbelievable is that it's wild And that's why we say yesterday we were because after talking to you actually he told me he's like well people talk about look and [ __ ] this is not luck like we met you and we're like we know this was meant to be yeah you know
and that we say that in the biggest compliment but we like it makes sense everything makes sense now you know and we I was saying yes for me it might be like a 50 50 you know like 50 look why do I mean say 50 look the parents I had which were Extremely loving and gave me an amazing education anything I could more want the people I've met in my life that's not luck though the people you've met in your life is because you've gone out there and looked you've gone yeah maybe 7 30. he's
right and he said that too he's like we met because we had similar interests and towards the universe we were kind of like attracting that you know this is not luck this is you going out there and [ __ ] finding what you Need a hundred percent it's inside you bro yeah your upbringing has a bit to do with it but it's not luck everyone in the world has the ability to go on social media they've got the ability to meet people the ability to look at things be inspired by things that doesn't mean it's
lucky yeah to be honest you push the boundaries on on luck and done the right thing to be honest like the only part I really consider to look is like how you were Born and how I was born and the things I was naturally born in with my head like for example the ambition I have right I don't think I've created but you think you were born with ambitious yeah I don't think you're born with ambition man you you learn that through your upbringing you see things and it makes you even go [ __ ]
that guy oh I want to be that guy and if you're the guy that thinks I want to be that guy that's ambition you might be right because There's a profound about debate about whether all our lives our conditions or condition or not or until which extent you have control over all that yeah you can you can dive a lot a lot of deepness into how that happens and like for me I believed it was like I was brought into a family where my dad was super hard working never stopped never showed emotion tough tough
guy like I had that side and then I had my mum that would sit on the End of my bed at night and be like Oh George I believe you're gonna make it when I'm in school can't do anything no no good at nothing she'd be sat on my bed like there's something about you that I know that you're gonna make like do successful get great get great results so I had both of them elements telling me these different things and then I really like is that look you know what reminded me of that a
little bit that's crazy but you know what reminded Me of the relationship Kanye had with his mum I don't know if you guys watch the documentary and stuff but Kanye says like his mom was a a [ __ ] vital instrument in his career in his life and it was that she was there and she gave them this extreme self-confidence and now we know Kanye or like and everyone knows Kanye and it's like oh he's a bit crazy or he's or he's too extravagant he's too and it's like no is that extreme self-confidence that his
mom Embedded in him because she was like yeah with Michael Jordan greatness same with gravy also for someone did you watch the ad uh documentary the film Michael Jordan Michael Jordan of course yeah I watched the last dance his mom on that the last uh not the last yeah bro they got to meet Jordan's mom in the movie and it's like she sits them down in the garden and she's just like this guy is going to be the best basketballer Universe ever and it's like Dude if your mum's telling you that as a kid you're
not gonna believe it that's gonna guess I don't know but like watching what you said about your parents it looks like your father gave you that or built into you that pretty extreme discipline and like work ethic and that your mother gave you that like unbelievable confidence that you were capable of achieving whatever you want to do yeah when I was a kid she kind of told me like you have to do this like You have to be great so it's like right I've got that my back is against the wall if I don't do
that I'm gonna [ __ ] no my Mom and Dad aren't going to be proud of me then I've got my dad that like shows up to work at 6am doesn't leave till 8 PM doesn't say one bad thing about it no complaints every single day of his life so I've got that event put them two together can you build me it's [ __ ] sick come on no but I I think that's I think That's magic man and I think that's is really part of it it's like mentality is such a big thing and
also like when I question myself why I do this why I keep pushing harder and like because I think it's part of it but you realize that when for example with the podcast we're looking at a lot of people that are watching this and hopefully Everyone likes it and hopefully we can add value to their lives but at the end of the day my biggest goal is for my parents to be Proud of me yeah it kind of it sounds a bit weird you know because they should be the people that are proud of you
no matter what right right but bro when I do anything big or when anything any Milestone we hit the first people I'm calling is my parents and they're the only people on this Earth that I can tell them anything 100 real without having to like touch it up or fake it a little bit and they'll always want the best for me and they'll be the most real Too they'll be like harsh when it's supposed to be harsh but at the same time they'll be like the most loving and accepting and just see my dad or
my mom like I remember we got I got an award and Alex wasn't there because he was somewhere else but we got an award it was like a fashion award or something and it was uh my parents were there for the first time and it was like the first thing that I'd done in front of them where they could see how tangible this Was and I bet you felt way better than than any other thing but I almost started crying and we've gotten bigger Awards and we've gotten bigger things and it was just like a
smaller word but it was like they were right there and my mom was like almost tearing up and I was like what would you say where the difference between your brother and you um I just think I'm I was I had to drive to like not let anybody down and I guess Mike didn't have that from the start like I was I was just so like not angry as a kid but I was so forceful on like that I had to do this thing that like and he had to come with me like there was
no way we was gonna let Mike just go off and do his own thing like I didn't want that for him my dad didn't want that for him like my dad and my granddad had a family business so like why wouldn't I make this my family business like this is me and Mike 50 50. I don't Want it to be anything else you never had a second thought of like oh this whole family working with family could it be would it be bad because I think there's a stigma in the world yeah everyone thinks that
family friends you know I think it's all about respect right like I respect Mike and I want the best for Mike like I would die for Mike and I'm sure he would die for me so like we've got to make sure this thing works and no matter what the decisions are Made in the business whether it's us or other people in the business like it's all for the best it's all for the best results like we've got a team we've got to build we've got to make that team satisfied we've got to grow the business
we're going to make all of our customers satisfied like they're all our number one number one aspects to the brand so we've got to do everything we can to serve them and uh going back to the initial question which was team you know And how to grow a team okay we talked about the initial phase which is finding a business partner yeah which is not 100 necessary because you can build it on your own I think personally for me finding a partner was a great thing like the only advice I would give here is like
find a partner I think it's a good idea to find a partner because it's very this game can be very tough and it can be very difficult at times and being able to Have a person that can understand you 100 in everything you're feeling and also celebrate with someone that knows how it feels exactly and the bad things being able to feel it with a person didn't know exactly how it feels that is magical because we see when we see Race For example where guy from any other War by himself by himself by himself he
goes home he loves it now he loves being by himself But for me it would be yeah when we have a bad day we live together and I think you and your brother live together I get home and I can be [ __ ] yeah whatever but he will laugh at the problems yeah he's right there and we're like [ __ ] cracking up this happened yeah you know and bro you the same with like your close team like I've got John I've got Spenny I've got Steph I've got James like China we we were
literally like we will lose Our minds over something that's gone wrong and then we'll all just think about it and just [ __ ] have a laugh at that really like no one actually knows what's going on until you launch the products and it's all on on site or whatever like nobody knows nobody cares as much as you either I think this is the type of thing you study in marketing that's your business class and you're like oh mission and vision and [ __ ] you know and it's like you don't give it Much thought
or like or how important it really is and even for us in the beginning we didn't have one yeah like we didn't have one consciously there was one there that was being created but we didn't put in a piece of paper and I'm like oh this is my mission same dude I didn't do that for you and it happened like I think it was our third year we sat down with like a coach or something we were trying to figure it structured a bit more of the business and then we did A brainstorm like three
hours and we ended up coming up with it and our mission is like to inspire the the new generations to live from their passion you know I think and kind of where like a living example of what we're doing uh and when I remember when he clicked when we talked about it it was like [ __ ] we've been doing this the whole time we started the podcast we showed the process we were very transparent of how we did things because we wanted kids to Be able to do in their own way but we never
put into words but we were already living it yeah I want to know what what your mission is and how how you came up with it I think I've got I've got two I've got a one for represent I've got one for three four seven and again it was the same with us like we were just living it not talking about it and just doing it all the time but really like the mission for represent is to build the best brand in the world obviously That makes no sense because you'd have to be Nike or
apple they would have to be the guys so what it actually means to us is like we got to do the best at everything we can I can talk to you about products I talk to you about the team I talk to you about the gym the environment all of that stuff like I've got to do it the best that I can and that that to me means I'm building the best brand Tick Tock I'm going to do tic tac thank you give me like two years You'll be like scrolling through what the [ __
] that's George so yeah like really the mission for me is just to be the best at everything we do um and as well on for 247 like the the actual mission statement is just on a mission on a mission on a mission and that just means you're doing whatever you can like however it is like you're doing something that's going to be great yeah I think you live it you know like Yeah we've always seen you because I think you're very vocal with like this to the public and we'll we'll be at home and
we'll like imagine I'm I'm hungover one day and I'm like uh hungover's the worst thing because you don't feel you feel like life is being drained out of you you know like that's how we've wasted away yeah yeah and I'm like [ __ ] bro what am I doing and now just look at George's stories and I'm like and this guy's waking up at 4am today and he just Ran across the whole [ __ ] world had a nice bath I don't know a joke though I'm joking but and I was just like [ __
] I'm not on a mission today so I think like it's cool to see from the outside that you really live it yeah yeah like there's not it's not bullets you can have fun also but yeah definitely man always is like it's it's great to have a rigorous routine it's great to have such a strong like discipline but it's also great that you can know you know you can Step out of that at any moment if you want to go and take a weekend away just [ __ ] go and do it you don't need
to sit and do the exact same thing day after day for years and years and years because you'll get into a hole and it'll become so routine to you that like other things won't make sense anymore and it'll make you kind of not not even not want to do them but like hate them and they've seen that happen with business owners before and I don't want to go Down that path so as much as you can see me in the gym at 5am and you'll see me asleep at 8pm like there is times when I
want to go and do whatever the [ __ ] I want to do and I don't I'm not going to sit here and say I'll never drink alcohol never do drugs and [ __ ] like if I want to do something I'm going to go and do it now I want to talk also about your future plans you have some very exciting things come in but I think it's like one of the challenges of of an Artist like you can be super disciplined you can work super hard but if you don't get inputs from the
real real world how can you be creative if you are doing the same things over and over every day we've said it's been a huge handicap for us at times where we're like working 12 hours a day non-stop office every day boom boom boom and we're just stuck in like a black hole and then we step out of it we go to Cape Town for days on our own and you realize so much these are The most productive days so I've had in the last few months you know or I'll go to layout meet some
guy and I'm like oh yeah I changed my life you know and I I thought it was always that's one question I had for you following you for a while which was like it seems like you're always on the same boom boom boom you're in your house in the middle of nowhere then you go to the office and that's the routine and I asked you yesterday I'm like is there like is There more to life you know or do you think it's necessary because people I think sometimes um are a bit confused with well being
productive is working every day and not stopping work and stuff when sometimes they might even be more productive to take a walk and like listen to music and think about life or just sit down for three hours in a plane and do nothing yep then to be working working oh yeah that's exactly it man and you can find a Lot of like you can find a lot of inner peace and you can find a lot of inspiration within yourself so it doesn't actually matter about your environment so yeah drop your phone go for a [
__ ] run for two hours like you'll you'll figure out way more than you will sat in your office for six days you know what I mean yeah really and and whatever that might be whatever your advice is like if you want to go and sit on a beach go and [ __ ] sit on a beach It's not going to harm your business two days away five days away it's not gonna harm that you might actually do the opposite which is no no it will do the opposition as your business and yeah come with
fresh ideas like for me I went back to Bali two weeks this year and I just went to like visit my friends I grew up because it's like it's kind of like Italian home and I remember I was like like okay I'm not gonna do any day-to-day tasks in Bali I'm just going To think about like apart from like being outside meditating and [ __ ] which I kind of want to get into I'm going to do like big tasks right in the office I don't get to do because I'm constantly speaking about every day
I don't so like one of those things are cute yeah is it a big real real big missions really and I was like season two of the podcast how do I want it to be right like from thumbnail to intro to the things we're talking about how do I want it to be Um the next designing the next uh spring summer 24 collection what's the universe what am I creating where do I want to become bro I did like three tasks only I think and those were two of them and bro that's and I came
back and I came back to the team and I sold them the speech and it was it's easy games yeah you gotta you gotta step away and you gotta have that helicopter view right you step away from it and you think of it look at it from a different Perspective look at it from a different Viewpoint and you could really see like actually there's so many different things you can be doing that don't need don't require you to be in that day-to-day all day every day even though you're so used to it you could step
away you can decide okay like you said what's the next season of the podcast who's going to be on it or how am I going to do this and then get back into the rough bit thanks and I think a trick tip I Would give to people like me I'm a I'm a productivity like I'm obsessed with productivity I think even when I was a kid yeah like even if I wasn't doing anything I would love to go to school then I'm gonna surf for two hours and then I'm gonna go to sleep APM so
I can wake up I've always been quite structured in my life I don't know how I like to do things and I kind of like tricked myself now which because I know time off and like Being able to like think about other things are important where it's being with my parents being with my friends having a weekend off all of those things I look at them as work yeah because I I think it's part of creating like my bigger self and being the the most productive I can possibly be for a new project for everything
we're doing I look at it as work and that's been like a huge tip for me to be like okay it's good to be able to have this time off And do these things and I don't have to feel guilty when I'm there right you know right because before it was like um one day in Ibiza what the [ __ ] am I doing The Hungover would be the worst thing in my life because I'm just questioning everything I've done in my life it's good that you've realized that at such a young age though like
that took me so long to figure out I spent many years just doing the same thing over and Over and over George tell us about your your plans then you're moving yeah it was wild yeah that's big news yeah man I always look at the first podcast I ever went on was like diary of the CEO back in 2018 and I said to it I said to Steven on there I was like look up my dream is to move to LA and then on another podcast I was like I'm going to move to LA by
the time I'm 30. so I was like I put that out into the universe yeah like if I Don't do that that's that's on me that's one thing I've failed at and I don't like failing at things um so yeah this like I hired a CEO last year I changed the structure of the business so that I have more breathing space so now I'm moving to La next month let's talk about that though because I think you said it quite quick and for me was it was crazy when you told me it's like almost here
but most people would think you're the CEO like the founder The creator of the brand is the boss yeah the big boss of everything hiring a CEO means that you're hiring your person to be on top of the day-to-day business in the company right and you can possibly be in La Ibiza or wherever you could be and the company still runs the way it should exactly so his role is not creative his role is business his role his role is exactly what it says on the tin he is running the business he is running Logistics
Wholesale managing the team everything that's day to day everything that's like not the part of the creative process because look I'm a creative guy as soon as I go into meetings that are about numbers and figures and things that aren't product related I'm 50 minutes I'm dead oh I'm falling asleep so like for so many years for so many years I would spend all my time in their meetings come out and I would be sold like depleted that I can't Design I can't do what I'm good at so the business didn't grow to the level
that it needed to because I didn't have my attention on the things that I was good at so then when I had the ability to hire someone who could take that out for me that I was trustworthy of and that I knew could do a great job and could build the team right that was when like I thought this is this is the perfect opportunity for me to be able to step into what I'm Actually good at and that self-awareness too no because I think 100 a guy with like a big ego for example would
be like no no I don't want to be on top of everything yeah I'm a [ __ ] I'm a pimp you know and but really and I think being able to have the self-awareness of like I'm not bringing value right to the business in this way and I'm better off finding a person that can because that's why I'm focusing on what I really do and I'm a great brand Builder but I'm not a Great business Builder like I'm not a businessman I didn't study business like it's not for me I'm I'm great at Brand
content fashion product like that's me so why wouldn't why would I want to stick stick around and kind of stop the business from growing because I'm not giving the right answers in them in their different roles because I don't want to do it handling a 20 million dollar business versus handling a 50 million dollar and a 100 million dollars Wow different worlds like I haven't been there yet but from where I've heard even Ben Francis hired a CEO in a certain moment because he was like I'm not in the business capabilities I'm not up to
the level where gym short goes right and and look at all these people in here like I I don't want to be responsible for them and make the wrong decisions for them when I can hire someone to make the right decisions for them like and for me it's like a confidence booster Because when I'm thinking about something that I need to decide on and he can give me the answer that I'm thinking about it's great because you know we're doing the right thing I remember hearing from you that you said in around 2018 you said
you were no longer in love with represent yeah what happened um we were just like we were designing the wrong things we were chasing like catwalks and Fashion Week when really we Were a d2c brand and like we had to see directly sorry to Consumer yeah we were built off director consumer and we were chasing we were we were chasing something else we were looking at other brands and trying to be like that whereas actually we needed to look in on ourselves and grow the brand in the way that we originally did so yeah we
had it we struggled then but also at that same time like it made us I feel like there's always two mountains In your life and there's one great Mountain that you struggle that you you struggle to get to the top and then you come down it and then the bottom of that mountain that's when you realize like okay this is how we've got to go and we was at that point in like 2018-19 and then the next the next mountains so much higher but so much more like worth it rewarding exactly I like the example
the next phase since we touched up a little bit of new opening over your first store I think for us it's been a huge moment when we've opened our stores we opened the first one like a year and a half ago and we always had that in mind sort of like yo let's create a Tempo you know like both Brands being super personal to us we I want to create a world where it's like you walk in the store you're smelling you're hearing the music and you're like I'm here okay I just did a line
for like 30 minutes and I'm in this [ __ ] you know like you've made an Ecosystem of what you believe fully and we represent and I see you very clearly you need to have a [ __ ] gym you need to have and even maybe people can do workouts in the morning that's super cool and uh first it's also a way of expanding the brand you know I think being able to and when you're trying to get into a different culture having a place that fully embodies and represents what the brand means is an
easier way to like get into the culture for example We're opening and I want to say this because I think we'll open like in a week's time from now when the podcast releasing we're opening our first store in Milan which is it was scary as [ __ ] to be honest it's still probably scary at this moment when I'm saying this uh but it was like it felt like the right thing to do you know because it was like um in Spain has been such a big thing for us we did a pop-up in Milan
there was like a line of 600 people waiting Outside so that was already like a good a good indicator but we're like we really Italy was saying you know in a cultural why Vibe like we kind of speak the same or we're way more similar than we are to like a guy in the UK for example so it kind of felt like the right Next Step and we have a store where we're opening I want to put like a photo we have a [ __ ] fountain in this store it's like I think it's the
craziest that's the advice that um the CEO of one of the brands of inditex told us that he it's it's a brand called leftish right it's very similar to Primark yeah right and he told us I'm going to open a new category that's going to be a Electronics earphones blah blah when you do something put your bars on the table big risk yeah with your balls on the table No Rest no reward right yes and he said I'm gonna open a [ __ ] you must believe it like you can just put Two airports in
in the middle you need to put an entire section of it yeah and that's what we're doing we're going to Milan we're going to open the best [ __ ] store exactly same with that light that's why I'm going there I'm not gonna [ __ ] fail because I believe that we're literally going there to do what we've got to do there's no other option okay we're gonna go into the last bit of the podcast which is what we call the quick questions you know what is Represent in in the phrase the best brand in
the world would you sacrifice your health and fitness if the brand needed you to do it it depends to the extent how many garments do you sell in a day a thousand plus would you open a store in Spain let's see what this podcast does fashion or do you know much more about it I don't know too much about it obviously I knew I knew Alex from back in the day and now I know you two guys And look your brand is really cool and but is it a quintessential Spanish or is it not like
I think it's it's super cool but it doesn't to me scream out Spanish outside of represent what do you think is the best one of the best brand in the world Rolls-Royce would you sell represent for 400 million pounds no what is your biggest dream in this world my biggest dream is really to just leave a legacy Legacy behind of what represent is who me and Mike were and the team to just be completely set for the rest of their lives what is what you most like about nude project and something you think we should
change the thing I like the most is YouTube boys um what I think you should change is nothing it seems to be working man like you're on a great streak don't don't mess it up right now and then the last but not least is we we always do a giveaway at the end of the podcast and We we give out a hoodie for the people coming to the people showing support let's give them a representative that'd be amazing yeah for you [ __ ] amazing we're gonna give away one representative hoodie the man himself said
it and won a hoodie advice to other people commenting here you go see the winner in the comments and George honestly we said from the beginning but it's been a huge pleasure having you on Amazing you having us here and treating us how you Have I think it's very cool and it's it's cool when you see people and you're following people for a long time and they're not dicks when you meet them you know yeah and then they kind of is that thing in it sucks because there's a lot of expectation you know I've been
growing up I've been watching you for a long time and then it's very easy for to go south of you yeah and in your case it was it was cool as [ __ ] man I'm glad I'm not a dick man no I love I love Connecting with guys that have the same vision as being like are really getting after it there's nothing better than sharing stories and learning from each other man it's beautiful man George thank you so much and see you guys next time nice one bro yes sir [Music]
