Today we’d like to introduce you to Taylor Offer.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Taylor. So, let’s start at the beginning, and we can move on from there.
Let’s take you back to 2014 in Amherst, Massachusetts. It was the first day of senior year, and I enrolled in an Entrepreneurship class. I had a custom tee shirt company where I was making shirts for tons of fraternities and sororities across the country. After class, I was talking (Parker says I was bragging) to some kids about how I was making $25,000 a semester.
All the kids were ooooo-ing and awwwww-ing over my story, then Parker comes over and tries telling me about his custom lacrosse uniform company. He could tell I wasn’t that interested… until he told me he has done OVER A MILLION DOLLARS IN SALES.
I was like “Dude, who the hell are you? Why are you still in school? How do we work together?” He started telling me about his new project, a sock company called FEAT. About 45 minutes after meeting him, we were in his car on the way to TJ Maxx.
We buy every pair of white Nike, Adidas, and Hanes socks we could find. We use a little $200 heat press Parker had and press designs on these socks. The next day, we hit campus with 200 pairs outside the dining hall, an effort to convince college kids with no money who are going to eat lunch to buy $10 socks. Within a few hours, we sell all 200 pairs and have $2,000 cash in our hand.
Senior year, we sell 20,000 pairs of socks basically out of our backpacks. The day after graduation, we get $250k from an angel investor, time to hit the real world! It’s 2015 when people still shopped in retail stores and buying things online was still “sketchy,” so we start selling into a store. We get our socks into 500 stores across the world, even getting a purchase order from Nordstrom!
This was cool, got us into the millions of dollars in sales at 22 years old, but we wanted more. I became hooked on selling through social media. This was 2015 before the word “influencer” existed and before Instagram even had stories or swipe ups. I don’t know any celebrities/athletes/anyone with a big following, but I start reaching out.
Thousands of DM’s and emails later (And almost no responses), we hear back from Aly Raisman’s team. We make her own custom pair of socks and sell hundreds of thousands of dollars of it. Then we work with The Chainsmokers, Logan Paul, Jimmy Tatro, and many others.
After selling millions of dollars on our site from their fans, we figure out how to sell to ours and grow our following. We raise another million dollars, grow our company, get named Forbes 30 under 30 for Ecommerce, met a ton of awesome people, learn a lot and here we are now. 🙂
Has it been a smooth road?
Hahaha! It has never been a smooth road, and it never will be. The biggest thing Parker and I have learned throughout the journey is to not get too high on the highs or low on the lows.
For the first couple of years, we weren’t happy. We were “grinding” and “hustling” 24/7, but didn’t do anything besides work. We rationalized it by “We are just delaying our gratification, we aren’t supposed to enjoy this, and it’s all about the light at the end of the tunnel.”
The light at the end of the tunnel doesn’t come. And if it does, there will be a new light to chase, and you won’t even be happy with the light you worked for. It’s not about working in the dark towards the light at the end of the tunnel, it’s about making the tunnel lit every day.
Once we flipped our perspective and started focusing on enjoying every day, having personal lives, and really doing what we really loved everyday, life became so much better. If you are struggling finding work/life balance, DM me on Instagram @TaylorOffer, and I’d be happy to help!
Some other stuff we’ve had to go through that I am happy to help on- Scaling a company- We went from just us founders to 20 employees, and now back to just us founders and everything outsourced 🙂
Working with a 3PL- In E-commerce companies use a 3PL (Third party logistics company) that stores all your inventory and ships to customers once ordered. We’ve used some really bad ones who have cost us over $100,000. Now we found the best one ever and how to best work with 3pL’s, DM me if you want help!
Working with friends- We’ve hired friends, been sued by “friends,” had over $10,000 stolen from us by “friends” If you are or plan on working with friends DM me! Working with influencers/celebrities- We’ve worked with everyone, I can help structure these deals.
Creating engaging content- We have an Instagram page with over 100k followers and insanely high engagement, happy to help with that. Running FB/IG ads/Ecom business- We’ve spent millions of dollars on digital acquisition and advertising, let us help you!
We’d love to hear more about your business.
We connect with our customers. We have hundreds of thousands of followers and customers, and they know us by name. They know Parker loves coffee. They know I’m annoying. This personal connection is what makes us different.
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Being in LA has helped us so much in business and life it is amazing. Some of our closest friends are our best mentors, Ryan Westberg from Serengetee, Dee Murthy from Menlo Club, Jake Kassan from MVMT, Steven Borelli from Cuts, Brandin Cohen from Liquid IV, Matt, Ammar and Zack from Yes Theory, Demi Marchese from 12th Tribe, Brady Silverwood from Sunny Co, Jason Ross from The CBD Way just to name a few.
These are all amazing friends with amazing businesses who all want to help. We are all around the same age, going through similar things in life, and have helped each other so much growth in business and as people
Pricing:
- Socks starting at $6/pair
- The Softest Hoodies ever for $89
Contact Info:
- Website: www.featsocks.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: @TaylorParker @TaylorOffer @ParkerBurr
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/featsocks
Getting in touch: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
