Sarah Blakely
Appearances
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah, I mean, you've got to create your own hype. Small wins. For sure.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
It's reminding me, I mean, for the first four years of Spanx, I wore a black T-shirt with SPANX ironed onto it that I went to one of those T-shirt shops and took a white letter and ironed on Spanx and cream pants. But I was the advertisement. So I wore that everywhere I went.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And then when I got a chance to sell it in Neiman Marcus, I would bring my friends to the store to act like excited customers. And they would stand around my display table and go,
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
every time we'd like cue it we'd like customer coming and this like really fancy lady you know perfectly dressed would be walking up and my friends would all go tell me more what is this i can't believe i'm just finding out about this and it would always cause the customer to go what you know what's happening and and then i'd be like yes i get an opportunity to explain it to her
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah. So when I first landed, Neiman Marcus was my first account. And two things about that that are just something that I reflect back on. One is everybody in the industry after I landed Neiman's came up to me and said, how in the world did you land Neiman Marcus? And I would look at them and I'd say, I called them. What do you do?
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And they'd say, oh my God, we go to trade shows and we set up a booth and we've been doing it for seven years. And everybody says around year six or seven that you get a chance with Neiman's. I didn't even know there were trade shows. So I often say what you don't know can be your greatest asset if you let it.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
If you're not intimidated by the self-talk of I have no idea what I'm doing and that shuts you down. So if you can power through the I have no idea what I'm doing and actually see it as a positive and go, That means I'm going to do it different. And that's where you break real ground. It takes a lot of courage and a lot of willingness to look stupid and potentially fall on your face.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
But that's where the magic is. So anyway, I got a chance to go and cold call Neiman Marcus. I flew on a plane from Atlanta, where I live, to Dallas. And I met with the buyer, and she was impeccably dressed. I'm in the intimidating Neiman's headquarters. I had my lucky red backpack from college.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I had the prototype in a Ziploc bag from my kitchen and a color copy of the packaging that I had created on my friend's computer. And halfway through my pitch, I was telling her what it is, and I could tell I was losing her. After seven years of cold calling and trying to sell things to people, you get really good at reading nonverbals. And I always say nonverbals tell you way more than the verbal.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
You know, when people sit there and shake their head and say, I love it. And I'll call you tomorrow. You're like, oh, my God, Mayday. You know, that's when you pull the shoes. I've got to like try everything. And so she was kind of doing that. She was like, OK, thanks. And I just stopped and said, you know what, Diane, will you come to the bathroom with me? And she literally was like, excuse me.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I'm like, I know it's a little weird, but can you just follow me to the bathroom and I'm going to actually show you what my product can do. I'm going to go in the stall. And she was like, oh, okay. And she walked down the hall and I went in the stall and I put it on under my white pants and I came out.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
So I showed her before and then I showed her with the product on and she just sat there and she goes, I get it. It's brilliant. And I'm going to try it in seven stores.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I mean, I would say to add to that, I recognize that the two biggest fears that we all have as human beings are basically the fear of public speaking and the fear of being embarrassed. And so I want that to lose its power over me. So I will intentionally embarrass myself. Or I will intentionally find scenarios where I'm not good at something. And then I go through it.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And it usually ends up making me laugh. Or if something ridiculous happens to me, I immediately want to share it with people. Because then I start to find that it loses its power over me. And then you also find that when these things happen... If you can make somebody else laugh or smile, then it wasn't all in vain.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And that's where real human vulnerability and connection happens, especially even with your customers. So I learned that from selling fax machines. I mean, anytime I tried to act perfect or put on the perfect pitch, I got kicked out time and time again. You know, if I walked in and was like... Look, I'm, you know, I'm nervous. It's hard for me to walk through your door. I'm sorry.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I know there's no soliciting sign. I mean, I would get farther with that. But just calling out the humanness and the real of what we're all dealing with and not not. being afraid of it. So we do that at Spanx too.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
We have oops meetings at Spanx where we have the whole company get together and we stand up and we share what we failed at or an oops or a mistake that we made and everybody claps and it's just like diffuses it. That's such a great culture.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah. Oh, great. Okay.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
i see him i see him looking at me my husband has been running every day on this island and says a bird attacks him so i'm on the walk with him where his jog got this because i don't believe him well honey where how bad can it be come on how are you gonna get past this walking spot He's fine. I see him, and he's fine. See, the bird's there. He's not going to bother you, Jess. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
every time and she's like it's impossible i said no you gotta come with me and she walked by the bird didn't care i walked by and the bird went bonkers it was very personal obviously for the bird with jesse i don't know i maybe they thought your hair was a nest honey i don't know meet a different guest
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Not much sleep. Not a lot of sleep.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I was so petrified. I did it when I was selling fax machines door-to-door. And I have this thing where if something terrifies me or if I think I would never do that and the answer is because I'm scared, it kind of becomes something I really want to try to do. And that was one of those things. And I just did open mic mostly around.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I did it around the country for two years while I was a trainer for the company that I worked for. But it was terrifying. I mean, I was so nervous and I wasn't that good.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
It's the hardest. Well, it's I mean, it's taking the number one fear in America, which is public speaking to the next level, because you can be in front of an audience and be bombing and not really know, you know, like. The whole back section could be asleep or on their phone, and you still ramble on.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
But if you're doing stand-up comedy, I mean, you get validation or you get crickets every 15 seconds. So it's like the most immediate, like, you're failing, you're not failing, you're failing, you're not failing. And the only way to test it is in front of an audience. So you have to be so willing to bomb in front of a group of people. So please laugh at our jokes.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah, exactly, or to learn what's funny or not funny. So, yeah, it was... But you know what? I didn't know it at the time. This combination, see, I wanted to be a lawyer, but I'm a terrible test taker. I'm not good in, like, I have trouble with reading comprehension. So I'm sure I have some sort of undiagnosed learning disability. But anyway, so I did debate all through high school and college.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And then I get to the LSAT and I bombed it, not once, but twice. So it derailed my whole vision of being a lawyer. And that was really depressing at the time. And then I
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
i naturally then went to disney world and tried out to be goofy and you have to be you have to be five eight in order to be goofy and i'm only five six so i'm the height of a chipmunk so like this was rock bottom for me i mean my family everyone's like what's happening i said i i'm too short to be goofy and i don't want to be a chipmunk and so i just started selling fax machines door-to-door because it's really i mean you needed a pulse to be hired there and um
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
So anyway, but the standup comedy I did, but life has a weird way of giving you these experiences because when I started Spanx, the combination of the amount of rejection I had had was perfect to start a company because I was told no every day for two years. The idea is no good. No, thank you. We don't want to help you. We think this is stupid, whatever. And it didn't really faze me.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And then the writing comedy for two years while I was doing that helped me do all the writing for Spanx and the marketing. And Spanx didn't advertise for 16 years. We became a household name and a household brand around the world without ever advertising. And I believe we did so much of that through humor and through the connection that we had with our customer and storytelling.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Jesse mentioned it. Lead with story. Your customers are so much more interested in why than they will ever be interested in what. What you're selling, why you're selling it, why you're doing it, who are you in the world, what matters, what's your why, that is what people really respond to. So if you can do it and make somebody laugh or smile, it's so much better.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I mean, then you have a chance of them telling five other people, which is what happened with Spanx. You know, it became a word of mouth brand.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Wait, Jesse was best known for two songs, Shake It Like a White Girl and College Girls Are Easy.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Which I had a lot of fun telling my dad. I was like, Dad, Dad, I think I met the one. He's like, that's nice, honey. What does he do? I'm like, he's a rapper. Best known for Shake It Like a White Girl and College Girls Are Easy.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
You know, I read his book in college, and I really thought he seemed like such an interesting guy that I would like to know. And so that was the start of it. And when he declared that he was doing his own version of The Apprentice, his own reality show. I just thought this was a great opportunity to meet him. And he started Virgin overseas in London.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
He's just a really colorful, fascinating, adventurous guy. But he... Yeah, so Spanx was four years old at the time and my lawyers literally begged me not to do it. They're like, why would you ever do a reality show? You're the face of this brand and you're putting your reputation over to Fox and you have no idea how they're going to edit you or what they're going to do.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I just I just had confidence that Richard from what I'd read about him wouldn't wouldn't be a part of something that would wouldn't edit me the way that I am but I got a 27 page contract before I did this and it was the most insane contract it literally said we can burn you we can submerge you underwater we can drop you in political unrest I mean it was like insane so my dad is a lawyer I'm
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And I emailed it to my dad, and I said, Dad, I'm thinking about doing this reality show. Can you help me edit the contract? And all he wrote back was, no sane person would sign this, love, Dad. And I signed it, and I went.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yes, I win last wife standing. I didn't sleep for 35 hours, so I was supporting him. And it's really challenging. I said at one point I had a breakdown, I think at like 4 in the morning, where I just started crying because I said marriage is hard when you have to really support each other's dreams, and especially if you have to watch the person you love suffer.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah, we have not let the kids see the video footage. But it was two months of the most intense stuff. What they didn't tell me, but I should have figured out and put the two and two together from the contract, was that if you lost the business challenge, each business challenge took place in a different city around the world.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
So instead of every challenge being in New York City, one was in Hong Kong, one was in Africa, one was in Tokyo. It was wild. We were traveling all around the world. But if you didn't win the business challenge, instead of going to a boardroom and just being fired... You had to do a world record breaking, death defying stunt with Richard.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And two days into filming, I literally was in Atlanta in the Starbucks line like the day before. And then the next day I'm in England and they woke me up at three in the morning and handed me a helmet. And I said, I'm an entrepreneur. Why do I need a helmet? And I had to scale the side of a hot air balloon at 10,000 feet in the air and have tea on top of the hot air balloon with Richard.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
and you're afraid of heights and i'm so afraid of heights like i cry on planes i cry during takeoff i don't like heights yeah so that was crazy and that was the first day of filming but jesse can't even watch it jesse's watched like half of the stunts got so ridiculous it was like sarah climb the scale the top of the building and jump in this glass of water you
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
No. He didn't know me then. But, yeah, so.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Are you glad that you did that? I'm so glad I did it. I mean, I think that I don't think I would have done the challenges if I was a mother at the time. But I wasn't. I was single and single.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah. But yes, I'm so happy. I mean, Richard's actually a great friend. I'm actually going to Switzerland this Friday with Richard and about 35 entrepreneurs from around the world. And we're doing a physical challenge through the Swiss Alps to raise money for education. And I'm not like my husband. I'm not this physical, you know, challenge person.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
But I had had too much tequila when Richard asked me if I wanted to go. And I said, yes. And so now I'm going. I hate it when that happens. I'm slightly terrified. But we're going to swim, bike, and hike through Switzerland. And it starts with a glacier lake swim in a full body wetsuit.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Oh, you have a clip? Which clip is it? Is it of the balloon?
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And Jesse had a pep talk with me before, and he said no matter what, Tell me I look good. Tell me I look strong. Don't pull me out of the race. Don't tell me that you're worried about me.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
That was so intense. There were so many things about that, but it took me 48 minutes to climb. It was a dangling rope ladder, so there was nothing anchoring it. So I spent the first 25 minutes of the climb just flailing around in the air. And then the last 20 minutes, I kept saying, just get to the balloon, get to the balloon.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
But once I got to the balloon, the balloon was hot and the rope was very taut against the balloon. So I had nowhere to put my fingers anymore around the rungs of the ladder. So I'd use my fingertips. And then once I did the little T thing and was like, woo, that was great, I started bawling because I realized I had to climb down. Oh, my gosh. I was like, wait, how do we get down?
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
So we had to go back down the ladder. It sounds horrific. Yeah. Thank God you're here. Listen, I'm here, and what an experience.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
That's true. But it was really a wild experience of just human spirit. You know, what we all have inside of us, that grit and determination. And there were 112 of really intensely impressive ultra runners there. And, wow, I was just blown away by mindset, really. Because I asked Jesse after this. I mean, Jesse's 51.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah, because we're on autopilot as human beings. I mean, think about it. Almost every single thing that we do, someone taught us how to do it or we observed how it was done. And so I like the space of closing your eyes and saying, if no one showed you how to do this, how would you do it? Like, would you be doing it differently?
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And oftentimes you will, and the answer or the vision comes to you, and then that's a real nugget for yourself.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I'm going to Switzerland on Friday. Which sounds very fabulous.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
How do I feel when I'm in the Giving Pledge room? Super humbled and, you know, kind of like, how did I get in this room? Pinched me kind of feeling. Sarah's agreed to give away half of her wealth to charity.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
So I said, honey, even though you didn't get the last man standing, you definitely won the oldest man standing. Because he was 10 to 20 years older than every other racer in this race. And so I said to him, I was so curious because I knew mindset. I'm a huge believer in mindset. And I said, what was your mindset and what were you thinking during the race?
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I mean, I'm a frustrated beautician, so I might have my own salon, or I was someone who did everyone's hair for prom, and I always liked doing makeovers and things like that. Oh, that sounds fun.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Oh, gosh. Theme song for my life.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Mine is... Baby Got Back.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I mean, this is so weird, but I can vibrate my eyes. What? What does that even mean? What did you say? I can vibrate my eyes.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I can vibrate my eyes. And the weird thing is, Charlie just looked up at me and vibrated his eyes the other day. Our little boy. So apparently it's genetic.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Well, I mean, you're probably about to answer something different, but running water.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
My pet peeve is when the windshield wipers are going more than they need to.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Well, growing up, my celebrity crush was Gene Wilder.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I found my real life gene. I'm not kidding.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And he looked at me with laser focus after it. And he said, I was saying repeatedly to myself, I push my body and my body responds. And boy, did it ever. I mean, because his knees, his ankles, I mean, the rest of his body really, I mean, was shutting down. But his mindset was there. And that pushed him. I would say, I mean, at mile 47, I thought you were done. I love you, but I really did.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I was, like, so worried. And then, like, you know, you just can't ever doubt the mindset. If the mindset of the person's in the right place, then they just go way beyond what you expect.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And if any of you guys want to be super entertained and inspired, it's on my Instagram page at Sarah Blakely. And it's in one of those, you know, I put it in a permanent circle in the bar below the descriptor of my name. And it's called The Last Man Standing. And it's really, it is very...
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Yeah, definitely mindset. I mean, I sold fax machines door to door for seven years after graduating from college. And I... you know, for 20 years, Spanx is going to be 20. I started it in the year 2000. And the soundbite in the media has been, Sarah cut the feet out of pantyhose and solved an undergarment issue. And, you know, now Spanx is here.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And while that is true, there was so much more about the behind the scenes of why this happened. And People have asked me, can I have 10 minutes, 15 minutes of your time? I want to pick your brain on how Spank started. But the real answer is it started way before I cut the feet out of my pantyhose. And it started when I was much younger.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And I had a series of kind of tragic events happen to me when I was in high school. And it led me to Wayne Dyer, who is a motivational, inspirational speaker. He passed away about two years ago.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
But I got exposed to him and I listened to his cassette tapes over and over and over again to the point that I had his one series called How to Be a No Limit Person memorized all 10 cassette tapes front and back.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Well, that's funny because in high school, no one wanted to get stuck in my car. Like after a party, they're like, she's going to make you listen to this shit. But then, you know, I said, I think I would take simple things like I'm just going to do the laundry tomorrow.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
So but then fast forward, you know, I think it was 10 to 15 years after high school that I ended up on the cover of Forbes. And the texts I got in my phone were so funny. I mean, literally all my friends were like, damn, should have listened to that shit. So I'm a big believer in it.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I learned early on about manifesting law of attraction, not caring what other people think about you, which is a really big one for an entrepreneur or, you know, in life, really. And I'm a work in progress on that. There are times where I do care and I check myself and say, you know, let's let's work on this. But it's very freeing to not care what other people think.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
You'll take more risks to not really focus on the outcome and be so afraid to fail. my journey and Spanx for sure. So I think mindset is, I work on it daily.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
That really came from a gut feeling. I really honor my gut and intuition a lot and still do through the journey that I'm on. But when I cut the feet out of my pantyhose and started Spanx, I had actually asked for the idea two years prior. So I was selling fax machines. I had one really bad day. I'd been kicked out of an office again.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I mean, I got usually business cards ripped up in my face about once or twice a week. I got escorted out of buildings all the time. And this day was just hard. I mean, I'm seven years into 100% cold calling. to sell people a fax machine. And I pulled over and I said, I'm in the wrong movie. How did this happen? Call the director, call the producer. This is not my life.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
Like I'm redirecting my life. And I went home and I wrote down a list of what I'm good at in the positive column and strengths. And I saw sales and I thought, okay, well, what is it about sales that I'm good at? And it led me to the fact that I like to offer people things that they may not know they need and then really makes a difference for them.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And I wrote down in my journal that night, I'm going to invent a product that I can sell to millions of people that will make them feel good. And then I looked up in the air in my apartment and I said, I'm ready for the idea. If you give it to me, I won't squander it.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And two years later, I cut the feet out of control top pantyhose one night to wear white pants to a party and not have a panty line or anything show. Because guys, you're out there in the audience. I don't know how many of you struggle with what to wear under white pants. But it's a legit problem that we have.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And so I cut the feet out of my pantyhose one time and I thought this could be the idea because I had already set the intention for the idea to show up. But as soon as I started on the path of it, I thought, okay, I don't want to tell anybody my idea because I feel that ideas are the most vulnerable in the moment that you have them.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And it is our human nature that the minute we have an idea, we tell our friend, our coworker, our wife, our husband, boyfriend, girlfriend. And in those moments out of love and care and all the right intentions half the time, the person might say something that completely squashes it or makes you not pursue it.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
So I didn't want to tell my family and friends, and I have very supportive family and friends, but I didn't want ego to have to get involved too early on in the process. I wanted to spend my time pursuing it and not defending it.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
So at night and on the weekends for two years, I would sell fax machines during the day, and then at night I would stay up, and I was working on the patent, and I was doing all my research and driving, taking vacation days to drive to North Carolina where the manufacturing plants were and begging them to help make the first prototype. But that is really why.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And I have to say, I mean, everybody in their life has a million-dollar, even a billion-dollar idea. I mean, we do. I haven't had mine yet. Well... Well, you do. And I feel like recognizing it is a big one. And then also, you know, holding it sacred for me. And I'm glad I did because I sat my family down a year later and all they knew was Sarah's working on some crazy idea.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And a year later, I sat him down and I said, OK, guys, are you ready? It's footless pantyhose. And I mean, they were like, so sweetie, if it's such a good idea, why hasn't anybody else created it?
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
And then someone else in my family was like, well, honey, you know, and even if this is a good idea, the big guys are just going to knock you off in the first six months and you will have spent your savings on this. And if I had heard those things in the moment that I had it, I probably would still be selling fax machines or something like it. So I really believe that.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
I believe that you've got to really protect it. Now, it didn't mean I didn't tell people that would help me pursue it. I was telling lawyers, having them help me try to write the patent. I was cold calling manufacturers and talking to them. I just didn't seek out people simply for validation.
Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan
Confidence Classic: Unlock an Unstoppable Mindset & Marriage with Sarah Blakely & Jesse Itzler
until I knew I'd put enough of my own sweat equity into this idea that no matter what the validation came back as, I wouldn't waver.