Everything Michael Rubin said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Rubin: Masayoshi Son said GSI Commerce was not losing enough money in 2000
“I remember having the founder of SoftBank, Masayoshi's son, tell me in 2000 that we weren't losing enough money.”
Rubin plans to remain CEO of Fanatics until he dies
“Till I die.”
Rubin: Anyone who denies luck's necessity in business is 'full of shit'
“Well, anyone who says that you don't need luck to be successful in business is full of shit or doesn't understand. You definitely need some luck to go with it. You need luck and timing are a very important ingredient.”
Rubin: Has not read a complete book since ninth grade
“The last book that I read was the book called The Swoosh, The Unauthorized Story of Nike. I read it I think when I was in Eighth or ninth grade”
Rubin: 99% chance he ignores three-to-four paragraph emails
“If someone sends me an email that's, you know, three or four paragraphs, I'm 99% not reading it.”
Rubin: Willing to work with adversaries but never forgets grudges
“If it's in the greater interest of the greater good, I'll a hundred percent work with them, but I got a long memory for people who've done me wrong, and that, that, I think that makes me smarter, that makes me better, that makes sure I don't, you know, get scr…”
Rubin: At age 21, his business did $120M with $50M debt
“By the time I was... 21. I bet you I owed the bank fifty million dollars. Because I had a business that was doing one hundred twenty million bucks, buying and selling clothes. I always had to finance the inventory and finance the accounts receivable.”
Rubin: Believes he was youngest public company CEO in the 1990s
“I think I was the youngest person to ever run a public company at that point, I think, in the world.”
Rubin: Fanatics Commerce division grew from $250M to $6.7B in revenue
“The business has grown from two hundred fifty million dollars when I bought it back from eBay, to this year that division is like a 6.7 billion dollar business, ok?”
Rubin: Averaged 4.5 hours of sleep a night over 20 years
“My sleep, if you look, if you average the last 20 years, it's probably four and a half hours a night.”
Rubin: Does not know the alphabet and gets stuck around M-N-P
“I don't know the alphabet. I get stuck. Around MNP, and I've never, and I've kind of decided that I'm not gonna relearn it, because I kind of like that I could not be able to do the alphabet legitimately.”
Rubin: His ski shop hit $500k revenue and $100k profit at 15
“Second year, very good. I think we got up to About 500,000 dollars in business and maybe made a hundred grand. You know, again, I'm 15 years old.”
Rubin: Sued roughly 100 times at age 16 over unpaid ski bills
“I'd say the spring of the year that I was 16, I probably got sued a hundred times.”
Rubin: Bought back Fanatics and GSI's licensed business for $330M
“We bought back Fanatics, including the licensed business that GSI had for three hundred thirty million bucks.”
Rubin: Major sports leagues now drive one-third of sales direct-to-consumer
“When we started, it might have been one or two percent of business would go through the NFL or Major League Baseball or NBA's direct-to-consumer business. Today, it's about a third would go through their own direct-to-consumer business.”
Rubin: At age 13, generated $25k selling consigned ski equipment
“And that year, at 13 years old, I did 25,000 dollars in revenue.”
Michael Rubin
How I Built This 1