The Exchanges

Q this idea is starting to coalesce in your mind. There's an, there's a gap here. And I think I can come up with something to fill that gap. And when you went to Chris, who, you know, had experience in, in, in the apparel business, um, and as did you, but when you went to him and you sort of talked to him about this idea, what was his response?

A I mean, he liked the idea. I also had a friend, Fiona Couture, who worked, um, at Ralph with me, and she worked in design, um, and she also was part of the conversation because I, I wanted to start a business with her. We had talked about it, and so she also had a bit of experience, more, more than I did, around the product and the actual design process. So in a way, she really helped me learn about that in the beginning, and, and Chris really liked the idea. I think he, you know, he had sold Eagle's Eye, and in a way, he probably missed that, the business, because he was very passionate about it, so he really did like the idea of us starting something.

AI assessment note: “I mean, he liked the idea.”

Q What, what, what do you, what, what were the books? Was that like, like a mood board of like different images or things that you had sketched or

A Yeah, it was all of the above. It was old pictures of my parents from the sixties and seventies. It was images of a ballet flat from Audrey Hepburn. It was a company my mom wore called Jax. That was what I really wanted to do, is relaunch Jax. That was, that was really what my first idea was, is to bring Jax back. And Jax was this Great brand, um, that all these very stylish women wore. It was designed by Rudy Gernreich, and it was in the sixties and seventies. My mom wore it, and it was the perfect cigarette pant. It was the perfect peacoat. It was the perfect gingham dress, and so we ended up going down to New Jersey to someone who had a ton of, uh, archives, and-

AI assessment note: “Yeah, it was all of the above. It was old pictures of my parents”

Q Let me kind of ask you about the, the logo, um, which is, which is now kind of iconic, um, two Ts, right? Um, was that, um, I mean, tell me about that logo. How did that, was that the logo from the very beginning?

A So, yes, um, I met with this branding company called Monco, and I said, you know, I wanted to create a logo that we could use in different ways, and I was really interested in Morocco. My parents had spent their honeymoon and then just constantly went back, and then also David Hicks, who was an interior designer that I always loved and my parents loved, and so I thought there was something interesting That we could combine, and that it would be more of a design element, and they came back with different iterations, but many different iterations, and, um, they came up with this one, and it was the one that I loved, and it was the first one that I had an emotional connection to, and I, I would say that wasn't the case for everyone. It was, it was polarizing, and people either loved it or they didn't, and I really loved it.

AI assessment note: “So, yes, um, I met with this branding company called Monco”

Q In, in 2009, you were finally able to launch that foundation that you wanted to launch, the Tory Burch Foundation, and, and tell me about the idea behind it. What did you want it to be?

A Well, so I wasn't exactly sure in the beginning of when I started the company, um, I knew I wanted to help women and children, and what I realized is that I was an entrepreneur, and there were a lot of exceptional women in business that weren't as lucky enough to have the access that I had, and so I thought maybe that I could help women get access to all kinds of things, whether it would be capital or Or each other, or her, um, other business leaders, and, and so in 2009, that was what we started, and even though we were doing a lot of work, I wanted real numbers, so we partnered with Bank of America to help women get access to low, lower interest loans, and, and their commitment of a hundred million was something that I was so excited about, and that's something that I, as a leader in business, would love to impart on startups and other businesses that doing good is good for business, and that's something that in the early days, I was pretty much laughed out of the room, and when I talked about building this global lifestyle brand so I could start a foundation, I was told never to say that, and that business and philanthropy don't go hand in hand, and I was told that more than 10 times by many people. And so to see that sea change happen today is very gratifying.

AI assessment note: “I thought maybe that I could help women get access to all kinds of things”

Q Did he, what did he do for a living?

A So, you know, it's funny. I mean, he never really worked, and so when you had to fill out those little things in school that, what did your father do? I, I never really knew what to write, so I, I would write investor, or I wasn't really quite sure what to write, but in a way, it was interesting. He was like a, a bon vivant, but he was much deeper than that, but he spent a lot of time traveling, and spent a lot of time in Europe, and I used to have books of the women he dated, and he finally met my mom and fell in love. I don't think they got married until he was 40 years old. And so back then, that was pretty ancient.

AI assessment note: “he never really worked, and so when you had to fill out those little things”

Q Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I mean, ambition is obviously a critical element of, of building a company and a brand. And so let me ask you about ambition in 2004, when you open that shop and, and you talked about to, to maybe people you really trusted about what it could be. What did you imagine in 2004?

A Well, I, I imagined something big, and I don't know why, but I felt that I wanted to create a company that reached a lot of women, and, and I wanted to build something globally, but it was pretty frenetic. It was, you know, um, a lot of Just moving in all directions and just trying to keep up. I never slept. Yeah. And it was being a mom, ah, I was working out of my apartment for the first two years. We didn't have an office, so it was doing everything in our kitchen or in our living room. Um, it was taking my kids to school and then getting on the phone until four in the morning, falling asleep on the phone. You know, we ended up having maybe 14 or 15 people working out of our apartment, so I was also contacted from the first day by Bergdorf Goodman, um, by Robert.

AI assessment note: “I wanted to create a company that reached a lot of women, and... build something globally”