Insight
Segal: Use reversibility and risk of waiting to guide major business decisions
“I usually ask myself without consciously doing this, two things. One, Is this something that I can recover from easily? Meaning if I'm wrong about this, what's the impact of it? Two, what's the risk of doing nothing and waiting for more information? More often…”
Assertion Supported
Segal: Unlisted additives make up ninety percent of commercial natural flavorings
“A natural flavor just means it was derived from a plant or animal source, but it ends up in a laboratory where about 90% of what goes into these flavors are preservatives and additives that go unlisted on the label.”
Insight
Segal: Apply extreme urgency to daily execution, not macro strategic decisions
“Those small things where a sense of urgency allows you to offer better service, better product, Become better at what you do. Those are the small things, right? And those things I think you do want to have an incredible sense of urgency around. The bigger thin…”
Insight
Segal: Business value is created at the transactional frontline level
“You know, the business happens at the transactional level, any business, that's where it happens, where the money is exchanged for the goods.”
Insight
Segal: Company values should never change, but operational methods must continuously evolve
“So I think what you stand for as a company should never change, but how you do things as a company should never stop changing.”
Insight
Segal: Forcing frontline retail employees to act robotically marks a company's decline
“You know, when you don't allow the people on the front to think for themselves and they become robotic about how they deal with people, that's oftentimes the beginning of the end.”
Insight
Segal: 'Interesting' is a terrible word to hear about a business idea
“Interesting is a great word in a classroom, but it's a terrible word in business. You know, you want to hear things like when you, can you deliver?”
Disclosure
Segal: I previously attempted to buy back David's Tea with Bain Capital
“I actually tried to buy it back at one point with Bain Capital.”
Disclosure
Segal: I left David's Tea partly due to internal private equity conflicts
“There was a fair amount of internal fighting in the company between my original partners, the private equity group. It wasn't an environment where everyone was just focused on the customer and adding value for the customer. And there's, there was a bit too muc…”
Insight
Segal: Overcoming depression requires hope without rigid timeline expectations
“It was the people that had hope, but not expectations that did, right? So they knew they'd get out of there, but they didn't have an expectation on when. And I think depression is, is like that as well.”
Insight
Segal: Entrepreneurship is a personal psychological journey disguised as a business pursuit
“Really that entrepreneurship is in many ways a personal journey disguised as a business pursuit. And what I mean by that is so much of it is managing your own psychology.”
Disclosure
Segal: Restrict major business evaluations to positive mental states and annual timelines
“Over the past year have really put a lot of emphasis in trying to manage my own psychology and get better at when I have a crappy day or a crappy week or a crappy month, not having an action bias or making big decisions or just being able to kind of broaden my…”
Insight
Segal: Specialty tea retail boasts superior margins, zero sizing, and non-perishable inventory
“There's no size, no color, like there is in fashion. It doesn't go bad like a turkey sandwich. It's leaves in a cup, so the margins are good. You can operate out of small spaces. And we call anything you put in hot and cold water that's not coffee, tea in Nort…”
Assertion Supported
Segal: David's Tea reached 200 stores, $200M sales, and $30M EBITDA
“When I sold my stake in David's Tea in 2016, we had 200 stores, about two hundred million in sales, about thirty million in EBITDA.”
Disclosure
Segal: Selling my David's Tea stake triggered severe post-exit depression
“Well, I actually went through one of the biggest depressions in my life after I sold my stake in David's tea. I thought that's what I was playing for. I thought I was playing for this big success where you know, the other side of the rainbow. And it was great.…”
What-if
Segal: Post-exit founders should immediately secure an office to maintain routine
“First thing I would have done, I would have gotten a nice office. You know, I didn't have that. I stopped and I didn't have any, I had nowhere to go in the mornings, right? I went from having this big office with a hundred plus people who, you know, with my na…”
Opinion
Segal: Late-night hours are the most hazardous for mental state and productivity
“Thousand percent. I think that's the biggest least productive, most dangerous time for our mental state of the day.”
Insight
Segal: The upfront inventory buy is the biggest risk in retail businesses
“When you're in clothing or anything with inventory, your biggest risk is your inventory buy, right?”
