YouSaid · the spoken record

Gérald Marolf

lines on the record: 60
first: 2025-12-19
most recent: 2025-12-19
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

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“Thanks, Harry. I hope there's a couple of things that actually have helped you with all the incredible people you talk to and maybe you've learned, or at least listened to one thing that surprised you.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“They probably don't see that there is still a white space when it comes to how you capture a consumer in their everyday habits and that it's not purely about doing one thing with one brand. It's very cryptic as an answer, huh?”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think a personal one where I am way too involved with some of the experts who know it way better. And so it's not a one product, but I think it's holding back teams sometimes, even though they've all figured it out. And that's something I'm on a learning path. That is a complex learning path, but I'm on that one.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Simon Biles She's with Atlita and she's just the most fascinating athlete. It's not even a mass sport or whatever, but I would love to meet her. I think there's so much there to unpack and just the way she trains, I find that extremely fascinating.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I feel that they're doing a great job in running, and I massively appreciate what Patrick, Bjorn and the team have built. I would just love that they would wit all the heritage they have in their backpacks and all the cultural relevances and even in basketball if they would just go slightly slower and just not try to recreate samba waves, but look at stuff and just also they have, they do an amazing job in so many places, but they're already always on to the next. And if just newness is the driver to the business, I don't know their balance sheet, but I think they could win more consumer back-to-brand personality. I think they could win more consumers' minds. If they would just take it tick slower.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I don't know if we should have done other stuff because a lot of it is just more stuff on the planet that no one needs. So I don't know if we should have done more. I just think we should have executed with the same level of madness, to use that word, as we have on apparel or on footwear.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Not deep enough into the Sox business. As a footwear brand, I think we have a tremendous opportunity or we would have a tremendous opportunity to create that product through more of an innovation. Now we have through also what we do with Lightspray. We have created for the first time really socks from scratch, which is next level, but that's only been the focus since maybe a year and a half and that's late if I think about how much we invested in everything else. We should have spent more time on accessories earlier.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, Hermes did tights, right, for 1,200 leggings, 1200, 1400. I think it's just capitalism. I mean, I don't think Mathieu will work on the Chanel sneakers. Maybe he does. But I don't know. I think this is just business. That's how I look at it.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That we're ever going to collaborate with them, but I think the Prada sport, just the product itself, we could have done an incredible line of products with them a couple of years ago if we would have thought about it even.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Very, very personally, I do think that product sport deserves a non-prada collab and the people at Lueva will kill me. But Prada Sport has done a very iconic thing in their journey with sailing and with sort of that uniform that they've built 2000s. Again, also the materials, the nylons, all of that. The product is just fabulous. Through the premiumization and the luxury playbook, they have re-edited that, but that is something where I would, I think that deserves a bigger consumer community approach, just making that more expensive and more niche. I get it. I know why they're doing it, but you look at Stone Island since they've been acquired by Montclair and the product they're doing is also fabulous. But Product Sport essentially is that blueprint.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, we're not using it the same way, but the way I think I've spent a lot of time in South Korea this year, the way you look at where there's more speed in subculture and how things develop and more appetite, again, to taking a product and repurposing it through your own lens, I think that is something there's a lot to learn for us, but there are cities, Seoul Taipei, in Asia where that is almost becoming normal and we have some of that also in some, I would say, less major cities in Europe, and it's super interesting to watch. And we need to learn from those communities, those kids, the whys, the hows. And I think it helps us to create product with them for them sort of in between.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Think they anticipated really well, and they went to a playbook that was unexpected. I mean, when the 550 came, no one thought that anyone needs another basketball shoe and it was just Air Force Ones. They were able to create that with a bit of an outsider mentality, and people wore it for a while with what they did with Teddy's Teddy's brand Emilian Dore, right? Same thing. And now it's tough because how do you replicate without just doing more and more and more? But what they, I think, did incredibly well is that they understood better than others that in that space, it's not necessarily a global market anymore. They were much more hyper-local, even though it was big, but it felt very local to the right communities at the right time. They did that exceptionally well.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Not with runners. I'm not worried the moment someone moves. So I think as people use the product for sports, I'm not worried, but there are definitely other places. I mean, you set the airport shoe, right? I think that's complex to solve because it's a compliment you make a great comfortable product, but it's also challenging because, yeah, the product can do more. And so, yeah, it's not easy to navigate.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think it's bad because it takes piece of aspiration away from the brand and it will make them do stuff on the product that is not necessarily nice. And you see that with LV or with other brands as well, right? Where you distinct a bit more just to be a bit more special where actually the simplicity or that it's super plain or super super normal or whatever quiet luxury you want to call it is the power of the product and through the imitation you take a lot of gravitance away.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Because the promise that you want to deliver with your technology needs to hold true. If they can make it as good, then I would probably even say, well, yeah, okay, great for the consumer. But in most cases, it is just looks and it's not the actual thing, and then it sucks.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Wish I could give you a great answer on that. I think it's both. It's imitation socks on innovation. Imitation is great flattery if it's purely sort of mocking and aesthetic or whatever what sketchers is doing to some extent is like it's not great, but then also. But when it comes to innovation, I think it really sucks.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Product feature needs to be complemented with materials, with shape, with fit, with many different things. Even that care label inside, right? That is important. I mean, whatever t-shirt you're wearing, you're probably having a beautiful label stitched in from whatever James Pierce or Bodhi or what it is, but it is important.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's feature king, but it's also, and I think materials make all the difference. And for me, the amount of times just spending time on sourcing the right materials that are different that are more premium. And that's why all the Zenias exist, right? They get that right. So I don't think that is functionality, but that is very much distinction towards if you want to call that feature, then yeah, we probably agree. But I just think the material itself, it's not that it's waterproof or that you have a zipper garage or whatever, but that the product as a whole, it just feels somehow better than what you touch from the other brand. So maybe I have to take back that I don't agree at all with your definition, but I think the in a parallel, it's just about the holistic.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I would agree with a slightly older audience. I would not agree with when a kid walks into a JD and wants the features and the price or doesn't care about neither and beliefs in the bubble there in so the community or actually separating from that. On apparel I don't believe in it at all, but in footwear I think there's a lot of truth in that but there is a very interesting consumer I think that shops with a very different filter on.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, I'm often surprised about late or early and I'm also often overwhelmed by the why, simplicity of pure comfort, an easy step-in, for example, for footwear. If you think about big footwear brands these days, and they come in all shapes and forms Birkenstock, Crocs, vans, whatever have you, a lot of it is You don't need to tie the shoes. And I had years to accept that fact. Tots, caminos”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We sharpen down to understanding much better how the consumer unboxes it and creates their own definition. And that's why this, I love to talk about the soprano's ending. And I don't know if you watch that show. I mean, just the way it ends, probably some people listen in will get it. It's up to you to make it up after watching six seasons. And engineering that is really, really hard. We probably didn't leave enough on the table. Like the story was complete, the product was perfect. We should have thrown in a second pair of laces. Maybe that would have been enough. But we should have left a bit more on the table for the consumer.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But lawyer is aspirational and as crafty premium as it gets and at the stage of where they disrupt sort of the LVMH universe, I think we partner up.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Isn't the opportunity to disrupt and create as a brand who doesn't exist in certain spaces opening up somewhat of a butterfly effect towards who you can be? I mean, Nike was a running brand when they started. Would you say they are a running brand to you today?”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“One of those things, you know, where pursuit of elegance, sort of my, it's an old book, but it's that. It's 90% perfect. And then you leave the rest to the consumer.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think we have created our very first collaboration with Loevid, the Spanish luxury house. We have created a, I will probably say dog walking trail runner. So we changed our core trail running show at the time, which was called Cloud Venture. And together with Jonathan Anderson, the person I mentioned in the very beginning, he came back from Japan and brought some samples of some shibberry towels, right? The denim fade stuff. And the factories really didn't get it, but we replicated that on a canvas and then created, I think, an incredibly beautiful product that I truly love. Obviously very early to do, very expensive running sneakers at that point because I was pre-whatever new balance, mu and all of that. It did okay, but I think if I look at that product now, it's”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I also wish we would be a good example for that, but we have a fantastic brand and marketing department who does an incredible job also of bringing Elmo on board to say that we launch an extremely soft shoe. And it's probably super hard. I mean, there are stuff that I simply just love, teenage engineering is one of those brands. I don't know if you know them. They're like Swedish consumer electronics things quite small, spectacular, but you have to be really deep into it. And then buy their Bluetooth speaker and you're just going to be blown away. But then they have great marketing. They have great brand. They have great product, but sometimes it just doesn't, I don't know, maybe it's the category or something else that doesn't scale or maybe you also don't want to because SoundCloud was also a good product. But we were on Spotify, right?”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I think there's a couple of other brands that will be heading there maybe, and I shouldn't probably say their names because they're still on the up. But I have some brands where I have a hard time understanding where they're heading and why.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There gel in there? Is there something else? Is there kinetic? Does it have some numbers as well? What version? It's an Air Force 1, right? Or it's an Air Max 95. I think ASICs is talking much more true product itself than many other brands that we have in our space. And as we've been talking, I do kind of like product and I like to also try things and I do feel that they have delivered really well on a lot of their products with a very honest way of doing.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I am happy for them that they're still independent and can do probably whatever they want. And yes, they probably should get rid of it. Then there are brands that are fascinating to watch because not everything makes sense, but the product is really good, A6 as a simple example”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In sportswarespace I have a lot of love for brands that have created clarity sort of in consumer mindsets. If you think about ALO yoga, for example, it is obviously now with growth, it's becoming tough and all the supplements and all of that. I think that is really, really good. And I don't know if that's working commercially, but they're doing their thing. not all product is great, that's fine, but they have a mission. And it even left yoga in their name, which I find quite bold.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Me, neither. I just love the concept of brand personality. And it's an old concept. But if you give a brand the right characteristics, and for us, a lot of that goes through product. I think that can go a long way in your relationship with the customer, even these days, even the very young ones. I think there is something to building a brand who has a bit of shape and form where consumers understand who you are as a personality. Does that create loyalty always? Probably not. But it goes beyond just trying to be everything to everyone.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We're not a footwear company anymore. We very much are, I mean, apparel is growing at a speed that I think we unlocked something there that is going to be very interesting. But answering your question probably no, not anymore. I think that used to be the case. But if I think about how people shop these days, who they listen to, and also where their share of wallet goes, I'm not sure. I think just a lot of things are changing if you look at beauty as well. We probably had three choices for, how do you call a lip balm? And where did you buy that? Probably at a pharmacy or whatever. Now there's probably 600 with all different flavors. Even smoking has diversified to a level where I'm like, okay, is there a hero Marlborough product these days? I don't even know.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm not great at marketing, but I just love to have the story being told by others, even if it's unfiltered and not always what you might want to hear. But we can learn a lot from fashion there. I think you put a runaway show out and the jury's out, right? It's not, you're not going to send out a press release look for is the best look that we've ever made. You just don't. You let all the critics basically decide. And I think we could do more of that and just let it out in the wild. The other part, I think, is on apparel and accessories. We released a fantastic line of soft backs, backpacks and other things. And we sourced with one of the last Swiss robe makers, some real Swiss rope and all that kind of stuff. Products really there, but I don't know. We're a footwear company still in many cases. So we had a hard time really telling that story well.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, this year I definitely would say it's that slow marathon running product that rightfully so probably the community didn't get. Because if you have that ambition, why would you want to wear a shoe for the slower runner even if you are that? There's a lot of health reasons and you just talked about your knees, but that was not thoroughly thought through from a consumer mindset if you go into that marathon buildup. Other than that, I think light sprays is just her relative innovation. It's just a very interesting piece of an innovation platform that we're building out. It can be seen as controversial because you make a shoe in three minutes and you don't need any humans. But I think the runway of that is going to be very interesting to watch.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's becoming slightly more formal, but in often cases it's a shortcut or a trip to a factory and then you just spend two days and you finish it off or there's a signal and a couple of individuals who test it and you're like, hell yeah, let's go. But a lot of it is also, I think, it's a group of individuals, right, that think through things and then have somewhat of an opportunity to agree or disagree. And then you build a feeling quite rapidly that it now should go. And it doesn't always happen, but when it happens, you're usually onto something really good.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Too slow and maybe a little bit too complicated is probably the most honest answer. I think we tried really hard to be probably overly precise in the product that we do. And that means that engineering is slightly slower and you should leave a bit more to the consumer or the runner in that case to make up their minds. We're striving for perfection, yes, but at some point stuff needs to go out and be beyond the pavement. So yes to some extent.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, but I think diversification doesn't just purely come from need, it's more appetite. And I think Jordan is interesting because it is at this point pure nostalgia and we all have loved what the NBA was in the 90s. And there is a street where relevance to it, if you do PSG or whatever in terms of football now. But you're also engineered that towards a target audience and you hope it trickles over to more mass. For us, I think we're at a very different point where we still have a lot of appetite to even build businesses that we feel that don't exist yet. And with Jordan, I think they have successfully done that. Now it's looking at how a brand ages wild target.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I mean, I worry probably about longevity of all of it in a sense of how do you create beyond an athlete's career cultural relevance and how do you make that happen? And then with the Roger brand per se, there is him, there is other things that he will be doing, but there is also a product in a silhouette. Now does whoever is still alive from Nirvana worry about that they're a t-shirt brand or a band is a bit the same thing, right? Do people know Stan Smith? I don't know, but I think there is a lot of work that needs to be done.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Roger's bigger than tennis first things first, but the way an athlete like him operates in sort of a global environment and strives for everything is possible and gives you also a view on unlocking things that are more through discipline and tenacity than to pure strategy, so to speak, created, I think, a white space for us to think beyond running, running lifestyle and really enable us to open new territories overall. And that is now sort of anchored in the DNA of a sportswear brand that strives to be the most premium sportswear brand on the planet. And the word premium is in there. And he's certainly part of the reasoning why we look at it that way.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, I think your brand DNA is driving product strategy. I think Roger is part of our DNA. Roger is part of our understanding and confidence that we have in how we build the brand”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It definitely does. I also think we need to look at tennis more holistically in terms of Roger as an entrepreneur him having a badge, being in with the product teams every two weeks, and what we build as an overall company and how you grow from sort of an international now towards a global company and who you also want to be and who you want to have close. With tennis or with Roger specifically, I think it's also friends of friends. I think that has an incredible power and that has created an athlete mindset for us that strives for excellence. And tennis might not be the last thing we do, but it's been an incredibly important territory to move a brand beyond running rooted in something that is sports and at the same time have clarity on we can be more. In just a running brand”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think it's closely connected to brand awareness. Where we're at right now, it's probably less important to be first. But the ambition to be first helps to attract great talent. It helps to bring in engineers. It helps to bring in innovators. And it gives you clarity in your roadmap to what you're doing. We very much want to be first in most of the stuff that we do. There might not always be a consumer need for that, but for the type of culture you're building, it's extremely valuable.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We probably would have explored different materials earlier, whereas I think we took a very conscious decision to make that a vegan product for all the sustainability reasons behind it, where then durability is sort of the other side of the equation. And we probably didn't go all the way in that process to look at, okay, if you wear something for two years and it is leather, is it still better than something that is a vegan leather alternative, but might just not have the same kind of repairability or durability? We're pretty stubborn there to make a very good vegan white tennis sneaker that is super lightweight.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think the way we're building new sports tennis, for example, I think we could have been closer to the consumer earlier in understanding how much appetite there is to upgrade 100 box white tennis sneaker and other brands have done that in a more precise way. We have now second wave, third wave done a much better job and I think we're getting there. But not everywhere you need to go full just your own way. And I think the Roger is now a fantastic range of products, but it was very complicated process for us, mostly internally, to really debate through what is a next generation next level Y tennis sneaker.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“If I look at what you're doing, you don't go in and fish for a reason to do something. And even if it's a $200 pair of shoes, I don't think we should do that neither. Even if you just wear it for lifestyle, you probably want the best running shoe out there. Or then you want a true fashion statement, but you're not going to wear your running shoes and then wear them again for a night out and back and forth. It might happen, but I don't think we should brief that in as a product.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Probably does. Yeah. But what brand do you want to be as well? I love having our craziest innovation marathon shoes in Dover Street market. I think that is much more of a place to be even your craziest running shoes than being in that in-between space where you make compromises on the product and at the same time you sort of it's not very clear what you want to do with the product. I think product intent should be much clearer and a pleasure always sort of smooses a bit with both.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Will go for style and not really care about the performance. But that I want something that really works and yet still looks good somehow still works or still looks good, that middle ground, I think that was not the smartest place to operate in.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We probably listened to customers when it comes to the space that exists between sports and lifestyle too much. So a lot of customers have a strong belief that there is a world in whatever we want to call it hybrids where you can use them for sports. You can also use them for lifestyle. And there's this persona probably that is a 2010 persona that lives in New York goes to the gym and then goes and gets their latte and wears the same outfit. Not sure that really still exists or has ever existed in the way that that's been described. And that it makes sense to have a product that does function and style equally well. I think you have a customer that will go for the most performing running product because of style. I think you will have people just purely”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So you need to create, and then once you're already on that, you might just don't want to create within that comfort zone and push it a bit.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Listen a lot. We don't always use everything, but we do listen a lot because the company has also been growing at a scale where you also need to find the right kind of balance. And we also need to become much more concise in terms of how we show up, where we show up as you do this more polar opposite sort of consumers. And there's an interesting aspect which we just don't have an archive. So that means every other footwear brand will go back in history, right? Now early 2000s are coming. You see all the A6s that have been there, now slowly phasing out again. Salamon has been having a bit of harder time because the outdoor trend is not there. So now the 2000s, the tech raves, all whatever, whatever's going to be, they're going to pull out back out and put on the table. If you just go sneaker. And if you don't have that, you can listen, but it's hard because you cannot pull it out of somewhere.”
2025-12-19 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20Product: On Running's CPO on How to Create Emotion Through Product | Why 99% of Products Fail and How to Create Cults Around Products | The Biggest Product Mistakes On Have Made & Lessons Learned with Gérald Marolf · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source