YouSaid · the spoken record

Mel and Patricia Ziegler

lines on the record: 133
first: 2024-08-19
most recent: 2024-08-19
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Staleness opportunities were presenting themselves by this point. There was a real estate developer who opened shopping centers and he was a customer. He loved the brand. He said, I want to put these doors in my shopping centers.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“All right, so you've got the store in San Francisco, and it's doing pretty well. And in your mind, I mean, did you have any time to kind of reflect on what was the next step? Or, I mean, was it just let's get the catalog, let's just stay on this.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I think We originally created the business for other people like us, ourselves. I mean, we really were trying to sell to other creative people And writers, artists. But it caught on. It caught on. It went beyond that. I mean, it went to everybody. It was amazing how many people. There were kids to grandmas.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“To make, and we had great credit by then because we paid everything within 30 days or 60 days. We learned that that was the trick.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I think we were pouring every penny that we had back into doing that. So yes, not to do it on any scale, but enough to make the clothes that we needed.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, you were sowing that into everything. Now you What we had to do, we first tried to find manufacturers who were making things that were similar to the kinds of clothes we would make. And by the way,”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That was it. We were selling something that was not. You couldn't replenish it. Surplus, the surplus we were selling largely was from the Second World War. And it was still around in the early 70s, in the late 70s. But we were fast depleting it. And we realized, whoa, what are we going to do? We have a whole business that's built around this.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That would make up the difference because we'd have. Margins, probably the same margins there, but at bigger volume, and that'll get us through this. And so you said to me, we need to open another store. And I'm there saying, oh my God”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Not want really to shut this thing down. I knew we couldn't go backwards. We knew that we needed at this point we needed help. We definitely needed help. I mean, this wasn't, these were in these days”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, that's what I so we didn't know. We didn't, we, again, we didn't do anything conventionally. All we did is kept it going. The idea was to keep it going. Somehow or another, we were going to figure this thing out and make it work.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, I don't know because we didn't really disagree. We trusted each other with whatever we did totally And we were just cranky because we were tired. And I remember once San Francisco to the printer to put out our latest catalog and I hadn't slept in like three nights. I think I was just up around the clock just trying to get it all pasted up and ready to go and then supervise it on the printing presses. I was driving home across the Golden Gate Bridge and all of a sudden I hear this honk. I wake up and realize I've veered into the oncoming traffic. You were falling asleep. I was falling asleep. I was so sleep, Starf.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“$16. Okay, now there's a lot going on, right? You've got catalog business and you're trying to grow and all these things. And from what I understand, Patricia, you are getting pretty overwhelmed because you are”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Out of the corner of my eye this pile of khaki that almost looks like the same fabric as his original jacket that he brought back from Australia. And so I went over and picked up this short and it had two buckles hanging off the side of really wide waistband. They were fantastic. Oh my God. You could see they were fantastic.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We began to realize the power of that, absolutely. And more and more and more media, then there was the fashion editor of the Los Angeles”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So now you get all these dollar bills, plus you can send out the catalog, but now you've got a mail order business. Yeah, we do. And an even bigger mailing list that's growing. That's amazing. So, but the store in general still pretty sleepy, still kind of quiet”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Less than that. I know it was at the most, it was 75%. I think we put a dollar on every one. We knew we were going to get it, but we sent it.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Several questions, and I went on about mostly quoting the catalog. And at the end, he said, and so what about anybody who's more interested and would like to get a catalog? One of these catalogs, and I said Oh, you just have them send a dollar to POBC seven four Mill Valley? No, 94942. And it was like, thank you, Patricia, from Banana.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, he was on our somehow or another. We sent him a copy because we sent the radio stations, television stations, anybody, any media we could think of.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And then one day you got a wrong number early in the morning you thought was a wrong number in the early morning. You pick up the phone and this guy says,”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Anybody who called, I'd answer the phone, of course, banana republic. And if they said, oh, wrong number, I said, oh, well, you didn't know about Banana Republic. I'd try and engage them in conversation.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“What can we do? 10 hours. Failure was not a possibility. We would make this work. We would boy each other. We would make this work one way or another, and we were determined to do it. Whatever we did, there were no mistakes. You just keep going.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“But we just were trying to think of new ideas for how we could start up sales again. But we had to keep, it was a store. So I had to be there 10 hours a day or something in case someone came in that wanted to buy something.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Two days before the end of the month, we went, I think it was a Saturday, that Saturday, to open the store in the morning, and there was a line of people outside. And somebody holds up the... The front page of the style section of the independent journal with a picture like three quarters of the page of the two of us in Safari”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Emerin County and said, you know, I'd love to get the story on this place. Can I bring by a photographer? And she was back in like two hours. They interviewed us. We tried on different clothes. They took pictures That was great. And so I think two days before”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We just kept adjusting The outfits that were hanging on the walls and slightly moved. Yeah, and I opened the door. It was cold, but it opened the door and kind of sweep outside, hoping to catch someone's eye and just said, oh, drop in, you know, just anything we could do to attract people”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think it was 650 and he gave us, I remember he handed me a $10 bill and I realized We don't have any cash register. I had to dig into my pocket to give a change. We had no idea. We didn't even think about getting a cash register.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Absolutely. They all went to the library after and got some books on direct mailing and what you should do. And we found out that we just did everything wrong. You're supposed to have product on the cover, on the back page, and maybe page three. We had a leopard print front cover, a cartoon on the back page, and I think an interview with me on page three.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Staple them at the kitchen table because you didn't have enough money to staple them. And hand wrote the addresses on each”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, we didn't have any mailing list, but coming from the media in those days, I realized that the only way we were going to get this story out without advertising is to sort of see if we can get anybody in the media interested. So what we did is we printed, I think, 500 catalogs. Sent them to every friend we had. And you guys.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And they were able to print it from that, like the early Xeroxing, but it didn't look like Xeroxing. And so we found a place to do that. I remember we had enough money to print it, but not enough money to stable it.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, Patricia's an artist. I'm a writer. Let's do a catalog. It was the pre kinkos days. And you would basically take it down and they would do an instant job.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, yeah. And then there were these big telephone poles that were holding the ceiling up. And they kind of got in the way of looking, so I thought. Well these are unattractive. Let's turn them into palm trees. And so I drilled holes into the top and went to the flower mart and bought big palm fronds and stuck them in the top. But I was worried that nobody would notice this store. From the outside so I painted the front door black and white zebra stripes. So they kind of popped.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Knotty pine walls and ceiling and the landlord said we could not paint the walls or the ceiling. So I needed light reflected so I went to the meat market and bought rolls of white butcher paper. The ceiling because it was cheap. And then stapled that to the ceiling and painted like big palm fronds to make it look like a jungle, but also the white would reflect some light. And you could do all of that because you knew.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“In this domain. Well, we're going to have a business. So I was the lawyer. I was the accountant. I set the business up. Basically, by figuring out how to set a business up without hiring any professionals to do that.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Right. How did you do that? Well, I ran an ad. I got one response. This Sicilian seamstress named Anna, and I showed her what we were going to do. I started cutting and pinning and she started sewing and we just went nine hours at a time. You were handsome.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We might 50 slipping methods. But you turn it into a vest. But now you've got to, I mean, you're starting up a business. You've got to decorate the store. You've got to make the clothes. How did you do that”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You would make good handbags. So you would basically, instead of look for clothing that you could sell, you were just looking at the material that you could then pull out, and then you yourself would...”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“All right, so just to be clear, I mean You weren't like initially you bought the Spanish Army shirts, right? But then you go back to this guy Zim, you go to the Shapiro in Sacramento. These are surplus dealers. And you're looking for finished items you could just put on your shelves.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, yes, how we would style it. But also I knew that we'd really need half our customers to be women because they would spend more on clothes than I thought at men at that time. I did try playing with the shirts, the Spanish Army shirts, taking them apart and Fynde and I could put two of them together and make a safari dress or cut off the sleeves and make a skirt, but we needed a lot more.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So, all right, what were you finding? I mean, everything that you were buying at this point, because you had to populate this store, and first of all, I'm assuming that 90% of this stuff was really for men because most people were... Military gear was made for male soldiers. So, first of all, it was basically going to be a men's clothing store It was you were going to differentiate it from an Army Navy surplus store because of how you were curating it?”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It was a smaller place, and there wasn't. That but you could see things more clearly. And we were looking for, we weren't looking for that time a lot of the US surplus was poly cotton and we were really into the natural fibers and the good quality. So we were looking for more European or foreign things, and we found a box of belts from Argentina and some Swedish gas mask bag”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I hope it's not Shapiro and Sacramento. I'm making up that name, but I don't want to name Why? He said, That son of a bitch, don't buy anything from him. He's a crook.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You broke a business plan. No, no, no, we had no No global, you do not own a place. We had no own a home. Did you get a loan?”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I gave my business card. He looked at it. He saw the crest, Patricia, and he said, hmm, I said, well, we need some cash because we need to buy some merchandise.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“But we went to the banker first. That's correct. And we said, you know, we're starting a company. He said, oh, that's great. What's the name? Banana Republic. He said, you gave me.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“What we found a store in the backstreet in Mill Valley that was available because the door had to remain unlocked because people had to go through the store to an Aikido studio, which was upstairs. As long as the door remained unlocked, it was available, we could rent it.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, that was another thing we hadn't thought about. But yes, now the money was tied up with the store. And we didn't have any money to buy anything”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And so we thought, okay, well, where would these come from? You know, they would come from a new dictator who moved in who wanted to, didn't want to look like the last army, wanted to have his own style. He would sell them, the old ones dust at a good price. That was kind of our background story.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Banana Republic. It was irreverent. It was intentionally irreverent. It was going to get attention because the Nana Republic is an unstable Country where the military takes over the treasury. We were only going to be able to sell these kinds of things if they had stories attached to them.”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There was a flea market in Marin County then in Marin City. And it was a very dusty flea market every Sunday. We said, let's go to the flea market and sell these things. So that's what we did. We set up a boost”
2024-08-19 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Banana Republic: Mel and Patricia Ziegler · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT