YouSaid · the spoken record

Mickey Drexler

lines on the record
57
first
2025-02-04
most recent
2025-02-04
sittings or episodes
1
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podcast

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  1. “Competitive with me in an ironic way. And I was getting a lot of press when I, you know, I worked 12 years in the department stores, and then I was very lucky, fortunate. I was called to run Ann Taylor then in 1980. I was a young guy. You know, I don't know. I said, okay, I didn't know what I would do next after 12 years in the department stores, I couldn't find the stimulation and the excitement or whatever you call it, of the organizations. And I don't think they're much different, political suck up. I didn't know how to articulate this, but I think in most big companies, people are always sucking up to their bosses. That's my own experience. And these developed...”

    2025-02-04 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Mickey Drexler: The Art of Selling with Retail's Merchant Prince · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  2. “He was one of the lowest paid people there, relative to his peer group, who he would always put down and whatever, that was a reality for me, so it was a cold reality, so my thoughts of him being whatever disappeared then. And as I grew, he wasn't a good dad. So when I lived there, I was going to City College. I was miserable. And I was, you know, I just got subways, Long Island Railroad, and I had an escape from the house. So I luckily got into, I didn't know where to apply, State University of Buffalo, some guy I knew went. It wasn't even a close friend. I got in, so I escaped to Buffalo. And for two years, but it was, you know, never took any, he was...”

    2025-02-04 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Mickey Drexler: The Art of Selling with Retail's Merchant Prince · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  3. “Well, I'll tell you, it's an interesting story. I used to work, he worked in the garment code company. He worked buttons. He had kind of a low-level-ish job. Well, I didn't want to face that. They asked me to take the payroll of sixteen. They said take the payroll to the bank. What do I do? I duck out the freight entrance on West thirty seventh Street and eighth Avenue, go into the neighboring freight entrance. I looked through all the pay stubs or whatever it is.”

    2025-02-04 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Mickey Drexler: The Art of Selling with Retail's Merchant Prince · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  4. “I think my ambition comes from being the opposite of him, I think. I always lived in my fantasies escaping where I am. And Peggy, my wife, said, you know, maybe that's where your creativity comes from. I don't believe it came from that because I think creativity is part of your DNA and I don't think it can be taught. But, you know, it affected me. Never took any pleasure in my success. And he just never did.”

    2025-02-04 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Mickey Drexler: The Art of Selling with Retail's Merchant Prince · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  5. “It wasn't good. He wasn't a sensitive guy. He had no emotion. He didn't treat my mum well who died. You know, she had cancer the year I was born. And what was it like? I didn't know any better at all. And I thought this is what a father is like. And over the years, I learned that this is not what a good father is like. And he was an angry, bitter guy. He was not successful. And he always talked, he wanted to be a big shot. So in my family, he acted like a big shot with my mom's three sisters and my seven cousins. And by the way, the Arnies, none of them liked him because he wasn't a warm, fuzzy, nice person. But I didn't know that when I was growing up.”

    2025-02-04 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Mickey Drexler: The Art of Selling with Retail's Merchant Prince · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  6. “He didn't fit my job description of what I thought a good father should be. Yeah, I didn't know what I wanted then. I didn't know, you know, when you're a kid, like you moving all over the place, you don't know what's right and what's not right. You learn over time.”

    2025-02-04 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Mickey Drexler: The Art of Selling with Retail's Merchant Prince · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  7. “What I do, I have a photograph in my mind. I go into a shop, it paints a picture or it doesn't. One bad color in a great painting that changes, throws off the whole painting. It's like the wheels, the ugly wheels on a mustang. And I mean that every car now has ugly wheels. I can't get over it. You know, you see the wheels. It's like having a bad button on a sweater like this. This is one of our bestsellers. And if you put an ugly button on this, that's what you notice And I say never give a customer a reason not to buy something.”

    2025-02-04 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Mickey Drexler: The Art of Selling with Retail's Merchant Prince · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT