YouSaid · the spoken record

Ronnen Harary

lines on the record: 93
first: 2021-12-20
most recent: 2021-12-20
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

“No, we did a lot of. We did a TV commercial. We bought media against it. We found distributors around the world. We came up with these really creative point of sale displays where you could actually pump up the airhog and flick the propeller and hear the magical sound that came from the motor. And I think we had them at like Walmart and Kmart and at a lot of places. So that was definitely in the marketing budget.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You know, I could just tell you that by the end of 1998, we started marking in that year, we had gross $35 million in sales. I think we had sold over a million and a half pieces, something like that. And I think our wholesale was about $20 at the time.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We took so much care, and that's why it took so long. It was like how to make the propeller safe, put a foam nose coat on it, super light. The wings would pop off so they wouldn't break. And, you know, one of the biggest things was usually it got stuck in a tree. So people. Yeah, and that's it.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Everything was going into this product. Everything's done in parallel. So we had no orders at the beginning, but as we started designing and developing it, then you start the sales process. And we were going to the Toy Fair and at the Toy Fair, we were starting to sell it. And so before we actually got into production, we did have orders.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We did everything in parallel. I would say this when we signed the product, we basically put all the money we'd made to date into the design and development. The design and development was very, very expensive.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, exactly. The difficult thing with the air hogs, which is what we called it, was how do you mass produce it? We ended up finding this company called K-development. And they did all the design work in terms of how the engine is going to actually function and work. And we actually didn't have a lot of money to pay them at the time. So they agreed to do a back-end royalty deal. And literally a year and a half, two years building the prototype, rebuilding the prototype, test it, and see if it was flying and see if it was reliable and durable and all that type of stuff. Got all the engineering done, and then we went to China, found a factory, which was called Kinsing. And so we sent all the plans there. They started actually building out the product for us.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, the way it works in the toy industry is you license the product in perpetuity And you pay a 5% royalty on your sales”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, so it's basically it's a plastic bottle, foam wings on top, foam fuselage, and they had developed this pneumatic engine that literally the air would actually drive the piston up and down, spin the propeller, and fly the plane.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“But they were showing us stuff and we were getting to look at stuff and we were developing relationships and contacts. And so in 96, we actually came across this invention, which was an airplane that you pumped up and would fly for about 45 seconds. And it came from these two British inventors, John Dixon and Peter Manning. They actually came to Toronto, came to visit us, and we flew this aeroplane, and it was probably one of the most magical experiences seeing this plane fly.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You know, they weren't, put it you this way, they were not showing us their best products. They were basically dusting off the stuff in the back of the closet.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, very coincidental. Between her and Austin's company called Canada Games, which was run by the Albert family, they told us that this whole network of toy inventors globally around the world that come up with ideas, but they don't commercialize them. And so Ben started going around with our wares and meeting all these toy inventors and trying to solicit ideas from them.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Let's just keep on going. Let's find some other products to sell. We did make a couple strategic macro decisions, which were we didn't want to, after Earth buddies and devil sticks, which were both, you know, call it public domain products. We said we want to design and develop our own products and we want to sell them globally around the world. And we don't want to just be a Canadian distributor. And then we said we're open to ideas wherever they come from and let's go search for these ideas. So in 96, we started meeting with Toy inventors. And so Ben was living with this girl by the name of Jen Irwin from the Irwin Toys family, which is a famous Canadian toy company.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We've always shot for unanimous consent, and we would keep on debating until we actually got the consent. And then there was one other thing, which was if we stepped over the line, everybody was able to say sorry, which I think is a huge thing. Sometimes if you didn't say sorry You asked for the story, and you always got the story.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Think it was everything, but the one nice thing is that through the fighting, and it wasn't like when I say fighting, it wasn't like you're angry at the person. It was just advocating for your opinion. But we were young guys and very excited. Everybody really wanted to win and everybody wanted the success. So maybe we were a little eager.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I mean, there was one thing that was working in our favor, which was there was something in the zeitgeist at the time that made Devil Sticks appealing to young kids. It was like seven-year-olds, eight-year-olds, nine-year-olds, 10-year-olds. It was like analogists are like the yo-yo. So we did the marketing, but I don't think the marketing helped, but there was something in the zeitgeist that actually made the product pull.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No, Devil Six is the generic term, and so we called ours a spin master devil sticks. So that's the origin of the company name from the Devil Sticks.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I actually played with them when I was in high school for some reason in 94 we started noticing that a lot of kids in the schools were actually playing with the devil sticks. So maybe there's a little bit of a trend going on. We had our factory. So we said, well, why don't we figure out how to mass produce the devil sticks and we'll sell them. So it was just based on this trend that we saw. And so we designed this packaging, and the same distributor that got us the sale at Walmart, Canada, they introduced us to their partner in the United States called UniWorld. And so suddenly we found ourselves a toy fair in 1995.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No, it was only in 95 when we started selling a product called Devil Sticks. Product did really well, and so it was after that after the devil sticks.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, the product was selling very well. So we had money coming in from the other sales. And I mean, in our peak, we were producing 17,500 pieces a day.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We had to move again to another facility. Every time we got more orders, we would move into bigger factory and build more machines and we just hired more workers.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I knew we can still make money, especially because of the Canadian dollar was low at the time. I didn't want price to be a factor, and I figured she's got so many options here. So we better give her a compelling reason to go with us. And so I pitched her. I showed her exactly what we were doing. And she gave me this big book, which was the vendor agreement. She said, okay, well, I'll give you an order for 48,000 pieces. And if it goes well, I'll give you an order for half a million pieces.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Nope. What went through my mind was we were going to charge a $2.65 US. And I dropped the price to $165 in my mind right then and there”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Or maybe they won't. I just, yeah, that's true. So I waited there until 3 30 and the craziest thing is as I walked into her office on the left-hand side of this counter, she had about eight other birth buddies there.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, like, and then I'm like, okay, well, do you mind doing me a favor? Can you find out who the buyer is? Because I drove all the way from Toronto. So he comes back with this name written on a piece of paper and said, Adrian Zachs. So I said, thank you very much. And I took my box of Earth buddies and I started walking around the offices of Kmart looking for this buyer. She was sitting at her desk when I found her. And she said, Okay, I'll see you at 3 30. And then the guys that we came with, they're like, let's go for lunch. And I said, I'm not going to go anywhere because like maybe she'll call me early or something like that.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Kept in touch with them. Well, that's one of the things Anton does extremely well. He keeps in touch with everybody. And so he said, do you have any relationships at Kmart? And they said, they did. So I don't know why, but I was the one that actually took the meeting. And so I drove down. It was in Troy, Michigan. I pitch the buyer, do like a 30 minute pitch at a full box of Earth buddies. Looks fun. And after 30 minutes, the buyer said to me, he goes, thank you very much for coming, but I'm not the buyer. And I'm like, and I'm like, this can't be true.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The universe works in funny ways. Anton was backpacking in Europe a couple summers before and he met this guy who came from a very well-connected family. And when we wanted to break into the United States, Anton called him and he said, do you have any?”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Correct. And so Bob walked into Ben's office one day and he said, you know, Ben, like I used to run a factory. Will you let me help you? And Ben said yes. And literally within two days, he had all these Gant charts up and this. And he started balancing up the lines between the workers and the raw materials and all this type of stuff.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“He actually had no manufacturing experience. He came to our office and we literally made a deal within 45 minutes and then he went down and started running the factory. You know, Ben was, he's a smart guy. I mean, he went to business school and he just figured it out. But Ben would tell you that he wouldn't have gotten through the manufacturing if it wasn't for this gentleman by the name of Bob Wakelam. So Bob actually, when we started, the first place we actually went to look for people to work in the factory was we went to homeless shelter. It was just people that needed work. So that's where we went. But there were two individuals. There was Bob and this other gentleman, Grenville, who ran shipping. Both of them were...”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We saw them on the street. We set up tables at eight different corners all around Toronto. And we sold basically 800 out of the 5,000. And we came into the office Monday morning and we're like, okay, well, we've got to figure out some other distribution. And then we found a gift distributor who took on the product and started selling it to the gift channels. And then again through my mom, she had a contact of a company that sold toys called Samco Sales and showed them the product and I said to them, would you guys be interested in distributing the product for us? And they said, sure, no problem. And two weeks later, they called us with an order for 26,000 pieces.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, it was like a plumbing tube. You could take the nylons and wrap it around the tube. And then on the side, there was a feeder where you can dump the seeds and the sawdust. And there was a way for you to tie it off. It was actually really clever. We found a small factory space, warehouse space.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, basically we said let's make 5,000 pieces from Mother's Day and go from there. And that was the plan. And so we got my sister and my brother-in-law involved. My sister designed the packaging. My brother-in-law, ex-brother-in-law, who's an incredible engineer, he designed the contraptions so we can manufacture these things at some sort of scale.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, that's correct. In the article, it said the original inventor or the product came from somewhere in Turkey, and no one really knew who it was.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“My mom's credit, she's very entrepreneurial and she's very much a doer She was like, well, something's happening. So I said to Anton, I was like, why don't we do it? And we literally went to Kmart and we bought pantyhose and we bought sawdust and grass seeds and everything. We started prototyping the products. And we had a solarium in my house and we were growing everything in the Solarium.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Immerse the whole thing and then just let it sit, and like, because the sawdust held the water, seeds were able to germinate. So she read about it, she translated the article for me. And in the article, it said that there was all these six different people in Israel that were selling them, and that literally every person in Israel bought one. And it was just like the biggest craze in the country. And two weeks later, my late grandmother came to Canada for a visit, and she brought me and my sisters one as a gift. And so I looked at it and I was like, no one's manufacturing or selling them here in Canada. Why don't we do it? And so I spoke to Anton. I was like, why don't we sell these earth buddies? We called it Earth Buddies. And he looked at me. He thought that it was literally crazy.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, what actually happened was so I graduated after three years. Anton was in a four year program. And then just before Anton graduated, my mom was reading the Yidiot Akhranot, which is the largest Israeli newspaper. And in there, there was an article about all these six different Israelis that were manufacturing this product called the Grasshead. It was a small little potato head made out of grass seeds, nylon, sawdust, and had a little happy face on it. And you put it in water and grow grass for hair. So similar to like a chia pet.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That was a business. That was a business, yeah. And then we ended up doing it in five universities across Ontario by the time we graduated. I think we grossed about $100,000.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Exactly. We work for a fertilized company. And then we started this poster business. So the business was actually taking pictures of kids during Frost Week and then creating a collage of all the pictures. Exactly. Exactly. Okay. So we would take pictures of the kids during Frost Week Then we cut all pictures out, we create a collage, and then around the perimeter of the collage, we would sell advertising. And then we printed up 9,000 posters and then gave it to the students for free.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, well, first after our first year of university, Anton and I actually sold fertilizer door to door because both of us had to pay for part of our education.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I was averaged at sports and academically I was average, so I figured that business was the right path for me. I saw it as something that had endless potential and not a lot of constraints.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Think it's in the middle. It's in the middle. No, it's definitely a good school. Listen, don't get me wrong. I mean, I worked hard and my grades were decent, but I didn't get many A's. I can't remember any A's in my days. It was mostly B's and some C's. But I actually knew from a very young age that I wanted to go into business.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The nice thing was, I actually call it learning gifts. And the reason why I call it a learning gift is because your brain is wired slightly differently. And as a result of that, you get some extra benefits. My attention to visual detail is very high. Like when we were developing in toys or engineering, I could see little changes when we were debugging the toys and people would use rulers and I could just see it with my eyes. So I think that's the”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It's a learned disability called Dyscrafia. So it's the inability for your hand to keep up with your writing. And then my handwriting is not very legible, and then I got to go back and I got to correct what I wrote. And then when you go back and you correct what you wrote, you lose your stream of consciousness of what you were thinking. And then you're going to stop. And then it's like rebooting. You have to reboot Bunch of times. So for me to write an essay would take me twice as long.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, yeah, yeah. Amongst the founders came out, some of the inefficiencies in the business, the way we're organized. This is why older people have gray hair. You know, when people say they have gray hair from something, like this was our seminal gray hair event.”
2021-12-20 · How I Built This with Guy Raz · Spin Master/PAW Patrol: Ronnen Harary · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT