I Spent $100,000 Testing My Sock Business Idea

This as-told-to essay relies on a dialog with Allison Strumeyer, cofounder and CEO of doublesoul. It has been edited for size and readability.

After I was in school on the University of Pennsylvania, I had a aspect hustle promoting T-shirts. I might join with native artists to characteristic their work and promote the shirts on campus. I additionally did pitch competitions with my now-husband, Ben. I’ve all the time felt very native to entrepreneurship, and I knew I wished to start out my very own enterprise.

But, once I graduated, I selected to work at BlackRock. It was intentional: I believed working with a world finance firm would give me insights priceless to me as an entrepreneur. BlackRock additionally taught me carry out at a excessive stage, in all the things from communications to venture administration.

I used to be at BlackRock for about two years, then joined Mirror, a startup that was acquired by Lululemon. Mirror was smaller and scrappier, and through my 4 years there, I realized about scaling a startup. The mixture of each experiences left me prepared to start out my very own firm.

I grew to become actually enthusiastic about socks

I all the time discovered it attention-grabbing that we put on socks greater than nearly the rest in our wardrobe. However there’s little innovation, product improvement, branding, or design around socks. I felt the class had been ignored, and I believed that all of us deserve socks we’re enthusiastic about.

My husband Ben and I grew to become actually emotionally connected to the concept of making higher socks. However we wished to check the market earlier than diving in. We created a prototype and ordered 10,000 pairs — the minimal order, which was about $100,000 price of socks.

We shared them with just about everybody we might ever met and requested them to put up in regards to the socks. That gave us natural gross sales and — extra importantly — proof of our idea. In 2022, we officially launched Doublesoul.

Funding gave me the boldness to depart my job

I selected to remain in my day job so long as potential whereas we began the corporate. On social media, individuals are inspired to depart their jobs to pursue their very own tasks, however that felt like harmful territory to me.

Having that backing gave me the boldness I wanted to depart my job. Ben and I knew we would want to promote a lot of socks earlier than we may fund a group. However we additionally wished to maneuver shortly, so we pursued enterprise funding. We raised about $2 million.

Leaving my job was emotional. I went to a college the place most individuals went on to high-paying careers, and I used to be strolling away from a safe wage. Regardless that I knew I used to be constructing fairness within the enterprise over the long run, that was scary.

I used to be too pregnant to look on ‘Shark Tank,’ so my husband went

We had a fortunate break early on on the firm when comic Pete Davidson tried the socks and liked them. He began as a buyer, however shortly invested. Now, he is like a 3rd accomplice to Ben and me.

We have been brainstorming distinctive advertising and marketing alternatives and determined to attempt to get on “Shark Tank.” I used to be too pregnant to journey when the present taped, so Pete and Ben went.

I did not thoughts lacking out: I did not need to be nervous, and having Ben there was like having an extension of myself. Ben and Pete known as to inform me in regards to the cope with Kendra Scott, the Shark who invested within the firm.

We create time every day for household, with out enterprise speak

When the present aired final September, our son was 3 weeks previous. In some ways, early parenthood mirrors a startup. I am glad to have Ben at my aspect for each. Splitting tasks and realizing that we share a imaginative and prescient for our future — for the enterprise and our son — could be very grounding.

We take a stroll most mornings to carry the infant to the park. Throughout that point, we’re not allowed to speak about Doublesoul. We simply calm down and luxuriate in a household second. We should be intentional about clearing time for our relationship, or it could be too straightforward to speak enterprise on a regular basis.