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A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

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Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#281

Post by trentnix »

mywittyname wrote: post #269
fortran77 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and maybe it's true that some styles of clothing are "not for everyone"

His comments weren't even controversial, as they echoed beliefs that are held by those in the fashion industry. Lots of clothing companies make it plainly obvious not everyone is supposed to buy their products.

He went into it in detail when he was interviewed by Guy Raz. Wilson defended himself by saying his comments had nothing to do with obesity, but rather material. He is a fabrics guy, and his clothes were being used to shape, a la Spanx, when they weren’t built to shape at all.

It’s a fascinating interview and one of the best in the “How I Built This” series.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#282

Post by core-questions »

ylesaout wrote: post #275
cryptozeus wrote: post #248

Kudos to the guy for bouncing back though !! “After losing everything, he toiled in misery for years — but he eventually made an improbable comeback. In 1997, he took out a £155k (US$203k) loan on his house, built up a health club business, and sold it for £3.9m (US$5.1m). He then used the profits to start an online jewelry company. (The Ratners Group rebranded as Signet in 1993; today, it is the largest diamond reta…

While he made a successful comeback (however far from his first success), saying he toiled in misery for years is a little bit exagerated. Indeed, he was still the owner of a house (and probably of other goods). And this house was big enough to have a value probably equal to a today million dollars. That's not what I call to be toiled in misery.

Misery is a state of mind, not of finance. I'm sure plenty of billionaires are personally miserable, despite their ability to do literally anything.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#283

Post by Smithalicious »

ylesaout wrote: post #275
cryptozeus wrote: post #248

Kudos to the guy for bouncing back though !! “After losing everything, he toiled in misery for years — but he eventually made an improbable comeback. In 1997, he took out a £155k (US$203k) loan on his house, built up a health club business, and sold it for £3.9m (US$5.1m). He then used the profits to start an online jewelry company. (The Ratners Group rebranded as Signet in 1993; today, it is the largest diamond reta…

While he made a successful comeback (however far from his first success), saying he toiled in misery for years is a little bit exagerated. Indeed, he was still the owner of a house (and probably of other goods). And this house was big enough to have a value probably equal to a today million dollars. That's not what I call to be toiled in misery.

Whether or not he toiled in misery is independent of how much money he had. It only depends on whether he toiled, and whether he was miserable doing so.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#284

Post by arunbahl »

ylesaout wrote: post #275
cryptozeus wrote: post #248

Kudos to the guy for bouncing back though !! “After losing everything, he toiled in misery for years — but he eventually made an improbable comeback. In 1997, he took out a £155k (US$203k) loan on his house, built up a health club business, and sold it for £3.9m (US$5.1m). He then used the profits to start an online jewelry company. (The Ratners Group rebranded as Signet in 1993; today, it is the largest diamond reta…

While he made a successful comeback (however far from his first success), saying he toiled in misery for years is a little bit exagerated. Indeed, he was still the owner of a house (and probably of other goods). And this house was big enough to have a value probably equal to a today million dollars. That's not what I call to be toiled in misery.

Misery, like happiness, is orthogonal to material possessions.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#285

Post by mywittyname »

ghaff wrote: post #257
calibas wrote: post #76

What I find most fascinating is that a multimillion dollar company was destroyed simply because the owner told the truth. Imagine if fast food CEOs were honest about the quality of their food instead of just parroting marketing bullshit.

I rarely eat at the big fast food chains--and it's usually because I have no other options. But what's the "truth" about the quality of the food? The CEO could quite honestly say that their goals are consistency, speed, food safety, and affordability. Quality? I expect the honest response would be something along the lines of 1.) Millions of customers apparently like our product and 2.) We try to deliver the best qua…

I eat McDonalds rather frequently for lunch because there's one nearby, a double cheeseburger is $1.89, and has 26g of protein and under 500 calories. I think they taste fine; I wouldn't pay more for a better tasting one.

I'm pretty sure nearly every McDonalds customer thinks the same way. They want quick, cheap, safely prepared food that tastes good enough to eat.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#286

Post by Traster »

cryptozeus wrote: post #248

Kudos to the guy for bouncing back though !! “After losing everything, he toiled in misery for years — but he eventually made an improbable comeback. In 1997, he took out a £155k (US$203k) loan on his house, built up a health club business, and sold it for £3.9m (US$5.1m). He then used the profits to start an online jewelry company. (The Ratners Group rebranded as Signet in 1993; today, it is the largest diamond reta…

Yes, let's all cheer on the guy who has open disdain for his customers. I wonder what he calls his health club customers behind closed doors.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#287

Post by asdfman123 »

ylesaout wrote: post #275
cryptozeus wrote: post #248

Kudos to the guy for bouncing back though !! “After losing everything, he toiled in misery for years — but he eventually made an improbable comeback. In 1997, he took out a £155k (US$203k) loan on his house, built up a health club business, and sold it for £3.9m (US$5.1m). He then used the profits to start an online jewelry company. (The Ratners Group rebranded as Signet in 1993; today, it is the largest diamond reta…

While he made a successful comeback (however far from his first success), saying he toiled in misery for years is a little bit exagerated. Indeed, he was still the owner of a house (and probably of other goods). And this house was big enough to have a value probably equal to a today million dollars. That's not what I call to be toiled in misery.

Happiness is relative to expectation.

Most people reading this will never feel extreme hunger and have all their material needs met forever, but they will probably also go through things that to them, feel like miserable failures.

You might even be forced to leave your cushy jobs and take an annual salary that is what 50 African laborers make in year. And it will possibly take years, maybe well over a decade, to live down how bad you feel about yourself.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#288

Post by nameismypw »

epylar wrote: post #235
refurb wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People seem to be using the economic word “externalities” as “things I don’t like”.

That is what externality means -- "a side effect or consequence of an industrial or commercial activity that affects other parties without this being reflected in the cost of the goods or services involved." (unless this person is affecting the cost somehow as a result of this dislike) In a sense, economics is entirely about what people like and dislike.

No, an externality is an impact you create that isn't a part of your business model. It can be positive or negative. Most of the time people talk about negative externalities these days, especially with airlines, they're talking about profiting from climate change. (Although I don't know that Ryanair is worse than anyone else.)

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#289

Post by colechristensen »

ylesaout wrote: post #275
cryptozeus wrote: post #248

Kudos to the guy for bouncing back though !! “After losing everything, he toiled in misery for years — but he eventually made an improbable comeback. In 1997, he took out a £155k (US$203k) loan on his house, built up a health club business, and sold it for £3.9m (US$5.1m). He then used the profits to start an online jewelry company. (The Ratners Group rebranded as Signet in 1993; today, it is the largest diamond reta…

While he made a successful comeback (however far from his first success), saying he toiled in misery for years is a little bit exagerated. Indeed, he was still the owner of a house (and probably of other goods). And this house was big enough to have a value probably equal to a today million dollars. That's not what I call to be toiled in misery.

Being rich doesn't make you automatically happy, you can hear many stories about billionaires who have and have achieved everything they could possibly want being miserable – wanting things and then getting them isn't the source of happiness, being faced with this reality firsthand by running out of things to want and still feeling dissatisfied with life can be (imagined at least) really miserable and hopeless.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#290

Post by EGreg »

Traster wrote: post #286
cryptozeus wrote: post #248

Kudos to the guy for bouncing back though !! “After losing everything, he toiled in misery for years — but he eventually made an improbable comeback. In 1997, he took out a £155k (US$203k) loan on his house, built up a health club business, and sold it for £3.9m (US$5.1m). He then used the profits to start an online jewelry company. (The Ratners Group rebranded as Signet in 1993; today, it is the largest diamond reta…

Yes, let's all cheer on the guy who has open disdain for his customers. I wonder what he calls his health club customers behind closed doors.

Probably similar to what Mark Zuckerberg called people who trusted him with their data :)

https://www.businessinsider.com/embarrassing-and-damaging-zu...

  ZUCK: yea so if you ever need info about anyone at harvard
  ZUCK: just ask
  ZUCK: i have over 4000 emails, pictures, addresses, sns
  FRIEND: what!? how'd you manage that one?
  ZUCK: people just submitted it
  ZUCK: i don't know why
  ZUCK: they "trust me"
  ZUCK: dumb fucks
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