Calgary-Based Entrepreneur is Changing the Way We Sleep

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[00:00] SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Countless Podcast.
[00:05] SPEAKER_00: Hello, I'm Mario Tonogusi with Calgary's podcast. Joining me today is Larus Methi,
[00:12] SPEAKER_00: who is founder and CEO of Lusame. Thanks for joining us today, Larus.
[00:17] SPEAKER_01: Hi, Mario. Thanks for having me.
[00:20] SPEAKER_00: Well, let me just start by asking you if you could describe for me what Lusame is and what it does.
[00:26] SPEAKER_01: Sure. Lusame is a technical luxury women's pajama company that helps women if they're struggling with night sweats.
[00:38] SPEAKER_00: Okay, and what did you start?
[00:41] SPEAKER_01: We are celebrating our 10th anniversary in October this month from founding the company.
[00:47] SPEAKER_01: I left my corporate job in 2012 and spent two years to create the most innovative technology for textiles to engineers, women's pajamas.
[01:00] SPEAKER_01: So it took two years of R&D and then we went to market in 2014.
[01:05] SPEAKER_00: And how did you come up with this idea? Like, where is the genesis of this idea to start this business?
[01:13] SPEAKER_01: Well, in my last corporate job, I was managing a big team.
[01:17] SPEAKER_01: It was a specialty apparel company that was very innovation-based.
[01:22] SPEAKER_01: So I traveled the world, meeting the most, the coolest, most innovative production facilities all over Southeast Asia, Europe, textile mills.
[01:31] SPEAKER_01: And around 2011, my younger sister was diagnosed with breast cancer and learning what she had to go through,
[01:39] SPEAKER_01: add millions of women through treatment, chemotherapy, radiation, and ultimately put her into years of menopausal-like symptoms.
[01:50] SPEAKER_01: And just imagining my sister and other women, you know, in these life-saving moments of trying to battle cancer and not being able to get a good night's sleep because they were struggling with night sweats.
[02:02] SPEAKER_01: But it was my call to action to leverage my experience and my connections and do something more purposeful to help women.
[02:09] SPEAKER_00: Okay. Can you tell me just a little bit about where people can find the product?
[02:16] SPEAKER_01: Sure. We are all over North America in specialty lingerie boutiques.
[02:23] SPEAKER_01: There's several here in Calgary, online, of course, on leucine.com, several department stores, Nordstroms.com, QVC.
[02:35] SPEAKER_01: We have quite a presence in Canada and the US now.
[02:38] SPEAKER_00: Have you ever thought of opening an actual retail outlet or store?
[02:43] SPEAKER_01: Certainly, that's in our plans.
[02:45] SPEAKER_01: We are launching some very kind of magical, innovative new product categories this November and next year.
[02:54] SPEAKER_01: So there will be a need for physical stores for sure in our future.
[02:59] SPEAKER_00: And can you tell me what the name signifies?
[03:03] SPEAKER_01: Sure. When we were trying to find a name that exuded luxury and something more romantic than granny jammies for night sweats,
[03:11] SPEAKER_01: we spent a lot of time researching beautiful names that could mean something.
[03:17] SPEAKER_01: And we found an old and ecological dictionary and the name Lusom without the accent on the end is an ancient Scottish term for desirable.
[03:27] SPEAKER_01: And we wanted women to feel comfortable and beautiful and desirable for ourselves, no matter what health crisis or sweaty night we were battling.
[03:37] SPEAKER_01: So it just resonates with women emotionally when they when they hear the genesis of our name.
[03:45] SPEAKER_00: Can you give me sort of some sense of how much the company has grown since you started it?
[03:52] SPEAKER_01: Sure. We've doubled the business every year.
[03:56] SPEAKER_01: It took us a couple of years to get off the ground in 2014 because there is a skepticism that something could work so effectively.
[04:04] SPEAKER_01: But in 2017 when we were in Oprah Magazine for the first time, that's really when we hit it big.
[04:12] SPEAKER_01: But so far every year we've doubled the business and we were profitable right from jump.
[04:19] SPEAKER_00: And what's your vision as you look into the future and the next say five years or so?
[04:26] SPEAKER_01: It is a very grand future vision of being the destination for luxury sleep.
[04:36] SPEAKER_01: Anything synergistic with sleep. So sheets and I'm asked and getting into menswear and overall evidence based content to support people's sleep.
[04:48] SPEAKER_01: So we really want to be the one stop shopping for science infused products that are proven to deliver a great night's sleep in a luxury experience and get to a hundred million dollar company sold globally.
[05:02] SPEAKER_00: All right. So when you look at your background, maybe if you could give me a little bit of your background and what you were doing prior to this and maybe that gives us some context of what you're doing now.
[05:17] Speaker UNKNOWN: So why?
[05:19] SPEAKER_01: Sure. It's been a journey. I started right out of university at Ralph Lauren and then the Gucci head office in Toronto and just got to learn about these global brands, how they resonated with customers emotionally and building this lifestyle brand.
[05:36] SPEAKER_01: So that was in me from 25 years ago and then in Toronto, I just kind of honed my craft as senior level buying, buying positions, overseeing sourcing, traveling the world, being a buyer and all the great things that go with it.
[05:52] SPEAKER_01: And then I moved to Calgary in 2004 to start my last corporate job, which was building the vision for ladies wear and the strategic plan from Marksburg warehouse.
[06:06] SPEAKER_01: So that's where I spent eight years and had an amazing kind of entrepreneurial like journey inside a corporate environment of really learning what innovation inside a parallel would do for people.
[06:16] SPEAKER_00: So what was the appeal or attraction for you when it came to, first of all, the retail sector and then secondly, I guess just the clothing aspect of the retail sector.
[06:31] SPEAKER_01: It sounds so simplistic, you know, retail or consumer packaged goods, but I've worked in women's wear in solutions, solution driven apparel, so footwear or comfortable clothing.
[06:44] SPEAKER_01: So it was very emotional to help women feel their best and that felt very purposeful on giving them either footwear or intimates that would kind of make them feel great about their bodies.
[06:58] SPEAKER_01: And you know, we weren't curing cancer, but it was very kind of emotional to wake up in service of women and to give them comfort through apparel.
[07:06] SPEAKER_01: And it just became that much more real from a healthcare standpoint on the amount of women that were suffering with night sweats to give them a very purposeful solution that they would feel beautiful, but also give them comfort.
[07:20] SPEAKER_01: So creating something from nothing and creating this fabric and this brand that didn't exist.
[07:27] SPEAKER_01: And now it's delivering, you know, millions of women around the world comfort is a very purposeful thing.
[07:32] SPEAKER_00: Okay, as an entrepreneur, Lara, what do you like about being an entrepreneur?
[07:39] SPEAKER_01: I like that every day is different.
[07:42] SPEAKER_01: I like that you can create something and deliver it to the customer and see the sales come in and it's, you know, very rewarding when the team can celebrate these financial milestones, but it's a very dynamic job and you're learning something every day.
[07:59] SPEAKER_01: You get the opportunity to learn from your mistakes and be better the next day. And this is kind of an everyday wake up and start fresh journey.
[08:08] SPEAKER_01: And it's a wild ride. You have to be wired for it. That's for sure. I think we're all a little bit crazy.
[08:13] SPEAKER_00: You know, on the flip side of things, what's the thing that you don't like about being an entrepreneur?
[08:20] SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's awful if you ever disappoint someone. You know, we are a consumer based business.
[08:25] SPEAKER_01: So when a woman isn't happy with the fit or she's disappointed, then, you know, that just cuts us all because we do prioritize customer service and we don't always get it right.
[08:36] SPEAKER_01: So when that happens, it's horrifying.
[08:38] SPEAKER_01: I would say my family would jump in and say it's very long days. And you know, you don't get to have Christmas holidays because that's our busiest time of year.
[08:51] SPEAKER_01: So there's certainly some personal sacrifices you have to make. But luckily, I've got lots of supportive people around me that don't give me too hard of a time.
[09:01] SPEAKER_00: What's been the biggest challenge that you've faced and overcome, I guess, on this journey of entrepreneurship?
[09:10] SPEAKER_01: Well, last year I fought off a hostile takeover from one of my partners who tried to take the company that I found it.
[09:17] SPEAKER_01: So, you know, that was horrifying from a personal point of view. When you get into these relationships, I'm not a transactional person.
[09:24] SPEAKER_01: I believe in loyalty and growing together through kind of good and bad. And so when that happened, it really I second guest evening wanting to continue and not just, you know, ending up on a beach and Costa Rica somewhere.
[09:37] SPEAKER_01: But I think that was obviously the biggest thing that I personally had to overcome in our in our 10 year journey.
[09:42] SPEAKER_00: Okay, now when you look at, you know, that journey, what would you say along the way has helped you the most in terms of, I don't know, mentors or examples of other leaders in business or even books.
[10:03] SPEAKER_00: What's helped you along the way?
[10:05] SPEAKER_01: Definitely my informal advisory board who are mostly former bosses, you know, experts in the industry from winning team.
[10:14] SPEAKER_01: I've got an amazing couple of capital markets advisors and legal brains and financial brains and brand building.
[10:23] SPEAKER_01: So I've got this network of people I can call who challenged my thinking, tell me when I'm not thinking about something right or if I've called something wrong and how to think about something differently, but have smart people around me that are different from me that push back.
[10:38] SPEAKER_01: And they make me smarter. I'm very lucky to have, you know, an advisory board around me.
[10:45] SPEAKER_00: Any books that helped you?
[10:47] SPEAKER_01: Oh, for sure. You know, good to great would be kind of the Bible. I refer to on just, you know, how to surround yourself with smart people and the right people on the team.
[10:58] SPEAKER_01: I think that's probably my favorite business book that I keep referring to to this day.
[11:03] SPEAKER_00: Okay. Now, if a young person, well, not even necessarily young person with anybody, I came to you and seeking advice on becoming an entrepreneur wanting to be an entrepreneur, what would you tell them?
[11:20] SPEAKER_01: Gosh, do your homework on the size of the market and how your value proposition will be compelling.
[11:27] SPEAKER_01: And then that's kind of step one, but the ability to execute is the biggest part of being an entrepreneur because there's a zillion good ideas and the people that have good ideas.
[11:37] SPEAKER_01: But if they have no ability to execute, then, you know, it's just a giant waste of money and time. It's going to fail.
[11:46] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but as an old friend of mine used to say lots of talk, no action.
[11:54] SPEAKER_00: So, you know, when, when you look at the, at the business, let me ask you just a little bit about, no, I know you're, you know, primarily, you know, your goods are out in a lot of different places and online.
[12:11] SPEAKER_00: But in terms of being a business person in Alberta, can you talk a little bit about that? What are the advantages of that?
[12:20] SPEAKER_01: I find a culture and climate of Albertans to be very entrepreneurial, less bureaucratic. So like minded thinkers in, you know, informal kind of networking groups has been very refreshing.
[12:34] SPEAKER_01: I, you know, started my career in Toronto, Ontario, and just the overall mindset is very different. People want to work. It doesn't matter your family, your heritage. Nobody gives a crap. It's about what you've done personally, what you did yesterday.
[12:52] SPEAKER_01: And I think that's been really kind of exciting and refreshing about the climate of hiring people and networking.
[12:59] SPEAKER_01: You know, the challenge over time as a small business owner is, you know, when, when some of the tax advantages have changed and, you know, not enough financial support and tax relief for small business through the various, you know, federal entities that shall be meaningless. That's been, that's been a challenge.
[13:18] SPEAKER_00: Now, I understand, Lara, that you tend to support young entrepreneurs. Tell me a little bit about that.
[13:28] SPEAKER_01: Sure. There's been a couple of organizations. I've really enjoyed so the foundation for women entrepreneurs out of Vancouver, which is now called the forum.
[13:38] SPEAKER_01: I've participated in an events and I take on one mentee every year and just go through their business with them, which has been really rewarding. It feels like my own when I'm kind of under the covers with these really smart engaged women.
[13:51] SPEAKER_01: And the other place that I've volunteered with is the Hunter Center for Entrepreneurs at the UFC and for an entrepreneur type program.
[14:01] SPEAKER_01: I think, you know, they're amazing and I've done, I've been judges for some of their pitch competitions and that's been super fun.
[14:09] SPEAKER_01: I've been working with some really bright young minds as you see that I've ended up hiring.
[14:14] SPEAKER_01: And so I think important to give back and if I can share the pitfalls and some of the disastrous mistakes I've made to help you, I know young entrepreneurs, I'm really happy to do it.
[14:25] SPEAKER_00: Now, I understand also you mentioned giving back. Tell me about how, how the company gives back in other ways.
[14:34] SPEAKER_01: Yes, we, we quietly do this for the sake of doing it, not for being recognized for it.
[14:40] SPEAKER_01: You know, I've mentioned how important the Canadian Cancer Society is because of my sister.
[14:46] SPEAKER_01: So we did a five year Canadian Cancer Research Fund for breast cancer, where we launched.
[14:53] SPEAKER_01: And then more recently, we do our sweet dreams campaign.
[14:57] SPEAKER_01: And this is partnering with women emergency shelters across North America and giving to the women and residents these care packages of pajamas and shampoo and hair brushes and triplets.
[15:11] SPEAKER_01: Just some necessary things, you know, these women have been so brave and left a horrible situation sometimes without, you know, anything but the clothes on their backs.
[15:21] SPEAKER_01: So we give them these care packages around Mother's Day and Christmas just to give them some sort of hug.
[15:29] SPEAKER_00: Excellent. Now you mentioned, you know, about one of the challenges as being entrepreneurs the time, obviously, you know, many ways it is a 24 or seven job.
[15:41] SPEAKER_00: How do you think your work life balance is these days?
[15:45] SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's a disaster.
[15:48] SPEAKER_01: It's a fun disaster and it's also a hobby because there's so much excitement happening.
[15:54] SPEAKER_01: And we're a small, but mighty team, but we're launching new products. We're going into our busiest season.
[15:59] SPEAKER_01: We're partnering with massive retailers that requires a lot of setup and work.
[16:05] SPEAKER_01: So it's unhealthy at the moment, but you know, come new year.
[16:10] SPEAKER_01: Oh, I always say that, you know, the next quarter will be a little bit better, but it'll get better.
[16:17] SPEAKER_00: So what do you do to relax the de-stress?
[16:23] SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, where we live right now in Calgary is just spectacular weather. So trying to get out and do walks with my partner or my family a few times a week is really invigorating or yoga or tennis or golf.
[16:37] SPEAKER_01: I've got two sons and they're very active. So we do a lot of sports together.
[16:43] SPEAKER_00: Okay, how important is that do you think for an entrepreneur to get that balance?
[16:49] SPEAKER_00: And, you know, how important is that to really the success of the company is?
[16:56] SPEAKER_01: Well, Lisa, my partner in business, director of marketing keeps reminding me that we're a health and wellness brand and we should practice.
[17:03] SPEAKER_01: But we're both horrible at it. It's essential. You know, if you can find a Saturday, when you don't look at work emails and just completely disconnect, I always feel better for it.
[17:14] SPEAKER_01: So I can't emphasize enough the importance of just finding the time to unplug de-stress, get out there and do something active.
[17:24] SPEAKER_01: It's really important to the success of you personally and to your business.
[17:29] SPEAKER_00: All right. Thanks very much, Larry, for joining us today.
[17:33] SPEAKER_01: I'm having me. That was fun.
[17:34] SPEAKER_00: All right. Super. That was Larry Smith, who is founder and CEO of Lucie May.
[17:39] SPEAKER_00: I'm Mario Tonoguzi with Calgary's podcast on Canada's podcast network. Thanks for joining us today.