Momentum Podcast: 731

From Crisis to Growth (With Marialexandra Garcia)

by Alex Charfen

Episode Description

Crisis is a natural state for entrepreneurs. It is where we adapt, make a massive change, and create the impact we want on the world.

Alex Charfen, a business growth coach who helps entrepreneurs grow and scale their businesses, gives practical, tangible, and actionable tips that you can implement into your business right now.

At a recent Charfen Summit, one of our members, Marialexandra Garcia, the CEO of Outplay Swimwear, shared with our membership how she has gone from a place of crisis to growing her business at an incredible rate.

Your business has the potential to change the world, and the only way to see that potential become a reality is to implement a strategic plan. If you're ready to learn more, go to https://predictableplanningsystem.com/pps/pps-reg/ to get started.

Our entrepreneurial journey doesn't end here! Be sure to check out our Facebook Community filled with entrepreneurs just like you who are getting into momentum and building world-changing empires —> https://charfen.com/community

If you are an entrepreneur who is listening in and you can relate, then be sure and head over to https://momentumplanner.com/mps and gain access to one of the most requested business tools to grow and scale your business in any market condition, even in this one.

Full Audio Transcript

This is the Momentum podcast.

In the last 18 months, so many entrepreneurs entered a period of crisis, but one thing that we recognize is that crisis is natural for entrepreneurs. It's a natural state of accelerated change. And so understanding how to navigate crisis and return to a place of clarity in your business is one of the most important skills that you can have at a recent Charfen summit. We heard from one of our members, Maria Alexandra Garcia, on how she's gone from a place of literally having to call her suppliers and tell them that she could not pay them to growing at a massive rate and making an incredible impact on the world. I can't wait for you to hear this presentation, and I hope you enjoy.

I'm Alex Charfen, and this is the momentum podcast made for empire builders, game changers, trailblazers, shot takers, record breakers, world makers and creators of all kinds, those among us who can't turn it off and don't know why anyone would want to. We challenge complacency, destroy apathy, and we are obsessed with creating momentum so we can roll over bureaucracy and make our greatest contribution. Sure, we pay attention to their rules, but only so that we can bend them, break them, then rewrite them around our own will. We don't accept our destiny. We define it. We don't understand defeat because you only lose if you stop.

And we don't know how. While the rest of the world strives for average and clings desperately to the status quo, we are the minority, the few who are willing to hallucinate. There could be a better future. And instead of just daydreaming of what could be, we endure the vulnerability and exposure it takes to make it real. We are the evolutionary hunters, clearly the most important people in the world, because entrepreneurs are the only source of consistent, positive human evolution and we always will be.

Like Eddie said, I'm going to see him, I am the CEO of Outplaying, and I've been asked to present today about how we had to overcome crisis and how clarity leads to success. First, we have cell phone self-assured. Did by traditional actor wear brands with a place to shop and offer a wide range of cuts, styles and compression levels that can be worn comfortably. Change we want to make is to enhance the confidence in the people we serve by providing them the act of that empowers them to feel comfortable expressing who they are to the outside world, regardless of gender or size. So we are gender neutral swimwear and sports for e commerce brand direct to consumer e commerce brand. Well, 20 20, like it was for most people was a tumultuous year, was a complicated year. We started the year really well. My husband and I were fully committed. It was I had been running our place for almost five years just by myself, almost almost as a side business. But it was growing. So we decided both of us to commit to the business.

And we were growing at a predictable 30 percent year over year growth. So we were comfortable. Around March, the beginning of March, I joined the Charfen group. At the time, I joined in the foundation group and we were good. We were at once. We started the Charfen and we decided that our target, after we'd looked at all our numbers, our target for the year was about two hundred forty thousand dollars in annual sales. At the time, though, we were heavily dependent on seasonal sales because we had started incorporating some sportswear. But we were still mainly a swimwear brand. So we knew that we had a we had very high seasons and very low seasons. And our high season started in March and then the pandemic hit once. Lockdowns were a thing. Nobody wanted to buy so much because nobody was going to the beach or the swim, the pool. So our sales completely plummeted. We had weeks where we had maybe five orders during the entire week, so it was horrible. Then luckily, once the the lockdowns were lifted towards the middle of May, our sales went. They skyrocketed. They were insane.

We had never had so many sales all at once and we didn't have enough inventory. So we had to start ordering inventory. And it was just insane. Once we were at that point, we were placing orders and then our factories closed down. It was just a lot of issues due to the pandemic. But we were having we had sales coming in. Luckily we because we had been in the Charfen process for a few months now, things had order and there was a process behind what we were doing. But it was just a lot of chaos. Unfortunately, like we all know, Lockdown's came back towards July and our sales plummeted again. By the time December rolled around, we were in serious financial trouble. We were two weeks away from deciding whether we were going to have to close the business and claim bankruptcy. But hindsight, we should have panicked. There is no reason to panic by this time, I had been in the Charfen process for about nine months and we had our waterfall built out. We were doing all our ties, our monthly ties, quarterly things. So we had this system ingrained in our brains, even though we weren't noticing it, because when I was going through all this, DNA kept telling me you're using the process. And I wasn't seeing it until afterwards. When I look back and realize that's what I was doing, I was using the Charfen kadence to solve our problem. So what did we do? We analyzed the first thing we did was analyze where we were and where we were and where we needed to be in order to survive. We weren't generating enough money to cover our minimum monthly spend.

That was clear. We needed to generate a minimum of twenty thousand dollars in the month of December in order to survive. We had over thirty thousand dollars in inventory that we still owed our production and our manufacturers, but we had no way of paying back and we needed to negotiate new payment terms with our manufacturers in order to be able to continue to function and then be then believing in what we were doing and sticking with us. So we need to prioritize. We need to prioritize what had to come first in order for us to really survive. So our immediate financial priority was to generate this minimum of twenty thousand dollars in sales. For us to keep the lights on and keep moving forward. We need to also negotiate new payment terms with our manufacturers and vendors. So we knew that so we could continue to have a great relationship with them. And knowing that we were going to continue to grow because that was failure is not an option, that they would still stick with us. So we committed we're committed to everything that we plan to do in order to execute this, this this whole plan and survive, and regardless of how vulnerable and exposed I felt, I was really committed to doing everything that we planned to do in order to complete the whole cycle. I was attending every single coaching call, every day, every time I could. And this is where I really learned to be vulnerable and how important it is to be as transparent as possible, not only within your own team, but with your customers as well. And that is one of the biggest lessons I learned being at the time in Charfen for about nine months. It's only it wasn't only that this whole cadence was stuck in my head.

I was ready to be vulnerable with my customers result, which is what I really committed to. So we executed and we sent out emails and social media posts to all our supporters and our customers. And I was the most vulnerable I've ever been in my life. Our emails explicitly said we're in trouble and we need you to support us if you want us to keep supplying what we offer. We had meetings with our manufacturers and explained to them where we were and what our plan was and how we planned on paying them back. And they were very successful meetings. We were very transparent with them as well. I've never been as transparent with anybody in my life as I was with our customers and our manufacturers at the time. And then we renewed we took everything we learned from Charfen, everything we learned from what we were doing. And we've done it over and over again several times since then. Another thing that really helped was within the cadence we've established our. Is very detailed, so that allowed us to know exactly where we were every single day and where what we needed to change or what was affecting us and what wasn't in order to get to our final goal. This is twenty twenty versus twenty twenty one. In December, we did not hit the twenty thousand dollars goal. We made it to eighteen thousand four hundred dollars. But we did hit our twenty twenty financial goal of two hundred forty four thousand dollars and our momentum gained. Our movement gained tremendous momentum because we had our customers backing us.

One hundred percent people were making videos to support us. People were sharing with their friends and family to support us, and we made it through continuing with the Charfen cadence and renewing everything that we do. May of twenty twenty one. Just last month we hit our first month of over one hundred thousand dollars in sales and we hit over one hundred eleven one hundred eleven thousand dollars. That's after returns. We are now on track to hit one point two million dollars in sales this year and our movement is one hundred percent solidified. Our customers really back us and share us with everybody they know because they now understand not only that we are what we stand for is real that but that we will be honest and transparent with them all the way. We're actually on track to hit almost two hundred thousand dollars in sales this month. And this is just a little bit of a story to send us pictures of them in our swimwear and our sportswear and just a little message from a mom that we get time, which is every time we cry again. It's hard for me to say that my team swear more in the past few days than they did she did in years. Thank you for a product that is great quality. This is one top that really changed my daughter's life. She's now swimming and having fun instead of hiding in the house hating her body. Your company Rocks are the kind of messages we get every day from our customers, from moms and from our actual customers, how we've changed their lives. So our list of my crimes with clarity and commitments, you can turn any crisis into success. Five months ago, we thought we were going to have to close completely. And this is where we are today, desperately looking for an end to hire more people and on track to over a million dollars in sales. Hey there, this is Eddie Kurk with Alex Charfen team, thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Momentum podcast. Listen, if you're ready to take the next step, if you're ready to understand the systems and processes and frameworks that we teach entrepreneurs to grow and scale their business with confidence, we're ready to help you. If you go to billionaire Koch Dotcom right now, you can get on a call with a member of our coaching team and find out which one of our coaching programs best fit the needs of your business. Right now, we know that when you are clear on where you're going and you're excited about the outcome, you will put the accelerator pedal to the floor and you won't let up. Let us help you get into momentum, grow and scale your business and make the impact that you've always known. You should go to billionaire Koch Dotcom right now to get started. We'll see you there. "

Thank You For Listening!

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With gratitude,

Alex

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