 This is starp store friend when must were custom light up shoes out one night Not only were people constantly asking him where he bought them But everyone wanted to be his friend the shoes are just to form a self expression And they had the power to instantly connect strangers in this must decided to launch his own shoe company Resa to build a community for people who liked their own path After multiple trips to Asia years of development and teetering on the verge of failure He has created beautiful Exclusive shoes that light up to give everyone the magical feeling that he felt that night out today We chat with musta facade the founder of Reza about in upcoming collab with a huge car manufacturer The insights he learned after locking in the designer of Crocs as his first investor and how the brand Exploded in popularity after Steve Aoki wore them one night while performing. All right. Welcome to the podcast on today's show We're talking to the founder of Reza must thanks for coming on people who don't know. What does your company do? Thank you for having me Diego. I'm the founder of Reza our mission is to inspire people to light their own path We've built the world's most advanced their own path light their own path exactly I like that. Okay. Yeah, we're designed in Detroit And it's all about bringing people together from around the world and doing something new and footwear Which is really exciting. What did you see in the sneaker world where you were like, all right? I'd like to have my own take what's missing or what did you want to do different as it related to? Sort of a sneaker world. I thought sneaker world was it was very boring It was like the same drops growing up and I feel like there was a lack of community It was really just about who had the hottest shoe but not really about, you know What what does that mean to have the same product into into being a in a niche community? So for me it was that and it was also just lights lights are such an amazing way to bring people together And when I was in high school, I just took some Nike Air Forces. I just taped some LED Lights around them were in my hometown in Michigan and I like 20 people want to be my friend that night You know stopped me at a bar something on the street And I was like wow like lights really have possibility to bring people together Yeah, what other way to do this footwear you saw something in the human that's interesting and then I love the community building part I think fashion is that for you know when done well I think fashion is all about community and creating sort of this cohesiveness. It's not like explicitly said It's just something that sort of materializes What's your background? Do you have a background in in shoes and fashion? Well, you know, what was your first step and actually deciding to make a shoe? I love shoes, but I never had a background in in design. I studied business I went to college for two years in Michigan State. I ended up going to China for about six weeks When I was in college and I wanted to create a crude sample of my shoe So I went there once the factory found a supplier who could put lights and shoes I came back with was that hard to do did it take you a while to find that supplier? It did super hard I didn't speak Chinese. I didn't know anyone in the country. Yeah, I somehow convinced my parents to send me over there But when I came back, I had a beautiful, you know like a mock-up Or did you have like a prototype like a real version barely a prototype? It was just like it was just a really simple shoe with lights running around and I thought it looked cool And then ultimately I I started showing you the shoes to people people loved it And I was like, you know what I I this brings me happiness like I see people loving the product I see people wanting to connect I feel like there's so little ways to connect especially after COVID people are really looking for an outlet and If I was wearing these shoes and hundred people were stopping me on the street just asking me questions And they ended up being my friends. I was like, why not do this? So I ended up dropping out of university after my sophomore year So you believe in it that much like you saw it that much that you're like alright. I'm done with school I'm gonna go big into this sneaker company. I did I was naive, but I just jumped into it I kind of love that. Yeah, you found your passion. I guess to some extent So you're seeing the signals in the market people are sort of liking the shoe on a community level in your hometown Do you then order? Gazillion of them or is this like pre did you drop out with with the order already made or were you like I got To go start a brand I got to get the website and then I'll order the shoes later Yeah, I don't have any shoes. I don't have any supply chain I just met one gentleman who is the former chief product officer at Crocs He ended up becoming our first investor. So I basically dropped out having one How did you meet him just networking telling people what you're working on and you were introduced just the cold email Yeah, I reached out to probably a couple hundred people over that time frame ended up meeting an incredible designer Andrew James Who's designed for Reebok for new balance and he he designed the crock It's like his thing or he just worked for them our first investor He worked on he was one of the designs of the crocs that he was a chief product officer for a couple years Wow was interim CEO. What did you learn from him? Just I'm just so curious because I think it's like the ugliest shoe ever But it's probably one of the most sold shoes of all time also What did you find interesting and just learning from from him around the shoe? Maybe the concept of why it works why he thought it works what he saw in the market. Yeah I think Crocs is just it's very simple like it's a really comfortable product and Not everyone just cares about how things look people care about how things feel Yeah, what kind of like like emotion that gives them so I think like this exact from Crocs He he saw me with just 3d renderings of a light-up shoe and he was like, you know There might be something here So he kind of took a faith and was our first check and he had a plethora factories in China in Taiwan And he opened his doors to us and then I spent about a year and in Taiwan building the product with him Getting a team we got through we were accepting the tech stars accelerator, which was our first venture which one I'm sure it all which one did you guys go to Indianapolis. It's a tech stars Indianapolis It's a sports accelerator So we were one of the ten companies who went through that and it was a pretty awesome experience What was one of your most memorable times there like what's the best advice you got while going through the program? Really just great mentorship. We were the earliest company We didn't even have a shoe and other companies in the program had millions of dollars in revenue But our managing director was a really incredible gentleman Jordan Fliegel He was a founder of of draft comm and had had some really successful exits and He just you know put a stamp on us I think people really love like when kids are doing things that Speaks to their heart and just they just want to do and we had a lot of support come our way What do you think is the thing people when they meet you or see your product what gets them? Is it like this like childhood? We used to rock these la lights like what's the thing that you think really just captivates their attention and goes You know I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna go ahead and get involved in this company I think it really the lights are amazing and the story I think is really cool. Let's talk about the product as well and what we've done. That's different. Yeah It's really you have a good team. So yeah, let's talk about the product and the evolution of what we're seeing right now Yeah, the product itself is is something that we've put a lot of our hearts into it So it's the first shoe in the world to have a laser diode in the shoe So the the the lights you see in the shoes is shooting through a glass tube And that's what gives us really beautiful Illuminate look inside of the shoe and it just feels very different than a kid's LED shoe feels really grown up And it's really sexy to wear at a nightclub Or just traveling and then also it has a wireless coil so you can charge it wirelessly It looks really futuristic and Reza itself means laser in Japanese So it has that appeal of people from many different geographies But I think the main thing that people really were attached to was light your own path. That's our philosophy Yeah, I love that and you have to apply to get access for the shoes So you have to write an application and tell us what you do different how you light your path and we've today We've had over 80,000 people apply for the shoes. Just go through the application whose idea was that? Where did you get that that concept to sort of you know make sure that in some way? Not that you're gatekeeping, but that you're like making sure people really care about the shoe How did that evolve it really came just to try to build something that is Authentic like when you have a product that is relatively new a new technology I think people don't know how to position it exactly correct. Yeah, I believe that yeah, so for for us Ask people to share their like most personable experience with us allow us to show them like no This is not a shoe. There's not what we're trying to do. Yeah, it's a part right out the gate Absolutely, and then for people listening or if you're listening you probably can't see what's in front of us If you're watching you can see it, but you how long did this thing take to create and so you have a shoe You need to charge it. There's probably 4,000 ways of achieving that You know what how did you land here? Which is a pad the shoes are on a pad right now people listening But how did you land on what we're seeing in front of us right now? It took two years from sketches to? Developing a product that's water resistant the lights work the lights are that's right Very comfortable the shoes comfortable going through different molds different testing We went through over 25 iterations of the shoe for our first production run so it took two years and it took a lot of Much more effort than I thought to make a shoe most people don't know that most Nike or Jordan's from sketch to storefront They they take about 36 months, so it's a very patient during that process Yeah, a lot of different parties involved a lot of testing and so what made you guys want to land on this like? Charging pad was it more of like you want people to have it in their house? And it's sort of like on display like a feature or you know, what was the logic here? It looks beautiful. It looks really it looks really cool. It does look cool. Yeah, yeah Just to have it really displayed as not even a shoe, but more of an experience. I can put anything on there Yeah, you can you can you can charge your iPhone on it and you can yeah Yeah, you can charge your iPhone, but a lot of features. Okay. Yeah It's really just the first experimentation of what the brand is and what it represents You know for forward-facing we have concepts that we're even more excited about but when people walk into your house And they see a charging pad People are gonna ask questions regardless like they're gonna they're gonna be interested gets the conversation going absolutely And so you you you place your first order you guys have two and a half years in you're ready to go What is this time like for you? Are you like the people care? Are we actually gonna sell and you go to market? How much is this you when you go to market? It's 360 bucks Okay, we already launched your own website. Yeah, so back on on that we My co-founder I wear in Taiwan for a year developing the products It took us we spent all of our venture money just on R&D and just flushing out the best product We could our factory ends up going bankrupt and we came back home to the US because of covid or partially Yeah, wow, we came back home from from covid with about 12 pairs of shoes And I think three of them didn't work so we had really nine pairs of shoes no money left my parents want me to go back to college and all of a sudden we get a We get a message from Steve Aoki's team and Steve Aoki had heard about the product somehow He got interested and I just I wake up at 2 a.m. And he's wearing our shoes in Las Vegas at Omnia I like a show that he's doing at his flagship show. Yeah. Wow. He starts posting us an Instagram to 10 20 million followers Everyone in my cousin is like Steve. Okie's wearing your shoes And then from there, you know a couple other amazing artist DJ ski and you had no idea how that happened Some of them were just through mutual connections. Some of them were just happening organically But those those nine pairs that we had we ended up seeing six of them and we had that's crazy Yeah, so you're down to your last nine you go at 12 three don't work. You're down to your last nine Steve Aoki shows up and you've sort of crushed it It couldn't it couldn't have gone better from a marketing perspective. It could not have gone better in two weeks Amazing we had 20,000 people signing for their shoes and then what happened and so then you got to find a new supplier start over or yeah Then we we did a drop it was 500 pairs We're like we can't have liability but you find a new supplier a new right well first We we did the drop we took the money from the customers We said it's gonna be a couple months and then we said let's find the supplier So we had the capital from our customers and we went back to Taiwan this time more determined Had a great supplier took us another couple months to make the shoes But we shipped we shipped them out to 20 countries and at some point or is like Steve and some of these third DJs are they like hey Look, this is what we want for iteration to this is what we this is what we see in the next Or are they kind of like they're good with it. They like what they see like what what advice are they giving you if any? Really colors like people like it's like like Steve and people like that They love to express themselves to different colors different iterations But I think when you come out with a product that's a little bit new like people just laugh On to it in in a really amazing way So we've sent Steve a bunch of pairs custom pairs custom designs different colorways I'm a couple other great artists who've just gone behind behind the brand and that was really, you know Steve doesn't have any kind of Equity or any partnership with us. It was just like it's the product Yeah, just he likes the product and really when we just back channel with his team Like he brought us out to to a show. He just loves to support young founders who are doing cool shit Yeah, no, I love it. Can you change the color of the shoe? There's the light not so much the color of the light you can't yeah Not this this the first drop was founders edition was 500 pairs just blue Yeah, our second drop is 2000 pairs we sold out. It's a white shoe with white light Yeah, and there our next drop is gonna have opportunity to change color and how many people bug you being like hey, man We go back. How do I get some shoes? Like how I mean people must bother you about getting shoes if they're all sold out They do they do it's a problem I I tend to I have a lot of samples at my house in Michigan So I you know, I'm always giving friends some shoes But it means a lot to have your family and and people around you support supportive in that sense My my parents they they're from Pakistan. We have a immigrant story and they they're doctors They want to mean to be a doctor But now they're really they're proud of me that there's some making light up shoes So it means a lot. They're proud of you. Absolutely. That means a lot Did you ever actually so in in real talk when you had nine pairs left, did you actually consider going to school again? Like where you like, okay, I'll go back in September. Yeah, I mean, I didn't have a choice like we we came out We went through tech stars. We had a loudmouth. We said we're gonna revolutionize footwear and We were down to our last nine shoes. So it was it was a pretty difficult situation But I think it happened with you know It could have gone out of that and in a better direction and yeah that I think as we grow the business and through any Experience in life you have to remember those those dark periods to push you forward and in the direction you want I think that's what it's all about. It's like this book like burn the boats that we have here It's like there's a burn the boats moment in every startup where it's like you don't have another choice And somehow that simplifies everything and it's also gives you an awareness of how close you are to achieving the thing That you set out to achieve And there's a beauty in that absolutely and then if you just keep chasing that I think that's when magic happens Absolutely. Yeah, so what's next for the company now? What are you guys working on today? Do you have more investors? Are you thinking of making this like a lifestyle company? Will you stick with issues? What does today look like for the company? We've raised a couple million bucks from from VCs We're really focused on building an amazing footwear brand. So we're scaling We're growing to probably 20 to 30,000 units over the next 12 months So it's really exciting for us scaling the team We brought on designers from Yeezy from Adidas to to lead our growth and footwear. We're also excited about apparel We made a light up track suit for for night running So a lot of our fan base they they run at nighttime and in the US I can be a real problem 15 people die every day by being hit by cars So any way that we can have the visibility I think is really important But really it's what's what's exciting about about when I hear from our customers and what I see what we do We've had people say They've met their girlfriend a boyfriend through wearing the shoes or we've had we have one of our customers is going through Chemotherapy and when they go when he goes he wears a resa hoodie in the shoes So I think for me, that's what gets me up every morning And I think that's what that's what the direction we want to go to we obviously don't know where that's gonna land But yeah, and let's say you bought the shoe the original with the with the pad Do you need to buy the pad again or is it does it do they all come with a pad? How does that work? Yeah, it's it's universal So the pad works with any any pair set of shoes and these originals they retail for 360 They're now trading on stock X for like 70 hundred bucks So that was really cool to see just the the secondary market. Absolutely. Yeah Have you gotten any companies that are coming in and trying to replicate what you're doing? Is that happening yet or trying to like, you know, take your take your thunder? I wouldn't say I wouldn't say that but we've had great conversation with other footwear brands I think IOT and technology and shoes has always been a really just exciting space Nike had a self-lacing shoe the dapped BB That was a pretty cool perfect concept So it's been pretty collaborative footwear production itself is pretty difficult when you're forging that with hardware It's not it's not an easy plate and it's something that you really have to be in a really particular setting like Taiwan which they have no high quality advanced chips and really detailed manufacturing so there's still a lot of Directions that I think people want to figure out in footwear and in apparel is how do we create the next generation and make it Make sure the cost is effective and the end user wants to have the product as well What kind of technology are you guys working on if any? Kinetic charging is something that we we've spent a lot of time on so right now the shoes charge on the charging pad But we envision When you walk the shoes just regenerate the battery itself and you can track your calorie intake your stride your GPS anything in an Apple watch you can put that in shoes I think for us that's the holy grail and what we think is exciting when you get a text your shoes vibrate Different kind of features in that way with would be really cool. Yeah, so they're super connected What do people do with them do people run in them? Do they just wear them all the time or they would you call it a running shoe? What do people mostly do in your shoes our first shoe is is athleisure So you can see there's no laces the shoe itself is pretty it's pretty light if you hold it It's something that we were really focused on that it doesn't have to feel like a light-up shoe it just feels like a really comfortable product to wear and Our designer who who built the product he was at New Balance for many years and we wanted to build something that looks kind of unique And kind of avant-garde and we're just going to continue continue in that direction But the most exciting thing for us is definitely just having a Product that is just has kinetic charging because then you can just walk and regenerate the batteries Really cool and the lights that we use our ourselves We have patents on and it's something that we've worked with a supplier to to develop Maybe you have something special and do you have like a dream collab a dream collab whether it be with a brand or maybe with like Obviously, so maybe someone like Steve or an athlete is there something that you would just you know, maybe you're working on already I don't know but yeah something that really like you'd be super pumped about yeah I think we're doing one of our dream clubs right now It's with a car company and we're doing an exclusive drop with them whoever buys a car It's an electric car is getting a free pair. I was literally about to say I literally before I asked this question I was like, I bet you and I'm not saying it's Tesla, but in my head. I was like these should come with like a cyber truck You know, I'm saying like I was like if I buy a cyber truck I should get I should get a pair of these shoes it because it makes the moment so much better I was like the acquisition of the vehicle. It's like now I got this gift and it could be in it could be Rivian, but the point is like an electric vehicle. It makes sense, right? Yeah, when is that? When does that drop? Can you announce it? That's dropping under this year. I don't think I can announce car company, but it's it's electric And it's it's pretty it's pretty exciting. That's amazing certain color It's it's a it's a red light So it's black shoe with red lights and actually red lights the car is red as well with a red interior So it's gonna be pretty cool. That's amazing people wear the shoe in many different ways Like, you know, we want to just make some that's versatile But a lot of our fan base is our athletes their skateboarders They like to jog but also you have people in healthcare who work in a pediatric ward Who would just want to put a smile on their patient's face? So it's really cool to see people express themselves differently. How would you wear there? How would you wear some light up shoes like this? That's what I was trying to think about I don't really know. It's like probably if I go to events, you know, I go to a lot of events and stuff like that And so had events I like if we're opening up something new like a ribbon cutting. I'd probably wear them there Right, you know something like that. I just like that. They're one color I don't know. I'm a simple guy if when it comes like right now. I'm wearing a white shirt I don't like logos and so this is like a it's interesting But it still has the flair because you can add the light right and so there's a component That's like stylish without sort of being in your face. Absolutely. I like about it Do you think there's anything in in fashion like how do you express yourself in terms of you don't have a lot of shoes? But what is there something that you notice and people whether it's a watch or whether it's a brand that kind of brings you together? Do you feel you have it in some in some correct capacity? That's interesting when I think about fashion I think about like the company market and we've had Mike Sherman on the podcast he's like a real creative genius from from my perspective and What I love about what he's doing is he'll take elements from culture that are relevant today And he has a way of creating these like t-shirts that are like I would say for the moment or street wear That's for the moment and that's a it's a really interesting way to look at fashion Right, and I just love that he does that and I love that he's built a community kind of exactly to what you're saying Actually, his whole thing is about community his whole thing is about you know His story he was bullied as a kid and so he found out that through fashion He could become like the cool kid or he could sort of come like come into the community He could be embraced by nothing other than fashion interesting and so he made his whole company about that and so when he's being part of the Culture it's like he's solving that problem that he has as little kid and that's the culture He's created and he's found a massive amount of people celebrities LeBron that wear his stuff all the time And so that's really interesting when I think about me personally I think about it like I just want it to be timeless like I want to look at a photo when I'm let's say 20 years old or 60 years old and It's not the fashion is not of the moment actually It's just like this like timeless piece You know and so what that means literally is it could be an old watch But it could be an old watch that I'm wearing in an old photo or wearing today. You don't know But it's like it's a piece and so everything for me in fashion is more of like pieces Which is why like right now just a waffle shirt white no logos And so you know the only thing that could tell you maybe the air is like the haircut You know I'm saying and so like that's how I think about fashion for me personally. That's what I like about it timelessness Yeah, it's not trying to do too much Yeah, does that make sense? Yeah, which I think is rare. I'm not also I'm not like a fashionista. I don't think but maybe I just like to keep it Simple so what's next? What can you tell us what's on the horizon besides the I love the electric vehicle drop That's pretty epic. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's really just like Sharing our philosophy like about light your path. I think it's I think it's really cool Concert that we're trying out what I what I think is really exciting for me It's just like in person events like a lot of stuff that you do I is just meeting people in person and that connection so strong. So in our discord channel We have all of our all of our users and thousands of people People are arranging meetups in Miami in Dubai and in Texas So it's about you know bringing people together and I think it's that's that's for me is puts a smile on my face when you can say Hey, people people met they shared they connected through a product that you've done That's that's really what we're after and we're going to continue to do I want to dive into this because I think like so almost give yourself advice from a sense of You're a young person. You had an idea start a company in doing that you have a product There's there's a couple different ways of launching a product You decided to do a drop in that you're trusting to some extent that everything you've done is going to work Right because it could it could also flop nobody could buy and so give people a window into Into things you did that made you successful During the drop and maybe what that was like for you in a real way of like fuck like I'm gonna go out and hope the world Sort of votes with dollars You know give people a window into the strategy of doing it and then what you were going through personally and then You know obviously it worked out, but yeah, are you asking more of the like how we knew that customers were gonna embrace the product or more Just what did you do insure it? I guess it was like once you once you decided to have a drop Then you have to make sure it's gonna execute of course So like what was that like nerve-wracking nerve-wracking for sure after we did the drop We had to go to Taiwan Taiwan was closed during COVID So we had to get a letter from the CDC to allow us to go there We had to do two weeks in hotel quarantine So I'd say just determination like when once you've put your cards down like you can't fail You have to make it work And I'd say some some sense of practicality as well Like we you can't just jump into something having no idea no context You have to really feel something and you have to be communicative to like we when people purchased our shoes There was nine month wait until we shipped we don't have one maybe one We'd have many customers that were upset They were excited about it and when they finally got the product they said hey the wait was worth it This made it better because it was right. It was like you spent your time getting it right exactly Yeah, getting it right and just being pragmatic and persisting. I think it's really important They're especially in fashion and and creating products. It's It seems easy, but once you get into the the smallest chip or the smallest unit It can take you way longer than you expected. Yeah, especially when you're buying that quantity also It's like anything can go wrong with a percent of them and that's that's real money Yeah, and you also have to sell sell stories with suppliers as well like in in footwear Most factories won't take you in unless you're doing a 30,000 unit and MQ and we had 500 pairs So you have to sell that story in when people believe that and on the other side of the world It's equally as important. Yeah, I love that. When's the next drop? Next drop is gonna be around September. So it's gonna be a new colorway color changing lights Our largest drop today probably about 5,000 pairs So it's gonna it's gonna be really cool and then and then the car thing is this fall. I'll be this round the same time It'll be this fall. Yeah, we're shooting a pretty cool commercial for that. So it'll be I believe it Yeah, well tell people where they can find you and and sort of well obviously buy stock X right now But where can they find you working? They buy working? They support on Instagram. Yeah, they can find Reza Reza dot footwear and they can find me just most of a dot say it and yeah We're always posting about our drops and we're always kind of sharing cool cool posts from our community I love it brother. Well, thanks. Thanks for coming on the podcast Of course can't wait for you to try the shoes and I'm going to get some pictures of it. Thanks, brother Thank you so much for the support and making it to the end of the episode If you haven't already please do review and show the episode with your friends If you never want to miss a beat on all things entrepreneurship Make sure to follow us on socials for daily content. See you next Tuesday for another great episode