Ben Gilbert: belief

Transcript context

…You never hear it from the perspective that we're about to tell it. Okay, here's how the story goes. Call it the late 2000s, early 2010s. Hermes is selling a canvas beach bag in Japan, and it is flying off the shelves, selling like hotcakes. It's like an equivalent of $150 canvas tote bag beach bag. This obviously gets the attention of management and the company that this is happening. They decide that they are going in true Hermes fashion. Because it is selling so well, they are going to not only stop selling the product. They're going to take all their supply of it and destroy it. They come into a board meeting with all the family members. The management announced this, and it is met with a standing ovation from the family. This is upholding what Hermes is, which is we don't sell beach bags. The family and the board is so aligned that no one even asked a question about this, they just stood and gave applause. Here's how this went on a meta level listeners. I heard this story, David heard this story. David texted me at one point and was like, isn't this an odd story? I was like, what do you mean? We realized, oh, this is not ever told by any of the family members or company executives anywhere. It's just out there, and the company is not secretive. They love telling these legendary Hermes stories.…

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