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How I Built This with Guy Raz

Serial Entrepreneur: Marcia Kilgore

How I Built This with Guy Raz

Guy Raz | Wondery

Business

4.831.1K Ratings

🗓️ 22 January 2018

⏱️ 54 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

After high school, Marcia Kilgore moved to New York City with $300 in her pocket and no real plan. One step at a time, she became a successful serial entrepreneur. First, she used her high school bodybuilding experience to find work as a personal trainer. Then she taught herself to give facials, and eventually started her own spa and skincare line, Bliss. The spa became so popular that it was booked months in advance with a list of celebrity clientele. After selling her shares in Bliss, Marcia went on to start four new successful companies: Soap & Glory, FitFlop, Soaper Duper, and Beauty Pie. PLUS for our postscript "How You Built That," how Steve Kral has created a successful business fulfilling a very particular niche: selling TV remotes for outdated television sets. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Hey, Prime Members, you can listen to how I built this early and ad-free on Amazon Music.

0:07.0

Download the app today.

0:09.0

New Year's is here, and with it brings the possibility of change.

0:13.0

As one behavioral scientist put it, first starts are really powerful.

0:17.0

So as you head into 2023, LifeKit is a great resource to help you plan your life and tackle changes, both big and small.

0:24.0

Listen to the LifeKit podcast from NPR.

0:30.0

I treated myself to a facial after an economics exam, and I had saved $40 or $50 to go to this place that was supposed to be the be-all-and-and-all-of-facials.

0:42.0

And I remember walking into that place, and the aesthetician looked through the lamp at my skin, and she actually went,

0:49.0

oh, what a pity. And I thought to myself, this is not a treat.

0:55.0

And I left feeling so horrendous, and I remember just seeing my reflection and my face was kind of raw and blotchy and thinking,

1:03.0

if I ever had a place like that, I would never make my customers feel bad about themselves.

1:08.0

From NPR, it's how I built this, a show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built.

1:23.0

I'm Guy Raaz, and on today's show, how an 18-year-old named Marcia Kilgore moved from a small town in Canada to New York, with just $300 and turned herself into a serial entrepreneur.

1:37.0

The founder of five companies, including Bliss Cosmetics and Fit Flops.

1:48.0

According to the Small Business Administration, there's a 50% chance that your business will fail within the first five years.

1:56.0

So there's some things that entrepreneurs do to maximize the chances that their businesses will succeed like plan and research the marketplace.

2:05.0

The way Arthur Blank and his partner Bernie Marcus did for nearly two years before they launched the Home Depot.

2:12.0

Or the way Jen Hyman from Rent the Runway did tons of market research and proof of concept testing long before she went to investors.

2:21.0

All of this raised the odds that these companies would make it past five years, which brings us to today's show because this is truly a story about someone who never had a bigger plan.

2:33.0

Marcia Kilgore didn't set out to become an insanely successful serial entrepreneur.

2:38.0

She never sat down and said, hey, I'm going to start a day spa and a line of skincare products called Bliss and then go on to start four more companies.

2:47.0

She was a personal trainer who had a side hustle giving facials.

...

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