One Woman's Journey: Transforming the Underwear Game with Wood with Terresa Zimmerman

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hello and welcome to this episode of the Unnoticed Entrepreneur. Today, we've got a special guest. It's a female entrepreneur that I personally know for quite a while because she used to be one of the doyens of PR in Asia. She was working in Japan and then running PR in Asia Pacific out of Hong Kong. Teresa Zimmerman, though, is now the founder of a company called Wood Underwear. She's going to tell us why men should wear underwear made of wood, or a little bit like wood, and how she's built a business that's now got over 500 stores and is really part of the main state of a men's wardrobe. Teresa, welcome to the show.

Speaker 2: 0:39

Thank you, jim, so great to see you.

Speaker 1: 0:42

Well, it's great to see you, and you know we had a debate about who is chasing who, but I know it will have been me chasing you to be on the show because you're a legend.

Speaker 2: 0:49

I don't think so. I don't think so.

Speaker 1: 0:52

It will be because you're a legend, because you've built Wood Underwear plus written some books as well, and I'd love for you to tell us about Wood Underwear and we're going to talk about why men should look at their underwear drawer in a way that they haven't done since their mother packed their drawers for them but also the journey you've been on and some lessons we can learn about how to build a brand without being on Amazon. So, Teresa, give us a little bit of the backstory of really why men should wear underwear made of wood.

Speaker 2: 1:23

Well, first of all. First of all, let's clarify, there's no splinters.

Speaker 1: 1:28

No splinters, you can sit comfortably.

Speaker 2: 1:31

Yeah, exactly no splinters, so it's actually wood viscous. So our fabrics are a cotton, blend of cotton, and we use a lensing branded Tencel Modal. Tencel Modal is wood viscous, so it's made from beech tree cellulose and it's an amazing fiber. You can go to lensingcom I know this is an advertisement for them, but they've got all kinds of crazy information about how sustainable it is and it gives the fabric its technical properties, so wicking, thermo control, odor control, all of that, all of the yumminess. And then cotton gives it the performance part of it. So it's fabulous. Women have had Tencel Modal and viscous products in their wardrobes for a very, very, very long time, and certainly 11 years ago when I started wood, there just was not a lot out there for men using these wonderful fabrics.

Speaker 1: 2:24

And I have to ask the obvious question how is a woman who spent her career in Asia in tech PR getting into men's underwear and I mean that the best possible taste, of course. Setting me up for this one, jim, I've been trying to get into men's underwear my whole life. Oh, there we go, there we go, and many a man would have been chuffed at the opportunity. But let's not go there. Let's talk about how did you get to doing this, and then we talk about the journey of building it.

Speaker 2: 2:55

Yeah. So, being in consulting, as you all know, you're always working on everyone else's stuff problems, solutions, brands, whatever it might be and I was just at a point in my career where I thought I want to work on my stuff, I want to own something and I didn't necessarily mean that you know literally, but you know turns out when you start something you have to own it literally too. But I wanted more of a, I wanted it to be more mine and all the good, the good, bad and the ugly of it. And so I started looking around out of a collaboration underwear was part of that and my husband got a prototype and spent the next three months telling me that I had to do it. So I, you know naively, I'm like, well, how hard can it be to sell a few pair of underwear, you know. So there we go.

Speaker 1: 3:46

But you've done a brilliant job and you've expanded out of underwear across to you've got lounge pants now and you've got t-shirts as well, but interestingly enough, you're not selling on Amazon, which you know would seem impossible. So how have you done that, theresa?

Speaker 2: 4:05

Well, so I, when I started the business, I was very intentional about wanting to sell to stores. I was looking for a wholesale model, and so for that, that's that's given. That that's where I started. I didn't even think about Amazon, and 12 years ago, you know, when this idea was being born, Amazon wasn't the powerhouse it is today for sure and they were really more of a consumer play. And so I, Once I started working with small business owners Main Street I'll just generically call it Main Street I just fell in love with Main Street. I love the store owners, the buyers, the multi-generational owners of these stores, and they are so in touch with their customers. It's relationship driven and so there was some depth in that that I had been looking for, without even maybe knowing I was looking for it after coming from corporate, and so I just kind of stumbled into that, and the last thing I wanted to do was to sell to corporate when I was in love with Main Street. So it was just more of a kind of trying to put my money where my mouth is deal.

Speaker 1: 5:14

But it does create a challenge because you know Amazon really dominates now from the retail and the distribution part. So tell us, how have you been building the brand for wood? And you've got this amazing orange color and you've chosen a very identifiable font type as well. Take us through that because you. I mean. It's hard enough to start a retail brand as it is, but to choose to ignore the largest online shopping platform is brave, I think, is Brave. Let's call it brave. So how have you done it?

Speaker 2: 5:55

One store at a time, personal service and kind of. You know we have not grown as fast as we probably could have, but I've tried to stay true to my intention of the reason why I started it and then my growing love for Main Street. You know we, the high service part of it and everything we do. We want it to be inviting, we want it to be about relationships, and so the you mentioned the color and the brand choices and all of that we wanted to, we wanted those to reflect that. Those, those, those things came ahead of my deciding that I loved Main Street. But you know it's, it's there, it's, you know, as part of what I was searching for, even if I had to articulate it with some hindsight, which SPR people are great to do. Right, we can articulate anything with some hindsight, spin the story. But but the the name was about having some fun. It was about being a little irreverent. It was about saying, on the sexy side of sex, you know, not crossing over what that boundary is, because you know in the world of underwear that it's very easy thing to cross that line. It was about coming up with messaging that was a little bit provocative, but then the product had to back it up, right. So we, you might say, oh, would help on, you know, but then you try the product. It's the product that's going to bring you back.

Speaker 1: 7:19

Yeah, and then our go ahead. No, sorry Go ahead.

Speaker 2: 7:23

I was just going to say, and then the positioning for us which you know is, I think, a real differentiator still, even though some people are picking up on the message, which I love is about wardrobeing. It's about man understanding underwear in the same way that women always have. Women are taught from a very young age. Girls, you know, growing up, you put on your underwear based on what you're going to wear, what you're going to do. All of that Boys are a huge generalization. Not to offend anybody, but I understand it's a generalization. You open a man's underwear drawer certainly in the United States it's very likely they have this style, color, brand that their mother put there when they were 15, because they haven't been taught different. And so once you start talking to men about, hey, you need to diversify your underwear drawer because you know you don't wear a simple, you don't wear black under white pants, you don't wear a lot of fabric, a really long leg underwear, when you are wearing a skinny jean or when it's 90 degrees with a heat index of 102. You know. So it's like, think about these things. Your date night underwear is not your gym underwear, or it shouldn't be right?

Speaker 1: 8:30

Well, especially not unless it's had a wash in between. I think probably yeah.

Speaker 2: 8:38

And that's where the fabric comes in as well, because a lot of fabrics right now that are coming out are polys. Polys are they're oil-based, and so the sweat that comes off your skin, without getting too technical, it's oil-based and so the stink molecules, if I can put a bluntly like that actually bind with fabric. So if you ever notice like gym underwear especially, you can launder your gym underwear very well, or even you're just just gym running clothes or the stuff you work out in and sweat in on a regular basis, the next time it gets even a little bit moist, that smell comes out, and it's not the smell from what you've just done, it's the smell from before, because you can't wash that out, right? So gym underwear is not your date night underwear.

Speaker 1: 9:26

Well, I think for all of us that are listening and probably sort of slightly embarrassingly thinking about our boxer shorts and what we do and don't wear, I do try and match my boxer shorts to my socks color, if that's any consolation. But that's about as sophisticated as I've become. But now I'm going to be quite insecure the next time I look at my drawer.

Speaker 2: 9:54

So that also is a reason why you should think about your underwear from a war-derbing standpoint. The confidence it gives you to know you're wearing the right thing under whatever you're putting on over it or whatever you're doing it transmits you, share it in your confidence and posture.

Speaker 1: 10:11

Of course, most of us are keeping our trousers on when we're going out, but there we go. I suppose at the end of the evening or in the gym, you might have a moment when you're showing what you're wearing underneath. But what about this idea then that you've raised, which is actually wearing underwear and what you? You know what you buy. Most of us discreetly buy a packet in the shop without talking to anyone about it. Yeah, how do you deal with getting the customer message that you talk about into Main Street? Because if you're, you know you're going through the media. We've shown and seen that you've got good media relations coverage, which is great. How are you getting people in store to know the difference? Because what you've just explained to me about the fabric I I had no idea, for example. So how are you helping people in store to understand the difference?

Speaker 2: 11:05

Yeah, so so the the one thing about younger generations is they are. They do care about, you know, a lot of the fabric and the sustainability part of it. I don't know that they're necessarily buying on it, but they do care about knowing about it. So they're there. I think they're educating themselves a little bit, maybe more than we would have at their age, but but we do this one at one day at a time, one store at a time, and you know we're. We are at trade shows with stores, we are in store with our store Owners and buyers. We produce educational materials for them to talk about wardrobeing and what the proper underwear does. So an extreme example in the case of a woman. A woman can pack Clothes for a week in a suitcase and go off on a trip and if she didn't bring the right bra, the right panties, whatever to wear with those clothes, she has nothing to wear. You can't wear it right. So that's maybe an extreme case, but if you are wearing something and you don't have the right bra, you're gonna fidget all night long, you're not gonna be comfortable and it's gonna show through on confidence. And and it's, it is true that with men as well Maybe not to the same extent because you know you're maybe not as conscious of it, but talking to the clothiers who are Setting you up with your suits, your shirts, your you know sports coats, whatever your pants, and Measuring you, and it's like let's get the right fit, the right style for what we're putting, putting you in, and we do that One store at a time. You know the scalability of it's a little hard, but it's also part of our focus.

Speaker 1: 12:39

It's really interesting because you're absolutely right, because if I go shopping, I buy a pure Egyptian cotton t-shirt because it just Feels nicer, mm-hmm, but there isn't anyone in the store helping me with those decisions or Any of that. In fact, you feel too embarrassed to ask right, so, right, yeah. So, teresa, you know, as founder of wood underwear, what have you been doing in terms of your relationships with getting wholesalers? Because Wholesale businesses often just sort of margin, isn't it an availability as well, and they don't want to have empty supply chains. How have you been communicating that? Because, as a new brand, although now 11 years in, you obviously established, but how did you get those first wholesalers to take you on? Because For them as well, there's a risk, isn't there, with a new brand not selling through?

Speaker 2: 13:32

There is, there is and, even as small as we are, still there are some supply chain issues and certainly over the last couple of years supply chains have been tested. But again, when you've got the relationships, when it's a relationship-based business and they know you're a small business too, they give you a little bit more leeway too. And it's about communication, being honest about where you are, what stage you're in, owning that stage and not making excuses or not trying to cover it. It affects a lot. So the first stock as I had I think I mentioned to you before when we were chatting I walked in after I got my first shipment landed in the United States. I packed my car with a couple hundred pieces of just whatever I had. I had one style in four colors and four sizes. And I drove around Los Angeles and I walked into stores and asked the buyers if they wanted to see my underwear. And that's how I started and I walked into this store in Los Angeles Third Street, never been in there before. And even at that point you couldn't just Google men's stores. I mean, I was using online sources. I was using an online version of the Yellow Pages, basically the phone book, to find these stores and Douglas Fur I walked into. They're on Third Street between the Beverly Center and the Grove fabulous men's store and Douglas Fur is a type of tree, so that was kind of fun. And then John Noble is the owner of the store. Noble Fur is another type of tree. I sat down with John he's a Brit transplant to LA and he was so kind and he wrote an order on the spot after I. He was my last stop of a very long, very sad day, very frustrating day and he wrote an order on the spot and I filled it out of my car and he just took what I had in my car. So that was the first thing. Otherwise, we go to trade shows. I went to a lot of trade shows I had no business at, spent too much money at, had nothing to do with relationship-based business. They treated us like numbers and I've decided since not to do those. But there's a lot of really amazing trade shows out there that are they treat you like a person, they're relationship driven, that the organizers know your name, know who you are and help you out. So it's a lot of that.

Speaker 1: 15:58

You wanted to build relationships and you've plainly been doing that, theresa. So what about this question that I always like to ask, which is one thing that maybe you don't advise fellow unnoticed entrepreneurs to try Is there something that you've done? I mean, you're a marketing guru, you work for big companies doing PR campaigns, so you get an expert in that. Anything that you did that you thought I wouldn't have done that again?

Speaker 2: 16:27

Yeah, there's a long list. But early on, at a time when I had no money, I tried to outsource my sales, and it was a very expensive mistake, and a very expensive mistake when you're just starting out can be fatal. And so I hired agencies. I thought, okay, well, they do this for other brands, they should know how to do this. And either it just didn't work for me or I wasn't ready for it. I actually tried it twice because I'm a slow learner, and it didn't work either time. But you just can't outsource your sales. You can absolutely get support and have people engage in your sales that's not a question but you can't give it away.

Speaker 1: 17:11

And that was hard. Why is that what fails?

Speaker 2: 17:15

They're not invested. So if you think about salespeople whether you're an agency or a person you're going to sell what's bringing money into your pocket, and so you've got this new brand. You're walking in and nobody's heard of this new brand. Underwear is a whole other barrier, because underwear is just an upsell for most stores. It's not a key point. You might take it out of your bag when you go into a store. You might not, because you're making your money somewhere else. So it's just harder.

Speaker 1: 17:48

So they're not invested.

Speaker 2: 17:50

And as your business, you have to be the one to make sure that your product gets taken out of the bag and shown and sold at least an attempt to be sold to the prospective buyer.

Speaker 1: 18:03

Yeah, that's really interesting, isn't it? That your passion got your first client and that started you on the journey to the 500 or so clients that you've got now. And you're expanding internationally, teresa as well. With wood underwear You've got distribution in Japan. How are you going overseas with the brand?

Speaker 2: 18:26

The Japan connection was out of LA. There's a big Japanese community in LA, big transfer of population there, and they approached me at a trade show and so they handle it with their distributor. Otherwise it would be very scary, I think, setting up in other countries with the rules, regulations, specifically the Japanese market. You have to have every single product, every single fabric tested. You've got to have all the specs. The way pricing is settled is completely different than here. It's going in with local knowledge has been the only way I can do it.

Speaker 1: 19:07

Yeah, Great way to distribute. One of the final questions is you are also on your website. Took about giving 1 percent of sales and getting into supporting of all surprises trees. Do you want to just tell us the role that the giving back has got within the business as well?

Speaker 2: 19:29

Yeah, from day one we've done a give back programs but we never actually led with it. I think I was too aware of the whole greenwashing and there's a whole bunch of stuff out there where people say that they're doing stuff for good to try to say they're better than they are. We never led with it but in the last couple of years we have been publicizing that we're doing it, most specifically in a partnership with One Tree Planted. So every order off our website, woodunderwearcom, we plants a tree with our wholesale orders. 1 percent of every wholesale order goes to planting trees. So if you're buying from a store our product, it also plants trees. Then the 1 percent pledge it started out as a corporate pledge. A lot of people have jumped on board with it. It's fabulous because it's not just about giving back money but it's giving back time. So 1 percent of your time as an employee you give back to at some service.

Speaker 1: 20:30

Yeah that's really impressive, we think it's important, it's important, yeah, and you've given over 5, you've built, grown over 5,000 trees or planted over 5,000 trees, such as we probably need to update that number.

Speaker 2: 20:41

But yeah, I mean, I'm very proud of 5,000 trees.

Speaker 1: 20:44

That's a great way to give back, and, of course, it's also true in the way that you would do everything's around trees and wood, and so you kept it all within the brand as well. Theresa, there's one piece of advice that you can give people in your role of building the wood underwear brand in terms of getting noticed. What would you say? That is?

Speaker 2: 21:06

Gosh, in terms of getting noticed well, in terms of that's a hard one. So I think you have to find ways to do things that you can afford that maybe are a little bit different, and I know you're a believer in this because you've started a bunch of things that way. But so when I launched wood in 2012, I couldn't afford advertising and I was at the beach. So I did have a connection into beach sports and so we started sponsoring beach sports up and down the coast of Southern California. We were selling underwear under tents at the beach, which is crazy because I guess it's our two men in a garage story. We're in a tent on the beach selling underwear to people who are not wearing underwear and the furthest thing from their mind is wearing underwear. But it is a blast. The athletes are amazing there and we have a team that we sponsor that plays volleyball team wood. They'll be back out there in Manhattan Beach in a couple of weeks, at the end of July, wearing their wood underwear. So we've sponsored seven or eight teams. So almost since we've been launched, we've sponsored team wood.

Speaker 1: 22:23

Yeah, that's a fantastic way to also get hotbots on the beach, as we can see, and get the product out and it's Instagrammable and it's photographerable and everyone's sharing on their own retweets and so on. Teresa, thank you so much for joining us, sharing your story of wood underwear, and I'm not sure whether you called me a cheapskate by saying I've started things for a lot much money or not. Oh no, she's called me a cheapskate on the app. Oh my god, no, she made it sound nice, but what she was saying was I'm a cheapskate. Teresa can say that to me, that's a good one.

Speaker 2: 23:00

Oh my god, I don't know if you started it cheap.

Speaker 1: 23:02

I did, but you certainly did something different and unexpected.

Speaker 2: 23:07

It might have cost you a lot.

Speaker 1: 23:08

I don't know no no, no, I've been following your lead all the way along. If you want to follow your lead and get in touch with your Teresa, where can they do that?

Speaker 2: 23:18

So woodunderwearcom is probably the easiest thing to remember, woodunderwearcom and otherwise Teresa Zimmerman on LinkedIn, Happy to take a connection.

Speaker 1: 23:29

Teresa, thank you for being connected with me and talking to me about Fancy my Wardrobe I had never explored before. Thank you so much.

Speaker 2: 23:36

You're going to go check your underwear drawer now.

Speaker 1: 23:39

I am. I'm going to go check just after finishing the recording. Well, and you can too, if you've been listening to this and found it interesting, yeah, a, check your wardrobe first and then share the episode with your fellow entrepreneurs and ask them to check their wardrobes as well, and then also give us a review on your player. That would be very helpful. And until we meet again, I just encourage you to keep on communicating and say thank you to listen to this episode of the Unnoticed Entrepreneur.