Davie Fogarty is the Founder of The Oodie, a company known for its top-rated, oversized, wearable blankets. He is a serial entrepreneur and has founded 12, and counting, successful ecommerce companies, including Pupnaps, Calming Blankets, and The Australian Furniture Warehouse.
Before Davie’s entrepreneurial ventures, he worked in social media marketing for companies including Aleenta Barre, The 5TH, and SkinnyMe Tea.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- Davie Fogarty explains how he got into entrepreneurship and wanting to start a business from a young age
- Why Davie prefers to be humble and behind the scenes with his brands
- Some of Davie’s biggest influences that shaped his entrepreneurial mindset
- Transitioning from direct-to-consumer marketing to widespread branding
- Pitfalls that ecommerce brands make when trying to hit million-dollar milestones
- How repeat purchases make an impact on the valuation formula
- Davie mentions some key mentors in his entrepreneurial journey
- Why Davie believes passion is overrated in the short term and prefers learning and growing as you succeed
- The importance of hiring the right people
- Davie offers advice to entrepreneurs getting ready to hand the reins over and exit their brand
- Davie’s routines and the value of scheduling your day
- What’s the future of ecommerce in DTC?
- Davie discusses his opinions on AI and DTC marketing
- Why you shouldn’t overlook the power of emails as a marketing channel
- Davie’s plans for the future and how he wants to invest in helping other brands succeed
In this episode…
Starting a brand from the ground up is challenging for anyone. How about doing it 12 times, with each being more successful than the last? Meet Davie Fogarty.
At just 25 years old, Davie has founded over 12 brands, including The Oodie, Calming Blankets, and Pupnaps. His entrepreneurial mindset revolves around staying humble and helping other ecommerce companies succeed, which has proven successful time and time again. However, starting any company has pitfalls and challenges. Davie is here to tell you all about them while leading you along the path of entrepreneurial success along the way.
On this episode of the eCommerce Profits Podcast, Joshua Chin talks with serial entrepreneur and Founder of The Oodie, Davie Fogarty, about his entrepreneurial journey and success. They discuss the avenues of DTC marketing, the impact of repeat purchases, navigating ecommerce channels, and much more. You won’t want to miss this jam-packed episode!
Resources Mentioned in this episode
- Joshua Chin on LinkedIn
- Chronos Agency
- Davie Fogarty on LinkedIn
- Davie Fogarty on YouTube
- The Oodie
- Calming Blankets
- Pupnaps
Special Mentions:
Sponsor for this episode
This episode is brought to you by Chronos Agency.
If you are a direct-to-consumer ecommerce brand that wants to unlock the optimum customer lifetime value through email marketing, then look no further than Chronos Agency!
Our team of passionate email marketing experts has helped hundreds of brands generate over $70 million in return from email alone, and our clients receive an average of 3500% ROI from our efforts.
Chronos Agency has worked with a variety of brands, including Truly Beauty, Alya Skin, and many more. Our mission is to help real businesses achieve real results.
If you want to take your revenue to the next level using email marketing, be sure to email our team at sales@chronos.agency or visit chronos.agency to learn more.
Episode Transcript
Intro 0:04
Welcome to the eCommerce Profits Podcast where we feature top founders and experts in the ecommerce industry and take an in depth look at the struggles and successes in growing ecommerce brands profitably.
Joshua Chin 0:21
Josh Chin here I’m the host of the eCommerce Profits Podcast where we feature top experts and entrepreneurs in the ecommerce industry. And we go behind the scenes of the struggles and successes in growing a brand. Now this episode is brought to you by Chronos Agency. If you’re a direct to consumer ecommerce brand that is ready for scale and to double your customer lifetime value to retention marketing, Chronos is your company. We’ve helped hundreds of brands scale profits with email, SMS and mobile push, we’re getting an average of 3500% ROI from our efforts. We’ve worked with brands like Truly Beauty, Alive Skin, Doctor Livengood, and today’s guest, The Oodie and many more. So the next step is to email us at sales@chronos.agency. Or you can go to chronos.agency to learn more. Today’s guest is Davie Fogarty, the nine figure founder and CEO of some of the fastest growing ecommerce brands such as The Oodie Calming Blankets and Pupnaps. Since 2018, Davie and his group of brands have generated over $200 million in Shopify sales. And for the first time ever, he’s sharing himself on screen. And on the public space. He’s got an amazing YouTube channel coming up to check him out. Davie Fogarty, on YouTube as well. Davie, welcome to the show.
Davie Fogarty 1:47
Thanks so much for having me mate.
Joshua Chin 1:50
Let’s start off with your your entrepreneurial beginnings, I think there’s a really interesting story that revolves around f&b and in these roles. To tell us a little bit more about that.
Davie Fogarty 2:03
Yeah, it’s been a been a pretty, pretty crazy journey. You know, I’ve definitely failed probably more than most entrepreneurs. Ever since I was, you know, 14, 15 years old, I knew I wanted to own a business. So I pretty much launched every single business that I could think of, I tried selling, you know, iPhone cases, headphones, I tried mixing seasonings in my shed at one point and trying to sell those, you know, all of them really didn’t work. And the funniest one definitely was a, you know, much debate, and these are all cafe in my local suburb, spent two years trying to try to make it a franchise, which, you know, is a tough gig. So, kudos to anyone that can actually achieve that. But yeah, basically, and then I ended up just learning digital marketing, you know, learning the fundamentals and launched The Oodie and Calming Blankets, and, you know, that really shaped my path. And since then we, you know, haven’t haven’t really, you know, a lot of mistakes, but none of our businesses have failed. So definitely learned kind of the process. And yeah, what what to do.
Joshua Chin 3:17
Really interesting. Now, what have you learned from launching your Vietnamese row shop in the FMB industry, that you still apply both today and building your businesses?
Davie Fogarty 3:29
Yeah, it was probably what I didn’t apply in the Vietnamese row shop, that’s, that’s probably more interesting, you know, part of my strength, and if I was to launch of Vietnamese row shop again I’d probably succeeded it To be honest, in it, it all comes down to understanding digital platforms, and how to market product, market a product. And furthermore, you know, just the product development itself. So, you know, if you’re to launch a cafe, nowadays, you know, what product offering I actually launching that is unique that can work with these platforms. So, you know, you see a lot of these large, I’m not sure if you have them where you are. But in Australia, we’ve got all these food groups that essentially make a cafe viral through there either food challenges or just a normal serving. So, you know, I guess it’s, yeah, it’s I think it’s, that’s if I had my time, again, I would out apply my strengths to that. And also just really focus on product development. So.
Joshua Chin 4:31
Let’s talk a little bit about your ecommerce journey. Now. Being on Facebook and any social media today, you see tons of, I guess, pseudo gurus and influencers coming up with their own screenshots of how you’ve made their first 100k a month or a million dollar month on Shopify, or an Amazon or whatever platform that they’re on. And there’s a lot of ego involved. I think one of the things that really stood out when we started working together with with If you was just how humble and down to earth, you and your team are, and you were really behind the scenes and kind of not showing yourself for a long, long time, well, kind of building things. What was the mindset behind that? And what was the philosophy? in doing that?
Davie Fogarty 5:19
Yeah, definitely, I think, you know, it took three years to start talking about our financials or just even talking about what we’re doing. I guess there was an element of relative Miss and secret, you know, we wanted to kind of remain behind the scenes. But yeah, I think the, you know, we we really try to be humble. Well, I’ve certainly do, you know, I feel quite blessed with where we currently are, and the opportunities that we’ve been given, but I don’t think we’re necessarily, like 100 times smarter than the people that you know, business 100 times bigger than it’s just this, everyone’s got a lot to say, and a lot of value to add in their own kind of areas of space. Our paradigms around ecommerce and product development. And, you know, direct response marketing is generally the reason why we get such large results. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t have a lot to learn with branding. But yeah, just I guess it was just probably more so a personal choice as well, I didn’t really want to be known as that guy. I wanted to keep my life exactly how it was. You know, that’s, that’s kind of changing. Now, I guess we feel like we can help a lot of people. And there’s, we’re just trying to get the word out a little bit about what we’re trying to achieve as well. You know, we’re investing in businesses acquiring businesses. So yeah, unfortunately, the easiest way to do that is show your Shopify screenshots, if if I could just kind of impart wisdom as a whole, that would be awesome. But people don’t really listen to you until you kind of show those screenshots. And then you can hopefully, yeah, the social proof. That’s it.
Joshua Chin 7:01
What were some of your biggest influences and in life, I think that a lot of your core values have been shaped in some way, as you’re growing up and building your businesses. Does it have anything to do if your parents understand that your dad is also an entrepreneur?
Davie Fogarty 7:17
Yeah, the parents were a big part of of who I am, they’re, you know, very kind giving people. I guess, maybe it’s a personal thing, where, like, when I was struggling and failing, I would see people flaunting things. And I guess it didn’t make me feel good. It also didn’t make me like them. It didn’t make me want to listen to them. So I guess, you know, trying to stay humble. And it he I guess that’s the thing is a is there’s an element of empathy to it, and not wanting to be that those people that I used to resent. So yeah, try to try to stay stay humble. But at the same time, you know, there’s a fine line, like you still want to be confident and proud. And, you know, share your share your team’s wins as well. So there is a is a fine line. And yeah, when Yeah, we’re just trying to walk that I guess.
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