Design Thought Leader

I don’t know what’s next! It’s kind of a joke, but we’re proudly ‘without business plan’ in our 13th year. We’ve had a lot of things not work, and that’s OK too. If it’s a good idea and it gets you excited, try it, and if it bursts into flames, that’s going to be exciting too. People always ask, ‘What is your greatest failure?’ I always have the same answer—We’re working on it right now, it’s gonna be awesome! …

You need to have the stomach for risk and you need to have good ideas. Let’s just assume that those are the givens, that without either one of those nothing else makes a difference.

I know a lot of people who are in our position, who used to work for The Man or whatever, and now are making records or making films or designing clothes or creating products or screening posters or any of a million other things. And all of them, without exception, all say exactly the same thing and they say it in exactly the same words: ‘I should have done it sooner.’

When you think to yourself, ‘In 18 months I’m going to start my crocheted beer coaster company,’ the problem with that sentence is the 18 months. What you’re really saying is, ‘I’m afraid.’ Do it now. If you bankrupt a company before you’re 25, that’s like a badge of honor! Get out there.

Jim Coudal
Founder, Coudal Partners