How I Became A BILLIONAIRE After Being Broke & Homeless Twice! 🤑 (JOHN PAUL DEJORIA INTERVIEW)

hi I'm John Paul and yes I'm very passionate about patron Paul Mitchell Rach John Paul Penn and many other things but more important I'm very passionate about doing something on this planet and continuing to do it that makes it will live at her place to live for others enjoy what you're gonna see I [Music] enjoyed this interview with LR because it gave the opportunity for entrepreneurs to see once again some of the different things you can do to be successful those are entrepreneurs some of the things that really worked in life and I love sharing the story that helps others become successful peace love and happiness hey guys welcome to this episode of passion if you podcast today it's your host Omar here and today is a very special day because we get to interview multi billionaire entrepreneur John Paul DeJoria and in this interview we get into the story of not only how john paul co-founded Paul Mitchell Systems which you might know from their shampoo and conditioner at your local salon but also how John Paul overcame homelessness twice in his lifetime had a single mother grew up in LA with not a lot of money and would go on to not only build successful company with Paul Mitchell but also with patron who he most recently sold for five point 1 billion dollars and of course you guys know me I had to ask him exactly what he did with the money the date of transaction cleared so in this interview we go deep into John Paul's mindset attitude and more so than his story some of the tactical and strategic things that he's used to allow him to become a multi billionaire in the process so whatever you're after in life money purpose or peace there will be something for you so no further ado sit back relax maybe even have a shot at stealing this one because you'll enjoy a wild interview none other than multi billionaire John Paul shaurya enjoy hey guys welcome to this episode of the passionate view today we have on America's most loved entrepreneur mr. John Paul DeJoria himself thanks for being on the show Shirley so growing up you had some entrepreneurial endeavors that is you had no idea would lead to what it would be but talk to me later about your early start because you started out believe it or not selling encyclopedias most people don't know this yeah actually was even before that Omar of my first entrepreneur job I was 7 years old at the variety boys club in East la and we would go there in the woodshop and they would give us 25 cents worth of credit my brother night on would it be enough what to buy to build a flower box about this big this wide rounded on the ends open on top flat on the bottom with hooks you put on your windowsill you can hang it up and we went out to sell it for 50 cents now this is in the early 50s well it took us two days I think we finally found a waitress to buy it from us which was wonderful and we went back we paid our 50 Cent's off we paid a quarter I should say for the wood the other quarter profit we did another one we went to unsold it 50 cents for two kids there are seven and eight and a half years old to have 50 cents in those days was a lot of mines my first time prettier job then in the back of a comic book when I was 9 years old I read Christmas cards we send you a free kit and all you do is you have four examples you go around and sell Christmas cards with somebody's name printed in now they're gonna give you a 50% deposit you send that in with the order okay but when the order comes in you deliver it they'll give you the other 50% and it's yours well that was pretty cool I think I sold maybe four or five people I thought that was okay at that time I was a nine years old Wow so then so already at that age orange trying to get the momentum of sales yeah you see my era was a little different than today's era we loved having a job other than the flower boxes we gave most of money to my mother at 11 years old and my brother now was 13 by that time we had morning paper routes with the LA Examiner we get up in the morning fold our papers deliver him before school and we made about $32 something like that a month we kept a dollar and a quarter each course back riding gave the rest of my mom we just thought it was the coolest thing to have a job we weren't doing because we're making this extra money we knew we were which would help our family live a better way of life but it was the fact you can have a job well I've been working ever since when I got into high school I'd have a part-time job after school all the time and then I won the United States Navy after I got the Navy it's another I call it on for your job because you're selling encyclopedias door-to-door there no salary commission only and you pay for your own food your own expenses that is tough yeah if the average encyclopedia salesperson lasts three days I lasted three and a half years but I believe what they told me they said the people are they're gonna make it are the ones will knock on ten doors and then if they're closed in your face you're just as enthusiastic on door number eleven but you got to do that well it's pretty tough when you're out there people are closing the door close the door you have nothing less you sell a set of books people are not expecting you there weren't even leads there well I believe what they sets on door number 101 I was just as enthusiastic as the first hundred doors but it took me about a week before I made my first sale it was happy were you always a pretty positive person or did you just learn that hey rejections a part of life and this is gonna be a part of anything I ever want to get good at did you sort of learn that lesson young about rejection I was always a pretty positive person my mom was pretty positive so I was always pretty positive but aunt realized the importance of learning how to overcome rejection until I sold encyclopedias when we were delivering our newspapers in the morning we also if we want to go out at night and get an extra customer we made an extra dollar per new customer we put on which was pretty exciting for us so that was the launch for nourish but as little kids you're not after a hundred doors you after five or ten right yeah when you're after hundreds of doors it's a good experience in fact uh I do tell people - the most important things you could do as entrepreneurs in starting a business or in getting your business doing a little differently or and working with somebody else it's the same thing whether you work for yourself or someone else - biggest things you could do to make yourself good is number one be prepared for a lot of rejection kind of the question you ask me if you're prepared for it and it comes along it's not going to bug you as much very very important the second thing is make sure your service or your product is the very best there is then you're in the reorder business not the selling business if you want to go into selling business just to sell your product well that could be a one-time event if everything you do is for them to like it so much they want to use it again or if it's a one-time product they want to tell their friends about it now you're in love jibing your business those are two the secrets and smile be happy right yeah no I love that and you've done that so well and built it into the culture of all of your businesses now I want to ask you did your motivation your drive your hunger obviously it's quite intense compared to most people's do you feel like it was rooted in the fact that you had a single mother and you were always maybe you had a you know chip on your shoulder you were trying to prove something to the world or was it just your natural personality you just wanted to be really good at things and so you excelled in sales never being in the world I was what I was we were immigrants single mom dad was a deadbeat dad and he took off before I was two years old it was just something we were around a positive environment we didn't have any money and we live in a very small little place and that go Bart oh we were happy we're just positive it wasn't anything that was to prove anything to anybody just set just how it is and if you take a look at life you can have your glasses they say half empty or half full us how you look at it now I've been homeless twice when you are down without fear my first time was 22 years old and I had a child homeless with a kid it was a couple years old which would be interesting because most people see you now in a small T billion-dollar situation they would never believe that a 22 you're homeless with a kid I mean he didn't look like the trajectory was heading here right up yeah but when you're down and out and you're that far down and you've got a kid and you're kicked out of your place because rents due you don't have the money and your wife took off with everything everything yep just little kids anyways we are just too young to get married so you know how to make it now when you're that low fat a friend of mine who's a blues singer said when you get down soloing you lock up all you can see is an edge right when you're that low you could only go up so instead of you have a choice you could sit around and blame what happened to you on everybody else which is usually what people do or say hey that's how things turned out now I'm going to turn things around another very important thing when you're down and out first thing people do is blame it on everybody else but themselves when you start taking responsibility you have a little different outlook you also have the responsibility of turning things around when I started Paul Mitchell I was homeless once again totally by accident and I started to cut me out of the backseat of my car how old were you at that time 37 that was 34 35 at that time so you were homeless at 34 35 again and what was this series of events that led to that second time it was just that we had money set up a half a million bucks we need to start to company at that kind of money and the day I was ready to start go down the bank and get the money and my partner the hairdresser Paul Mitchell flew her from Hawaii with his girlfriend and we were ready to get the money and get going get started I had left everything I did my relationship wasn't working out so left the house plenty of money for many months with her had a few hundred bucks in my pocket took the used car which is 20 years old but a decent one okay down the hill to get the money I was gonna check into an efficiency it all set up the money never came in no never the guy changed his mind 1980-81 inflation in the United States is 12 and a half percent interest rates if you could get a loan prime rate 17 percent Wow we stayed in line to get gasoline and interest an unemployment was 10 a half percent the United States the guy said you're as hostages are still near on which they were at that time he says it is this cetera I'm sorry it's the last minute No so as a matter of what are we gonna do Paul came over he was older than me he was on his last few dollars and what are we gonna do is Paul looking you afford how did you meet Paul to begin with I met Paul 9 years prior in the beauty industry a mutual friend of ours had introduced us at a big beauty show baby show we just became the best of friends so for nine years when he or he and his girl from come over to me in the United continental United States they'd stay with me my guest room when I went to Hawaii he would go in his guest room which was the Volkswagen bust with flat wheels in front of us a little tiny beach house I let my wife and I have a little beach house at the time because the best of friends and decided to go to business with each other yeah and so at what point was that where you guys said huh you know what we might be onto something here with Paul Michels you know shampoo and conditioners which you guys came to be known for what was the point where you guys said hmm like let's do this like what was the well we why need to do it because I knew the business I was in marketing sales and structure and had connections with product development and I didn't do hair Paul was a great hairdresser when the best in the world very advanced in what he did however he didn't do business it was the perfect combination where these two guys that were just the best of friends and we knew we could do it uh obviously we start out with nothing we made the distal edge astir let's just make this happen and as you will see in your guest will see when they look at good fortune the movie and it's on iTunes it's on Amazon all those whether you look at it it's the whole story of starting in America with nothing a couple times and making things happen because of what you believe in but the important thing is even we had nothing we started giving back weather was the first company to say we will never test on animals and never have to this state Wow or other things we gonna shake your hand to the show you betcha that's awesome it's still going on lately not very cool now when it comes to you actually wanting to grow the business did you guys start it with the intention that we want to build this big or was it like let's just test the waters because up until that point you probably had no experience of the kind of success that Paul Mitchell would grow to be so was the intention to build a big business or was it just to sell to salons and just grow and see that question we knew we would only sell it to beauty salons and the reason we picked that area was for two reasons one if a hairdresser who's in hair all the time likes your product they're gonna recommend it to their customer to take care of their hair in between visits to look the same they're the experts and we didn't have a major multi-million dollar advertising budget go in the other direction I had been for those last eight years nine years since professional beauty industry of course Paul was also what a perfect beautiful industry to go into and I knew that I could knock door-to-door and sell my products without an advertising campaign we had no money now you want to learn from selling encyclopedias oh yeah learn exactly learn from selling encyclopedias how to do without an appointment yeah however our motivation when we start it was not to have a giant company our motivation start with was survival survival I thought I have nothing I left everything I'm doing right and God let's just give it a shot here I'll sleep in my car we know our products were darn good if people use them they want to reorder them let's go for it it took us two years before we knew we'd be successful our dream when we started out was if we could only get this company up to five million dollars a year we'd each make about a quarter of a million dollars $250,000 we have it made for life we're so excited right yeah that has things rolled I learned how to be a little better businessman as we got bigger and bigger I brought other people on board to run operations other people are much better than I to run other parts of the business that was they were more qualified to do and we had no idea in fact when Paul died back in 1989 of pancreatic cancer we were together he said I believe in the afterlife I believe that my spirit will go out and I'll be able to look down on this planet earth you said gosh 8pb so wonderful if one day out there there could be a hundred thousand you know dollars worth of Paul Mitch I mean hundred million dollars to the problem it could be a hundred million dollar company one day oh my god would this be wonderful you know what if we could do this JP i'ma look down and watch it I said Paul I'm gonna build this company to at least one hundred million dollars little extra motivation there and that's to say we went way beyond that but it was good yeah good intentions and then also I know that you came to be known for your sales pitch right and that became what you were coined for in the industry um can you talk a little bit about what your pitch was when training either yourself initially or when training your salespeople to go into the store put it in their hand I know you have a sort of routine you used to do do you mind sharing that routine rattle the first thing is it could not be a sales pitch if you're selling somebody with a sales pitch you're trying to create a sales when you're trying to sell somebody something instead of selling it to them help them make the right decision and put yourself in the reorder business for example selling is all about here is the feature my product enters house could have benefits you make sure that those features and benefits are honest uncle lying to people don't exaggerate here's the feature Lebrun here sells could benefit you with our Paul Mitchell conditioner because it was leave-in conditioner I could put some in their hand right now once it went on their hand they didn't know what to do with it and I can finish explaining we have two hands out like this their hand in my hand I can finish explaining and they don't know what the world to do with this right but I have their full attention I said it bottled down they see by the way rub your hands together it neutralizes all the chemicals in your body put on your skin it's very good for your skin it's a leaving conditioner there's all these great things so that was part of the technique and then obviously the other part was you want to help people make the right decision right often people will say to you know they're not really saying no they're saying I haven't been convinced so it's very it's very very important sales to realize this in our case we have every line in the world why do we want a new line that no one knows okay and for us we would say because this product saves you time and money one shampoo incentive to a leave in conditioner opposed to one you've got to spend 10 minutes the back base and waiting and then rinsing it out of their hair saves you time and money it's new and exciting and I will come back show you how to sell it and from the period of one month it's not the hottest product and you're not totally satisfied I will take back every bottle you haven't used or sold out the door and give you your money back now that's fair enough isn't it all right and you would not just like oh yeah and I would give their money back yeah I believe in our first two years only one bottle came back so when you first asked that because I won't ask when you first made that offer it was part of you kind of nervous I call man I hope they don't take it back or was genuine confidence it was genuine confidence there was no doubt in our minds our product is so good a few uses a hairdresser you want to use it again and again and again and we were right again within the first two years only one bottle came back that's incredible and then I know to that that's at the center of your ethos right of always having quality products same happens with patron you guys went in and revolutionized an industry that before then a lot of people thought well you can't go premium or it can't be done and you Sir John Paul did it can you talk a little bit about why you think entrepreneurs typically don't do that or why you know what is it that entrepreneurs don't get about that because it seems so intuitive that you have the best products is it just cutting costs I mean what is it do you think that holds most entrepreneurs back from really putting out quality stuff it's a combination of several things one obviously is a cost and number two is your thinking your mindset if your mindset is to sell something to somebody that's your business that's your mindset if your mindset is I want to be in the reorder business and if it's a one-time sale I want it to be so good they're going to tell their friends about it when you have that mindset well what's gonna create reorder I like the product so much I want to use it again now it doesn't mean that you have to go the cheapest or the most expensive it means you have to have the best or conceived as one of the best or something that satisfied their needs it's like marketing is fulfilling a need in the marketplace but in such a way that your sister your brother your best friend's gonna use that product and say this is really good I want to go out of my way to order it again salons how often do people go to salons I think the average is once every oh gosh for those that go once every six weeks something like that you know to get a haircut get a trim all right well in between do they want to make sure they have enough when they go back to get enough to last from the next visit got to be good product here that yeah one that works that's why Paul Mitchell my gosh you know we're will be approaching next year almost 40 years in business and our original product shampoo one shampoo two in the conditioner we still sell Proctor that good and in my industry every three or four years you flip products over our products are that good that people say I want to continue to use it it's still the best it's still timeless Wow okay so as you're growing your business because a lot of entrepreneurs watch the show and I want to ask this for them what entrepreneurs will say well wow you built something that's just so intangible in my mind would you say that as you grow as you scale your business there was many times where you were like ma'am I have no idea what I'm doing right you sort of assumed the role I mean how many times in your career growing is you know what people would see as multi-billionaire who has it all together how much of the time are you really just sort of figuring it out as you go as opposed to knowing what you're doing every step of the way for people out there I knew some of the stuff I was doing but especially how to run and get it evolving it cut me there did more than four five million dollars here let alone to the hundreds of millions billion you know the value of this company my god you learn along the way I kept trying to learning and trying to do everything after about nine years I realized man I can only do so much that's when I brought in people like Luke Jacob Ellis who was far more experienced than I was and running warehouses running inventories and things of that nature and all of a sudden he had this responsibility another person was great at this and they had that responsibility so you have to learn once you get pretty big how to find the very best people better than you are I say to management all the time whether it's government management independent management or corporate manager when I lecture always find somebody in your department or in your business that can do it better than you are and hire that person I tell my division heads here and all other comes in the ball with guys even though you're full operations you run the businesses for me make sure this that when you hire someone that person you hire has the capability being better than you now what if they go on and you don't go on you are one of my best managers any manager that's a brain tire someone better than they are and as a better capability that's the kind of person I want to board for the future mmm I love that now let me ask you this what's your process for decision-making obviously a business is big whether it's hiring building a culture choosing colors logos ads marketing you have to make lots of decisions all the time without all the pieces of information what's been your rule of thumb or what have you learned after decades of making decisions what does John Paul DeJoria is you know system for effective decision making well I'm very lucky now because with all my various companies whether its patron whether it was Paul Mitchell John Paul Pat block mobile whatever I have great managers great presidents great people that make some very very good decisions however I'll commit more of a creative end of PR and and say hmm here's my input on this done and everything but on some of the things and I go by how do I feel you know how does my spirit feel about it how we initially feel my intuition yeah you know how do I feel exactly you know what's what's my intuition on this one then does it make sense and then from a consumers point of view if I was this person how would I look at it and all too often I'm saying by the way that eight and ten point type make it bigger I want to kind of read it without their glasses on that's a no-no jp's come you better increase that a little bit and I have really great people that do most of that big decision-making but for me as what what's that intuition how do I feel about it how do I think others will feel about it is a price properly and is it extremely great and I will use just about every product of myself whether it was patron that I built over the years how do I like the taste or the Paul Mitchell other than you know obviously not I don't have a permanent ways there's a lot of products we have I don't use on me John Paul pet I used every products on me and I don't have ticks so I'm flea and tick shampoo probably weren't pretty good for the diner yes but I would use the products on may to to give them my opinion nice how about on your way up when you didn't have managers in place and you have to make decisions what was your system was it really just that intuition ablai system was intuition and oh who do I call to see what they would do but it was usually my intuition and I was very lucky most the time I was right but many times I was wrong that's very interesting that you learn from your mistakes yeah that's true and it's very interesting that you say that because a lot of people you know built big businesses will say that hey I didn't all the information so any time I hit a roadblock it was a matter of who not how right who can I find how important do you find networking is or building a resources of people of rolodex of people who can help you support you how important is it to build your network if I had them the early days would have been great I didn't have it in the early days so most of let's say the first five years are just my intuition of what I thought would be right and if I didn't have an answer I would try something and again luckily I was right most the time and there were times row wasn't right I came out okay yeah and then how about meditation was that ever something I was a part of your life forever Rutina meditation or anything like that I think the closest meditation for me is the majority of times I'll wake up in the morning do what most people do go in the bathroom go right back to bed and just take a couple of minutes to be in the here and now now that's difficult because I'm not a regular meditator well how do you be in the here and now that's almost like a meditation when your mind is totally blank well you could sit up in your room and just have your mind blank hard to do because things rush through your head so what do I do I look at the ceiling oh that's the ceiling OOP that's the pain that's the TV set to just focus here then I focus on air going in me air going out of me as I do things like that then all of a sudden for a couple of minutes I blank my mind out period then I go about my day you become more present more tuned to the moment this matter of a couple of minutes and then you go right through so talk to me a little about patron obviously you know Paul Mitchell had built this massively successful business for you guys and then you add patron to the mix how did that come about what was the start of that because I know most recently there was an acquisition in early January with Bacardi was actually in May it finished in April in May of this year yeah there was a very large act but it was the biggest in the industry 5.1 billion I put 1 billion dollar valuation that's correct so I got to ask you what does it feel like the morning that the acquisition is done and that whole clears you wake up the deals done how do you first thing I did was immediately once I knew was in the bank I wrote a check for 15 million dollars to charity it's the first thing I'd add period and then put all the money away for the future I have enough to handle things now I don't want to play with this money for the next year I gave it to experts to take care of it for them to manage the money I have enough to exist off the money I make right now and this way don't do some stupid a lot of people get a lot of money they're putting it here in there and just let me give to the experts you guys take care of that that's from my future other than I'm pulling 50 million out for charitable work now for people that really need it and is there any part of you at times that goes back to that young kid growing up in Echo Park LA may be the tough times along the way sleeping in your car where you wake up and pinch yourself and go oh how did this happen but constantly I'm saying creator of souls thank you for this incredible life you've given me in the health of me and my family and happiness thank you so much let me go forth and do good things to make the planet better because I'm here and you feel like that energy is what keeps things flowing correct note that energy is just what I feel I don't do to keep things flowing just what I feel and I just give that gratitude and whether you're an atheist or they believe in God let's call it God for now our Creator of soul right is we're all part of that and maybe some of us have been given a little extra whether you call a good-looker got opportunities to go along with or just something that was good in our lives or a good break in life whatever to make something happen success unshared is failure often people make so much as to make more and more and more and more but don't share it with people and that's that so success ensured is failure and when you're making it and you're doing good you're happy with yourself mmm powerful and then I know I asked about patron but if we get into a little bit of that what what was the seed or how did patron start what was the city around with Martin Crowley who was going down to Mexico I went God bankrupt in the hospitality business so a friend introduced him to me and I put him in the architectural business he go to Mexico buy furniture and pavers come to the United States and sell it to restaurants or architects for their model homes right little niche business we're doing pretty good and I was building a house there in Malibu for my family for the future and I said Martin when you go down there we need some pavers and some things here some you know steel some wood whatever especially granite you know a different stone that's ground for these pillars go down there and see you know with the prices but by the way because we were drinking tequila at that time remember margarita I said see what the Mexican people drink the aristocrats drink and maybe bring back a bottle or two it was okay so he went down there with one of my builders Jack and they went across this one place and brought back a couple of bottles in this very thin long bottle it was the smoothest I ever taste in my life really and the Martin says but JP I met this guy named Francisco al Korres that works for this little distillery says he could make it even smoother now this little distillery will make it for us with Francisco's little touch in there there charges some money is expensive to make but we go into business I thought great we could make it smooth let's do it yeah I'll order a thousand cases what year is this this is 1989 early 1989 Wow a bar order a thousand cases which was twelve thousand bottles and let's see what happens that if nobody bought it will for ten years every gift you can imagine is a great bottle of tequila Martin and Allah know is with him found this bottle that was a out of recycled glass I thought God we could do this out of recycled glass it goes along with my philosophy yeah we can make him out of recycled glass and at first no one wanted our product the average tequila sold for about four or five dollars a bottle the best one was about fourteen dollars a bottle back in 1989 because of the quality and what we put into it we have to sell it for 3795 a bottle Wow no one would touch us no distributor with touches but it was think true to your ethos you have premium quality and the market will adjust to the premium that's right woody yeah we went to Wolfgang Puck yet Spago's he's a friend of mine goes JP this is the best I've ever had well if we give it to your celebrity sure JP give me a bottle as you know Martin went to ba cantina we kind of built it like that ground roots like encyclopedia sales where did you come up with the name patron Martin and Ilana we're working with names and founded they said I think the name patron me like the boss the good boss wife a good boss right is available Christ let's go for here's extra money try and get easy we could get a trademarking trademarking trademark and then later on we found there was someone in mexico that some called reserva del potro whatever and of course we gave them money to buy that out right it was brilliant it's just a brilliant name and then how long did it take from when thing you know you started to things took off and I gave me the rundown on the story but what was the timeline before you really started seeing a momentum on sales when they say the momentum of sales probably didn't really happen big time until towards the middle of 1990s around the middle we started we did okay and we were doing good but right around the middle is when we started going to 50,000 60,000 cases a year and that's when it started really going now when she really took off was in 1993 when Martin unfortunately died I'm sorry 2003 Martin had died and Edie Brown who was our Vice President of Sales who should have been pressed and immediately made him president and he put into it everything for example we pulled out the models he was using girls as models and made patron the image not pretty girls right now there are a lot of pretty girls right and he redid our entire team then it all since started taking off like that well no one had any idea in the world we would become by dollar volume the largest tequila company in the world and stay all high-end that's incredible to never give up we can make more money if we had less of a product quality never gave up never gave up I never tweaked on your laurels never treat I don't know fully made it better better better that's a real secret keep your products so good people one reordered it now since that time since we started there's gotta be - 250 tequila company said about right none of them close to patron I believe our closest competitor that's owned by a giant company did close to 500 a thousand cases we did far in excess of 3 million for it exists at the peak how many cases a year were you guys done far in excess of 3 million I'm sure by now it's probably over 4 billion yeah and then how did you feel when you started singing ingrained into the culture writing songs patron on ice you can have whatever you like you know oh happy over 200 hip hop songs were written about it country-western songs popular songs very happy excited we didn't pay for it really so we went to some of these people and said and I went to some of the rap singers this is so cool why this is JP cuz we love your product we love patron and it's at our culture now it makes you feel good a lot of us drink some patron and not do some of the drugs we get kind of that same feeling because it's so good we don't get sloppy drunk but we try and drink responsibly so good keep that responsible drinking up you know keep that in there and then it was part of your guys's designed to to make the bottle different to make it totally different I mean what was the what was the thought process behind the design process the beginning was they brought me a bottle that a lot of Martin that was out of recycled glass at look like that we thought that's perfect looks like something old that a pirate and old the keel are up a trouble would have right and at first we had a glass a topper on it with cork and then that kept on separates we just want pure cork and made it cool-looking and never changed I never looked back nope okay how about the tough times because we've talked a lot about the successes talk to me about some challenges that maybe maybe you haven't shared before it could be financial it could be whatever just managing so many moving parts talking about some of the toughest challenges you've dealt with maybe that you haven't shared before and how you overcame them if you wanted to a lot of we shared before but perhaps one or two may not have but you're viewing on is will figure it up and they murder before what was the very beginning was survival when you only have a few hundred dollars in your pocket in my case too proud to tell my mom who lived in LA mom I'm going to my room it's empty feed me for the next few months okay I've left everything behind I have no money that was tough had to live in my car and learn how to live off two dollars and fifty cents a day and I did it hard that is challenging how long were you living in my car I thought two weeks in the car yeah and then Joanna ped and an actress of the day giving me a room in her house found it I was living in my car found and then still is living off two dollars and fifty cents a day for breakfast and for dinner it was some tough times and then to call people every month for almost two years the check I'll delivered next day buts in the Vale jp2 I'll come down yeah it took two years a lot of people say with all your challenges and your bills are late and you can't sleep and I nestra there were nights I could not sleep because I knew I couldn't pay the bills now did that help me no it doesn't do any out but you're just worrying about it since I tell people hey if that happens to you write on a piece of paper all these problems in your life whether they're personal or business that keep you from sleeping what's going through your head over and over again write on a piece of paper and just tape it to your bathroom mirror and now say hey I don't have to think about it it'll be there in the morning and you rest more easier big challenge was how to survive when you have bill money but we pulled it off mm-hmm and then how about in terms of you when you sort of later in your career you've experienced all these different things what have you found to be the most meaningful experiences of your life because from the outside looking in you know I'm sure you get all the time people think of billionaire they have no idea that there's so much more to it whatever you found to be some of the most rewarding or fulfilling experiences is it employees is it the customers I mean obviously it's not just the money no it's a combination with the greatest joy come from combination many things one my customers love us and we have a retention of most all of our customers because they love what we do they love what we stand for the love our culture big deals people love our culture by giving back whether it's for Waterkeeper lights the sea Shepherd mobile loaves and fish is taking the homeless off the streets or just all the things we do now on a global basis to give back they really light that appreciate that and that gets me off my staff members I think we only have around uh maybe a turnover of close to a hundred people in 39 years almost that said no way yep people love what that we do but we love the way we work with them very proud of my people I'm their people they're my people very very proud and very very proud of having the ability to make extra money where I could give back and change the world in fact a projects going on right now where I've always wanted to change the world for millions of people for better now I've got some projects going though where I'll be changing the life of hundreds of millions of people to do better in life and upgrade their economic situation and that makes me very very happy that what I'm doing is good and I'm proud of now along the way there's challenges people want to take advantage of horn I have been sued several times all frivolous lawsuits but he's a billionaire so he must be at fault right all these fruit and I have to find him what a pain and I'm singled out because I have all this money right right which is stupid right there are frivolous lawsuits but other people run across a safe because he's got money maybe he's bad let's get part of it that's big the biggest disappointment is frivolous lawsuits for people saying well he would did do the right things he's a billionaire look we're gonna so he must have cheated there's twelve people we're gonna sue but let's only get him because he's got the money that that's a downside other than that it's wonderful to be able to give back and be careful with people because people will do that to you and for entrepreneurs or leaders listening how did you build the culture to the staff and I'm pleased obviously as you grow in scale it's about putting the right people in places you can't be there but what tips would you give entrepreneurs out there who are looking to build a culture for their organization their company their business how do you create a culture like that and transcend it to where you know people want to stay question be a culture of heart how would you like to be treated if you could be treated I work for companies where the guy said do it this way well why just do it that's how you manage people you work with them I can remember ties onward for others where things were really good in my life and maybe had a dollar for lunch you couldn't buy very much for dollar so no problem the minute we could afford it everyone that worked at Paul Mitchell gets free lunch they still do they would run menus and they still do I still do okay so you look at what people need what people want profit sharing health care we provide all of that for our people so they're happy they could grow they have a savings account that we participate in with profit sharing we make people happy we look grow together because we look at what would they like how could we treat them we had a good year let's give some bonuses out mm-hmm and I think what you're saying really is how would you want to be treated exactly you were them how would you want your employer to treat you and you just sort of reverse engineer and land that out and by example like we're very giving you know we do something we must turn down every month many many requests cuz we do too many I think last cow this is JP you've given to 167 different causes stop we don't have the time the energies you know okay so we slow down a little bit here undoing that but we keep on giving now our staff feels it they love being part of giving okay so one day I came here last year and everyone's gone but the receptionist where did we go this afternoon Oh JP they all volunteered to go down to and this was the California office to go down to Santa Monica and clean up the beaches I said wow that's great they say do it all the time they volunteered to do it because it's the thing to do now I'm not at that office very much maybe once every three weeks I'll come to California come in for a day or two and shake hands do a little bit public relations but they're doing without me being here watch didn't even know about it that's beautiful our schools this is the greatest example of a promise we have in the United States now over a hundred maybe close to hundred twenty Paul Mitchel schools part of our curriculum is giving back our schools participate in fundraisers and they raise a lot of money we have raised today in the last 15 years millions of dollars I think the average maybe a couple million a year at least these are students half the money stays in the local community the other half goes to great causes for the United States and other parts of the world so they learn while they're in school joyous things like a car wash to raise money a cut-a-thon need to come up with all kinds of ways every dime they raised goes to the charity every dime they raise to our Paul Mitchell school charities we the school department underwrite the entire charity so every dime it cost to run and operated and Minister it is either done by volunteers or we pay for it every dime goes to so they learn as part of the curriculum the joy giving back well some of these children ever meet the survivors these little children whose parents have died of AIDS they just one day two 12 years old in Africa that people wonder the throw away that we save their lives and educate them give a place to live no but they know they did something for somebody else asking nothing in return and how good it feels that's our Paul Mitchell school culture and boy does it work and it makes people better off sometimes children or adult children could talk to their parent where they haven't talked to their parent in many years they learn how to communicate it's all about giving back and loving one another and just being selfish for yourself and not caring about the other person thinks it's part of the culture we teach in our schools and of course with our company that's beautiful and it seems like you were always like that because even we didn't have money I read something I think it was an article where you said even when you didn't have money that you would still give a dime if you had it you know the end of a dime out of a dollar you're not gonna do a billionaire or when I'm rich I'll give Christmastime and that's also a good fortune how my mom we had nothing we gave a dime to the Salvation Army and why we did it what mom said and then always stuck with me even my days when I used to ride with the Satan slaves in the Hells Angels in California you're a rebel aren't you Jim let's just say I was different time free-spirited it's different times okay I used to ride with them we shared in the school I would let's just say I went through the 60s whatever I had but even during those times I would go to Griffith Park and they would have feedings at Thanksgiving and a Christmas time where I would just go there one a volunteer to be on the line to serve people food for Thanksgiving or Christmas and there were lines of people you know going all over the park but we would serve them free food and made me feel good I did something to get back absolutely and we actually have an event we have these passion pay shirts where we actually for every shirt purchase we donate a meal and a shirt to the homeless in need for the holidays yeah so we're very aligned with you in that one I want to ask a couple last questions here before we wrap up so there's a lot of entrepreneurs watching and a lot of Marcin here wondering like what was JP's mindset what was his motivation so I want to ask obviously you wanted to create a great product the or durable product serve people help the world but how much of it was I want to make a lot of money I mean even if that was a parallel motivation was that in there or not really was that kind of a byproduct I mean obviously it was important but did you have the aspiration for hundreds of millions or billions or was that not really the dialogue what was inside your head absolutely not the whole thing is if we can only do five million dollars a year while we make a quarter million each were set for life and then has to cut me grew that we realized hey not only could the company grow up we could actually do things like maybe buy a nice house one day maybe buy a new car I never owned a new car in my life until 1985 and we started Paul Mitchell 1980 it was the first my enough money fell coffin enough to actually buy my first new car was like was your first splurge first a new car first versus Anouk I bought a new car no no it was a sedan but it was into it it was a Mercedes so was it Mercedes then I just felt like on top of the world like Janis Joplin had a song Lord won't you buy LSA these fans you know yeah and you're just playing the music Wow finally living the American dream so it was great well the American dream to me is to be happy have the opportunity whether you're working for someone else or whether you start your own business to be happy people have enough money to buy yourself a house and live okay that's the American dream and have a shot at having a big business or little business on your own and making some money for a better life for your family that's a dream to keep on going up having an opportunity that dream is still alive today inflation is not 12 and a half percent right unemployment is not ten and a half percent interest rates are not 17 percent lowest interest rate and our employment today my god is less than four percent you know so they have a better opportunity today to be able to start a business than ever before and you have the internet in my day you tipped and we had telephones we would dial or push the button on we'd have all cell phones the cell phones were this big if you could afford one I think yeah when we were four or five years in business I bought one of those big ones so when you see the generation now you think man you guys have so many tools you have no excuse to not research though so okay when you see entrepreneurs now what do you think most of them are doing in effectively because I'm sure at this level you've dealt with many CEOs who do really well you've seen people crash and burn what are you know what do you notice are patterns of executives or leaders who build companies that actually work does it speak just to what you've already said about quality products putting people first I mean what is the common denominator among companies and leaders that succeed versus those who constantly fails it's all that you said but I would throw in there rejection and it's only human nature when people keep rejecting your friends your family this is not going to work you shouldn't be doing this to do something else no the person doesn't want to buy it if you know your product or your service is the best you could possibly do and you will overcome rejection you're gonna have a heck of a good chance of making it having that positive attitude of drive drive drive look at Fred Smith Federal Express several times he was turned down he just kept on going for it now it's just a huge company but there are many companies like that to give an example many you've got to stick with what you believe in some are gonna make it and some won't I've started other entrepreneur jobs along the way or businesses that just didn't make it but you learn yeah and of course we only hear about the success as desc we only hear about the poor Mitchell in the transcript so okay quick question what's the worst advice you've ever gone in your career oh I got a lot of bad advice Mike I couldn't tell you the worst coz there probably several worst recessions like Oh put some money in that and just at work out there were several on the way I couldn't pick out anyone as the worst one but there's several we all get several things we make a decision and oh my god always give an advice and that was wrong all you do is learn from it try not to make that same mistake again and if you make it a second time shame on you make sure there's never a third what's the best advice that you would give somebody else looking to build a big business build a meaningful business impact the world what would be john paul looking back on your years what would be your best advice to people out there looking to make the life work a combination of make your product or service the best it is so you could be in the reorder business not in the order business number two don't give up be prepared for a lot of rejection and then remember successful people do all the things on successful people don't want to do like work from morning till night work on the weekends not give up and the most important thing is as you grow remember this success unshared is failure you want to be happy in your life and take care of your people I love that okay now this is the last question before we play a game so typically at the end of every interview we play a game called first things first where I rifle off ten words or phrases and it's like a relation game you tell me the first word or phrase that comes to mind but before that I have one last question and that is for people watching us that have seen what you've you know built in the world have seen what you know you've done the impact you know they followed your story through the roller coaster maybe they've watched good fortune and they themselves might be stuck in a rut maybe they're maybe their business is you know not doing so hot maybe there's a salesperson and there's debating quitting maybe their relationships not doing so hot or maybe they're in a successful business but their unfulfilled I'm sure you've seen it but they're just stuck in life what would be John Paul DeJoria is best piece of advice is somebody out there who's just stuck and looking to make their life work go get rent it or buy it's only a few dollars now good fortune the documentary movie okay and you'll see what I mean once you see it okay it covers several types of being stucked several times of being everything you possibly imagined in your life but how to overcome it with kindness in a good way watch that I think it's gonna answer your questions I love that okay so you ready for the game jerk all right here we go so again ten words and phrases first word that comes to mind the only rule is that you can't repeat yourself twice hmm makes sense so the first word or phrase or let's go to show you all right first word money I just to me popped up mobile loaves and fishes because I was able to give them more money for the homeless people building an ecological Center for them that gives you entrepreneurship and work mm-hmm challenges oh my gosh all the ones I've been through for the last 74 years [Laughter] homelessness I've been there twice your dreams my dreams are still my dreams and when it turns out of my life that my regrets take the place of my dreams then I'm getting old passion how you truly feel passion is so strong it's got to be part of what you do your passion about it not just do it because you have to the 5.1 billion dollar acquisition with Bacardi and patron very nice valuation on the company very nice valuation hit a homerun did something really really good and gives me the opportunity to do other things and be very proud of being the founder of patron spirits what your mom would say if she saw you right now in this office and what you built in oil honey I love you that's my boy your wishes for people out there watching this interview who want to make their life work to make your life work be sure that you look at those around you to make their life work at the same time then you move forward together the frequency of this planet is rising every one of you out there don't care how old you are have noticed this last year went by faster than any year in your life the frequency is rising things are happening quicker as you do things make sure others in your life are part of it don't just single yourself out and then as you go along help either along the way mmm beautifully put and then teamwork teamwork is so important if you are the boss and you have people telling them then what to do without them being part of it you're not going to accomplish anything a great example is when I was in the Navy I went right out of high school just an ordinary guy but in the Navy they teach ordinary guys like me and others how to work together as a team and achieve extraordinary results we do that in our businesses and I'm the last one here Eddie it's more of a question does money buy happiness money helps with happiness because you have to worry about not sleeping it helps but does it by total happiness absolutely not I know of some people that are very very well-off that aren't really happy or are ovary statistical with themselves they're only happy with some good happens to them not for others to be success and share this failure so what is happiness to you this is the final question what does happiness truly mean to jump all these happiness to me is how you feel waking the way with a happy face knowing what you do is the greatest good for the greatest number and that you're benefiting others on this planet while you're here a little bit like paying some rent for being on the planet Earth and being fortunate enough to have a good life for you and your family I love that I feel like you would be just as happy whether you were a billionaire or not you would be in this mindset would you agree yeah I've been pretty happy guy most of my life yeah my boss situation money helps a situation course it does but if I had a choice of being wealthy but not as happy as I am or as happy who I was when I wasn't wealthy or traded 19 happiness in my opinion in priorities in life our happiness first health second and wealth is next one happiness no those are two things that are the most precious thing she could have in your life well thank you so much for my pleasure sir your audience peace love and happiness absolutely get all cameras okay guys next time make sure to check out the link below we'll see you guys next time thank you for being one of the passionate if you guys enjoyed that video be sure to hit that subscribe button right now because every week eaten is a very best inputs on the government content interviews and insights help inspire you to take your life in your dreams and make them a reality and also if you don't know how to look between guests same way I have you can check the link below for my top three secrets so if you have a podcast or a show or whatever is you want to collaborate with them if you click that link below I'll give you those top three secrets to help you get in touch with anybody and also don't forget that the passionate view is available on media platforms as well so you can subscribe to the podcast and until next time thank you for being one of the passionate [Music] [Music] you

Channel: OMAR ELATTAR & THE PASSIONATE FEW

Views: 444,935

Rating: 4.9110479 out of 5

Keywords: billionaire interview, passionate few john paul, john paul dejoria interview, john paul dejoria documentary, john paul dejoria story, how i became a billionaire, john paul mitchell story, paul mitchell story, john paul dejoria paul mitchell, How To Be A Billionaire, john paul story, Omar Elattar, passionate few, jean paul dejoria, John Paul Dejoria, Paul Mitchell, Patron Tequila, Beauty School Founder, Billionaire, Entrepreneurship, good fortune, entrepreneur, Patron

Id: -ggEBOTAKr8

Length: 53min 54sec (3234 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 28 2019