Agenda NYC has come and went. Some of the biggest and most well known lifestyle brands set up shop for two days at the Javits Center in Manhattan to network with other brands, retailers, and investors. And if you looked carefully enough, there were plenty of new faces. Agenda has come a long way from 2003 when its creator, Aaron Levant, started with 30 brands in a lot in California. Turntable Lab showed up to keep the music fresh while attendees checked out next season’s lines and the activations from brands like Brother Printers and Flexbit/BSCMP. In the midst of all of this, we stole some of Mr. Levant’s precious time to ask him some in depth questions about running the monster that is Agenda and his top 5 favorite Hip-Hop artists.
Throughout the interview, we had to stop a few times since Mr. Levant was so busy answering phone, texts, and letting VIP in without a hassle at the door. I only mention this to point out how busy the man was on the first day of Agenda NYC and his amazing ability to multi-task without a hitch. The young entrepreneur thinks, acts, and talks fast. And I can only assume, he’ll get faster and better at everything he does in the future.
So, Mr. Aaron Levant…
That’s me, unfortunately (laughs).
Why do you say unfortunately?
Oh, just you know. Today’s a busy day. It’d be nice to be a fly on the wall, an atendee, walking around, checking it out. Unfortunately, when people have problems, they call me.
Yeah, I was wondering about that. Obviously, half of Agenda is checking out new brands and next season’s lines but it’s also a lot of networking. I feel like you’d like to walk the floor a lot more than you are able to since you are kind of a celebrity now within your own creation.
Definitely not a celebrity by any means. But in this group, I know everyone here. If they have problems ranging from catching up to a problem with their booth, they’re expecting something different, they want your opinion on a new product line, they’re asking you to hook you up with a buyer or whatever. Everyone wants something. It’s an impossible numbers game for me to be interacting with every single person on the show floor. There’s a few hundred brands with a few people per brand… But it’s a good thing. No complaints on my side.
Agenda has taken off in the last 10 years where it started in the back of a Thai restaurant in Long Beach, California, and now it’s in the Javits Center in New York City. I get the vibe, immediately, that you’re the type to prefer personal relationships. How has that changed or become difficult over the years?
Definitely, to this day, this is our smaller show. We have one in California that’s like five times the size with almost 1,000 brands. I, still to this day, try to know at least one person from every single brand. I still personally review all the products that go into our show. I personally select every brand, if they’re in or they’re out. That’s my personal, sole decision.
I’ve intentionally positioned myself and my staff so I can take a lot of the operational and logistic jobs away from me so I can stay connected to the brands, to the culture, to the people because without that this whole thing would fall apart. I don’t want to diminish anyone else’s position in the company but there’s a lot of people who can right checks or fill in invoices but to have a good eye and relationships and be a people person is not everyone’s forte. I try to stay very connected to that side of the business as we grow so it doesn’t become a faceless corporation. That’s the difference between, say, Agenda and the Magic trade show. I don’t think anyone identifies anyone with the Magic show where people identify me with Agenda. I’ve been here for the last 13 years, delivering on my promises. They’re people, not just companies. A lot of them have come to my wedding, to their weddings.
That brings me to the next question. Do you see other trade shows like Magic as competition?
I don’t really see anyone as competition because I don’t see anyone doing exactly what we’re doing, in terms of the product mix, the way they approach the show, and my feeling of their authenticity level. Sure, trade shows are way more competitive than clothing brands. How many clothing brands are here? Thousands, right? Trade shows? There’s only like three. It’s like do or die. There’s two or three people in the ring and one comes out alive. That’s the mentality I take towards trade shows. Few people have come after us very aggressively and we’ve weathered the storm. I think we’re getting better at what we do. If I was the head of Magic, I’d be scared because I don’t think that they wake up everyday and want to grow and kill them (laughs), to be quite frank with you.
You speak about waking up and having this do or die mentality. What is the average day for Aaron Levant like?
I wake up everyday around 6. I checked the emails I missed during the night. I start responding to those. I check Instagram. I live about an hour away from my office. I get in the car 7/7:30. I drive for an hour/hour and a half. I use that time to call my office on the east coas and calling customers on the other side of the world. Once I get to the office, I answer more emails because by that time, everyone wants something from me. I get pretty amped up listening to a lot of music on the way to work.
And who are you listening to these days?
(pulls up iTunes on iPhone) Some Chief Keef. I just downloaded all of my old Wu-Tang albums again. I used to listen to a lot of Jay Z. I go from a lot of old stuff like AZ to the new Rick Ross album. I’m all over the place.
So back to your schedule. You’re at your office…
I get about 500 emails a day. I’m expected to answer at least 400 of them. Some people accuse me of being a micromanager so I definitely sit down with every single person in every department, whether it be graphics, which I’m heavily involved in, and the packaging and the imagery and the marketing. I spent a majority of my career pre-Agenda doing all the graphics for Agenda and graphics for t-shirt companies and designing marketing campaigns. I feel I could still jump in and do that myself so I’m very critical of the people who do that with me, as much as to their dismay. I’m breathing over their shoulders like, “Make that green. Move it over to the left.” They hate that. I find myself going desk to desk like, “What can I help you with?” I’m constantly striving to do more and be more aggressive. I want it more than everybody else.
You know the show Undercover Boss? I feel like you could never do it since everyone would know you.
I could never do that (laughs). Yeah, my company’s not big enough for people not to know me even if I had a big company… But overcommunicating is always better.
Let’s back up for a minute. How did you get your start in the clothing industry? I know that you went to some trade shows and figured out that the smaller brands deserved some love to.
I got kicked out of high school when I was 16 years old.
For what?
(laughs) I think the question is, “What didn’t I do?” Drinking, graffitti, everything you could possibly imagine I could do wrong. I did it all. I was a regular kid, maybe a little worse. Put my parents through hell. For a while they didn’t think I was going to amount to nothing. I fooled them in the end. I was really into graffitti and graphic design. I had a graffitti website. I tried to start my own t-shirt company. I failed. A friend of mine was interning at an L.A. OG streetwear brand called Gat. They needed some interns to come set up a tent at a trade show. I went and the first ones I went to were the Magic show and the ASR show. I had never been to a trade show.
My eyes were wide open. It was all my favorite graffitti writers working for the companies doing graphic design, all these famous skaters and rappers and everything you could imagine–the heigh of Fubu and all these brands. Hip-Hop was coming into the clothing industry hard. I was blown away by that and the guy said, “You did a good job. You wanna come work at the office?” I said, “Alright, cool.” I showed up on a Monday and he said I could come Monday, Wednesday, Friday from 9-noon. I showed up that Monday and came every single day for the next five years and didn’t get paid. I interned and took the bus everyday and learned what I could like a sponge. I started interning then graphic designing then marketing and worked every job from b*tchwork all the way to when I left, being a partner at the company. During that time, I was doing to a lot of trade shows and saw that they kind of sucked. I thought I could make it better for me and my friends, the upcoming brands. I have those moments where most people think about that sh*t and I just jump in the water, for better or worse. I’ve failed a lot, also.
Have you ever considered starting up a clothing brand again?
I don’t necessarily want to start my own brand. I like supporting other people’s brands. Someone put it to me really well last week. It’s the first time I heard this analogy. I had a brand in my office and this guy said I’m like Levi Strauss. I didn’t know much about Levi Strauss and he enlightened me on the history. All these guys are panning for gold and he’s sitting there selling them picks and axes and tools. Some would get rich but most guys would go home broke. I’m providing the tools to do it rather than mining the gold myself.
I’ve read in a profile piece on you that what’s kept you so ahead of the game is that you’re so good at spotting trends. Can you be specific at how and what that means to you?
Trends… in everything. In the way we market ourselves, we’re up to date. Instagram is hot right now. All the other trade shows just got on Instagram but our Instagram following is bigger than all of them combined. Some of these shows are way bigger than us. And what brands are coming in hot because I’m in touch with the market. I’m in the stores. I’m online. I’m able to find these brands six months before other people are finding it. And there are trends within the market. Right now, there’s an outdoor influence coming into the skate and streetwear where everyone wants to collaborate with tents and sleeping bags. It’s glamping–glamorous camping. We were on that six months before anyone else was.
It’s about having your ear to the ground. We’re not sitting in our office, waiting for people to email us. I’m constantly calling people who aren’t ready to do the show… do you know what an Instabrand is? It’s a brand built off Instagram. He’s got a Shopify account, a copy of Illustrator, and good ideas. He doesn’t have money or backing. I’m finding cool Instabrands, convincing them to come to Agenda. They’re like, “I can’t afford Agenda.” You don’t know how much Agenda is. I force them to come out and make some kind of deal with them–encouraging young entrepreneurs, sometimes twisting their arms.
In New York, I’ll spend four days here after the show. I’m gonna walk around every shopping neighborhood, going to every store, find every little t-shirt label, and I’m going to take a picture, write it down, and hit them up afterwards. Sometimes I don’t always twist their arms like I said but I build a relationship with them. There are 50 little brands out there that I’m having ongoing conversations with, like, “Hey, let’s talk and have lunch.”
There’s a cool little brand in L.A. that could be the next Odd Future type thing. The kid is 19 years old and he’s making hundreds of thousands of dollars selling his stuff on eBay. He never wants to wholesale his stuff and Agenda is all about wholesale. One day he will. It’s about being in touch with those people early and recognizing. So when they’re ready, they know who to call instead of some fake bullsh*t.
It’s like you have that mentality of a Young Diddy but you’re already an established label like Bad Boy in its heyday.
(laughs) You have to be. If you get complacent, you get nowhere. If you wait till you’re ready… no one’s ever ready. I used to have a partner in this business and I was like, “Let’s go to New York. Let’s go to New York.” He always came up with reasons why we shouldn’t go to New York. One day I said, “F*ck you. We’re going.” We went and it was the best thing we ever did.
You must get thousands of applications to get floor space at Agenda. What’s your criteria for picking brands that get the coveted booth?
We get hundreds of submissions all the time. We turn down hundreds of brands a year. The number one thing I’m looking for is authenticity, originality, good taste, and good people behind the brand. You could have all those first three things, if you’re a sh*tty person, I probaly don’t want to work with you. I always look at the aesthetic side–it’s clothing–like if you’re ripping somebody off, I don’t want to see that. At the peak of Ed Hardy, Christian Audigier, which is obviously huge, but to me it was just corny. I said, “No.” And they’re like, “What do you mean?” They could not believe it.
In an interview, you said you have to be ready to hear, “No,” a lot. Does one particular “no” stand out to you?
Never any that stuck out because everyone told me, “No,” in the beginning. I had a brand here who told me, “No,” for 10 years in a row. I called them 10 times a year for a decade. The 11th year, they said, “Yes.” My best advice for entrepreneurs is that. How you react after you hear, “No,” is really going to define the success or failure of your business. Most people would not call anyone for 10 years. That’s a lost sale. To me, nothing is a lost sale. On a long enough timeline, I’m going to win.
Let’s say a brand gets a booth for a couple years running at Agenda. What’s the next step for that brand?
It depends on what their goal is. Some people want to cash out and some don’t want to be the biggest brand and sell out. Some want to create a livelihood and never “jump the shark.” Some are looking for investors, bankers, venture capitalists, factories. Daymond John was here earlier. He’s looking for stuff. Mini version of Shark Tank going on here.
Do you plan on starting something that’s more business oriented for brands under Agenda?
Not for the brands already here. They kinda know what they’re doing. There’s a whole layer of brands like Instabrands, so we’ve started something called Agneda Emerge, which is our educational conference. That’s for the younger kids to learn firsthand from the most successful people in the industry. It’s two parts with Agenda Emerge which is like TED conferences. We had Tinker Hatfield from Nike, Marc Ecko, Bobby Hundreds, Shephard Fairey. We also had a daytime thing for the first time. Pepsi has this Cobalt thing as an educational platform. We had a day time class with 700 kids and lessons from Jeff Staple and Shopify. We’re teaching a miniature college for free. We’re trying to harvest the next generation of entrepreneurs, retailers, media. Educational and inspirational are big things of what Agenda will be doing, moving forward.
What are some of the brands to look out for in 2015 or the future?
Depends on what category you’re looking at. Up and coming street brand, CLSC, or pronounced Classic, is one. They’re blowing up. Born and Raised is blowing up. There’s also guys like 10 Deep that’s been established for 20 years but they never “jumped the shark.” There’s an episode of Happy Days where Fonzie jumps a shark tank and they use it as a moment where the show went downhill. When a brand jumps the shark, they went too far and lost everything they’re about. So 10 Deep never had that moment where everyone is wearing their sh*t and it became cliche to wear it. That’s definitely happened with brands. Native Shoes, Herschel bags, Stance socks. These are a lot of guys who are category focused. There are brands doing a niche product and putting everything into that. Just to say that you’re a clothing line isn’t that unique anymore. Everone’s got a clothing brand.
Yeah, a lot of rappers have their own clothing brands now…
Every rapper has a clothing brand and to be honest, a lot of them suck. We got a lot of them here, too, that are good. It just depends. There are some who I’ve straight banned.
Before I let you go, I have to get your top 5 rappers.
This might be kinda weird. It’s definitely Ghostface is in there. Shyheim from Wu-Tang. He’s lesser known. Jay Z is in my top five. Tupac. I’m probably gonna say RZA. I’m a big Bobby Digital fan. That’s an obscure list. There’s a lot of stuff that I love but I have to pick what I fall back on, like if I go back to Supreme Clientele from Ghostface. I kinda f*cked up for leaving Raekwon out because Only Built 4 Cuban Linx is the best Hip-Hop album. I can only pick one of them.
Bryan Hahn will never jump the shark. He’s on Twitter (@notupstate).
