10 Years of How I Built This: A Decade of Innovation, Risk and Reinvention
In this special 10th anniversary episode, host Guy Raz and Ring founder Jamie Siminoff reflect on a decade of interviewing over 600 entrepreneurs on How I Built This. They revisit defining clips and timeless lessons on founder fear, scrappy early marketing, surviving investor rejections, the physical and emotional toll of entrepreneurship, and the perpetual debate over luck versus skill in building iconic companies.
- Tom Campion built Zumiez on the belief that luck plays almost no role, arguing success comes entirely from measured discipline and relentless work ethic. Read →
- Banana Republic co-founder Mel Ziegler once veered into oncoming traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge after working three straight days without sleep to print a catalog. Read →
- Jim Koch left a secure consulting role at Boston Consulting Group to build Boston Beer Company after realizing his comfortable job was an existential hazard. Read →
- Getting on retail shelves is not the finish line; it is day zero. Sara Blakely paid childhood friends to buy Spanx off department store shelves to artificially create sell-through velocity. Read →