10am: Parade

12pm: BBQ

2pm: Pool

3:45pm: Watch Put it in Reverse Terry 14 times

5pm: Michael Rubin’s All White Party

Oh you mean you weren’t one of the 350 people invited to Michael Rubin’s 4th of July White Party at his $50 million Hamptons estate?

Perfect, neither were we! We did do all of the other things on that schedule though. 

With hundreds of the most well-known names in Hollywood on the guest list, it’s kind of ironic that Michael Rubin, the host, is the name that drew a total blank???

Who is he?!

Michael Rubin is the founder and CEO of Fanatics,  a global sports platform that sells licensed sports merchandise, trading cards and collectibles, among other sports-related services. 

Fanatics is projected to be worth about $41 billion.

I bet the appetizers at this party were so good. 

Knowing that would’ve been enough to close the loop for me, but I’m glad I kept reading. 

A good old fashioned Google wormhole would make it known that Rubin has been an entrepreneur since he was 8 years old. 

First, by selling vegetable seeds door-to-door and then, by founding a ski-tuning shop in his parents' basement when he was 12: Mike's Ski & Sport. 

A business at 12 is impressive, but a moment of silence for door to door sales at age 8. Like if there IS a guaranteed path to entrepreneurial success it would almost have to start with that, right???

I imagine there were a few things he still needed to learn as a pre-teen (like everything), so Mike’s Ski & Sport would call it quits after 4 years in business. 

From there, Rubin moved into reselling liquidated merchandise to retailers, which helped cover debts and honed his deal-making skills. 

Reminder: Every single thing you do is preparing you for the next thing. 

Michael’s parents were just like most of ours and certain that his “business obsession” was ruining his life, so his father made him promise to go to college.

You know they just imagined him without dental insurance and it broke their hearts.

He early-enrolled in Villanova University, but he didn’t last a single semester.

Another successful dropout but who’s counting? 

Michael had noticed that may of the clients he was reselling for, were having trouble expanding into e-commerce. 

So, he developed a business to solve it for them. His system would manage online purchases, payments, fulfillment and returns.

He sold that company in 2011 to a little startup called eBay for $2.4 billion. 

I hope he can afford self-pay teeth cleanings. 

Rubin’s story is inspiring, but aside from him running an entire business at the same age I was failing the flexibility test in 6th grade gym, he’s not much different than every other successful entrepreneur. 

He saw a problem. Created a solution. And he sold it. The money that he made is data for all of the people whose lives he made easier.

Identify a problem. Create a solution. Sell it. 

Xo, The Salesgirls 

PS. If you’ve done the first two (identified a problem and created a solution), but need to Phone-A-Friend on the selling part - we got you. The next Sell Your Offer Challenge beings July 15 and is the perfect place to start. 

If we did need an all-white inspired look, these would be coming home with us…

Michael, if you’re seeing this, we are ready for next year. All ‘fits are linked for the girls.