How Build-A-Bear’s CEO engineered a multi-million dollar turnaround

Fortune

Sharon Price John has led Build-A-Bear to new heights—and her journey to the C-suite started serving people burgers at a Fortune 500 fast-food chain.

Transcript

00:00There's a lesson in there about how beneficial it is sometimes to not know your odds.

00:06When you don't know that your odds are ridiculously impossible, you believe in the possibility

00:11and with that very belief, you actually tip your odds in your own favor.

00:16Sometimes you have to look at the facts of the matter, but don't let facts overtake your

00:23dream.

00:24Somebody out there is going to get it done.

00:26Why not you?

00:27Hello, I'm Sharon Price-John, the president and CEO of Build-A-Bear Workshop, and this

00:33is my secret to success.

00:35I grew up in a small town in Tennessee, south of Nashville, about 7,000 people.

00:41My dad worked for South Central Bell, AT&T, and then he eventually worked for NASA.

00:46He was in communications there at NASA, and my mom was a church secretary.

00:51I worked at McDonald's.

00:53I worked at a florist in my hometown.

00:56In college, I had some summer jobs as well as waitressing and random jobs like you do

01:03in a small town.

01:05I went to undergrad at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Tennessee.

01:08My first professional job was in a big furniture store as the head of marketing and merchandising.

01:13I was reporting to the president of this company, and it was a fascinating experience, so that

01:19was really fun.

01:21I then went to an ad agency in Knoxville after that.

01:25At the University of Tennessee, the ad club had already been to New York during my senior

01:30year.

01:31I visited some of the top 10 agencies, and I definitely wanted to go back.

01:36I put together a crazy plan that I was going to use my one-week vacation, fly to Manhattan,

01:45set up all of these interviews.

01:47I had this vision that I could get a job at a top 10 ad agency in one week.

01:53This was my goal.

01:54I set up 15 interviews, three per day in Manhattan.

01:59I thought that should be fine.

02:01I ended up with a 16th interview on that Friday, and they said, well, we love you, you know,

02:10we think this is great.

02:11We'd like you to join our training program.

02:13We'll get back to you.

02:14And I'm like, why can't we just, why can't you just offer me the job right now?

02:19And she literally offered me the job right at that moment.

02:22And I got my job in a top 10 New York advertising agent, global agency in one week.

02:28So from the New York ad agency, I ended up working at another major agency where a gentleman

02:35on the client side, he recommended that I get my MBA.

02:38And he talked me into applying to Columbia, and it took a lot for me to convince myself

02:45that was a possible dream.

02:46I got in on the last round, and off I go to Columbia for my master's in business.

02:54I didn't want to do what most MBAs from Columbia do, which is venture capitalism or private

02:59equity or investment banking or management consulting.

03:02So I sought out brands and businesses that were really inspiring and special to me.

03:08And so I initiated the interview and the opportunity with five different companies, one of which

03:15was Mattel, mostly because I loved Barbie.

03:18I did get the job at Mattel, but not without a few tries.

03:22I ran Barbie fashions, which was awesome.

03:24Mattel was a fabulous experience.

03:26Learned so much about brand, brand management, brand building, the toy industry.

03:33I also had gotten married in the meantime and was about to have my first child.

03:37And so I left Mattel and my husband and I moved to Chicago, and then went to work at VTech

03:43Toys.

03:44Then I ended up starting my own entrepreneurial company by buying another fashion doll.

03:49It was the number one selling fashion doll of the 1970s.

03:52My next large company was Hasbro.

03:55From Hasbro, I went to Strideright Children's Group.

03:58I was recruited there to be the president of the division to turn around the retail business.

04:04It's a children's footwear company, and I had not had any experience doing that, but

04:09we turned that around, returned the company to profitability on both the wholesale and the

04:13retail side.

04:14That, in so many ways, made me a pretty viable candidate for the CEO of Build-A-Bear because

04:21the founder, Maxine Clark, was ready to retire.

04:23At that point, I understood the toy industry, the sourcing industry, everything along those

04:29lines.

04:30It was a difficult turnaround.

04:31It was financially struggling.

04:33The company had lost $49 million the year before I got there.

04:37They had been working very hard to return the company to profitability after eight years

04:42of contraction by getting back to what they had done when they were so successful.

04:48But the world had changed in 2008, 2009, 2010, leading up to me coming in in 2013.

04:56And there really wasn't a going back.

04:58And I think that when I got there, there was also a lot of fear that I would somehow, sort

05:02of theoretically, rip the heart out of a company that was full of so much heart to returns of

05:08success.

05:09And so this was an interesting type of turnaround where I had to be extremely respectful, as

05:16well I should be of what had been accomplished and assure the organization that I believed that

05:23we could be successful while keeping the heart and the culture of Build-A-Bear.

05:27And we laid out a strategy that was about monetizing the extraordinary equity that was in this brand.

05:34The company literally had built something that started as a vertical retailer in malls for

05:40kids that almost didn't realize what a powerful, emotional, memorable experience, particularly

05:49that heart ceremony was.

05:51And that all of that equity was still just packed in this brand.

05:54And I wanted to pivot the organization and start with the return to profitability before

06:00we started growing the revenue line, which took multiple areas and bringing in new leadership,

06:08new organizational structure, a new IT infrastructure across the organization to be able to do this.

06:16We popped out with a great team and a great strategy, not just thriving, but surviving.

06:22And we're now, I've had three years of record setting results.

06:26I think that I am most proud of the fact that the heart of Build-A-Bear still beats and that

06:32we have both believed and proven that you can be a company that adds a little more heart

06:39to life and be successful.

06:41And I think that the associates at Build-A-Bear were as surprised, maybe the

06:46investment community.

06:48But there was a lot of, you can't be an e-commerce company because you're an experiential retailer.

06:55You can't, you'll never be able to appeal to an older consumer.

07:02You know, this is a fad that, you know, Build-A-Bear is not, there's no place for Build-A-Bear

07:07in today's world.

07:09Malls are dying.

07:11It's just pretty remarkable how many hurdles can get thrown in your way and you have to

07:18hold fast to your vision and get a team that believes and kind of plowing through that with

07:28good results is very satisfying.

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