Cheddars news wrap from teenage Heartthrob to R. And B.
Singer to now businessman Ray J has shown us what it's like to continue
to garner success from your passions and he is back with his latest business venture
reckon a wireless audio brand that enables inspirational audio experiences.
Cheddar Shannon Lanier is joined by this entrepreneur, music superstar actor,
producer and tv personality himself, Shannon
that's right.
Ray J does, oh thank you for coming on news wrap, appreciate you being here,
brother man,
super excited now you gotta tell us you have decades in the entertainment industry.
So why did you decide to make the switch and
to become an entrepreneur and then why earbuds and headphones?
Well I felt like I've always ran a business and anything I've done been independent.
I've seen her saying one wish, I mean you know I own 100% of those masters.
Um we started out in independent um we were signed
to a major and um we just felt like with our
marketing we could do it with a small team and
it went from music to tv from tv to technology,
um different marketing templates but the marketing I felt was
our strongest key to having success in in multiple areas.
So um whether it was technology or television or entertainment,
we just tried to create these unique
Marketing templates that worked um in different places right,
there's different templates for different companies
and businesses and I felt like
we found our we you know we found our sweet spot.
Yeah, but in finding that sweet spot,
you had to go through some transitions and your vision
for Reagan has kind of changed throughout the years.
So talk to us about your vision for it and I want
to test you and give you a 32nd elevator pitch right now.
What Raycon represents today. Are you ready? Yeah, that's it.
Now that we're what go well we're a five year company. Um shout out to my ceo rarely.
Um We have an excellent CFO, daniel song.
Our mark, our CMO roman con is one of the best.
Um We, we have a unique team is very diverse.
Were over two million customers now in five years. We're scaling
rapidly and I think we're,
we separate ourselves from everybody else in the air
but business because we have the best prices,
the best colors, the best style, the best fit
for half the price, half the price, which is how much, 79 99.
So the competition is at 2 53 100. So if you lose one of the
2 53 100 like that. Yeah, that's got that, that's gotta hurt right?
But the 79 99 joints in different colors. They fit better.
So it's even hard to lose them. And speaking about money.
I mean is it true that you funded this by yourself?
How how did you get the money and the financing to start this company?
Well, we started with with with a small amount like you know, we had,
we had an opportunity to use a big massive amount of money,
but we started out very small.
Um shout out to Mr lee shout out to really
um and you know,
giving us the opportunity to to come into this
business because you know Ray lei the li family,
they knew inventory,
they knew they knew hardware um and
you take our strategy and our marketing templates
and you tie it in with a really killer CMO out of Hong kong,
give that to Daniel Song,
our CFO to make sure we're good with the financing
and as as the sales started to come in,
we just started to scale and scale and scale and we're 100% bootstrapped.
Um you know,
it's it's the team's money and we we felt like we
could just continue to to put it back in and continue
to believe in our own brand and and have long term
success and that's the most important thing is getting into anything
that you know is gonna be long term and you're gonna have a life,
a life with this product, you know, it's good to have a good team,
especially a team with some money in their pockets.
Yeah, I mean more so the skill so the skills,
because we make the money and then we put the money back and you have to
just know how to scale it and that just goes with having an all star team,
I do my part, but it would not be successful without the full squad.
That's a good busy structure to put it back and invest it back in the company.
It's dangerous,
it's dangerous at times any business business is risky and it has its challenges.
So what was the biggest challenge, A roadblock for you and creating this company?
Well, I think, you know, you have challenges every day, you know, with,
with just the hardware business and I think, you know when the pandemic hit,
we got a lot of orders and a lot of people were at home and they needed to,
they needed things for home.
Um, and then you have in inventory situations sometimes, but again,
when you have a good team, you have a good three pl service,
you have a good squad of people who can take the challenges
or the problems and then come up with a solution very fast.
I think that's what we have and I think we, we clean it up and we keep going.
You know, if we make some mistakes, we look at it,
we make some adjustments and then we go right back to it.
And that's why I think you stand as
a good example of a successful entrepreneur because
you're not afraid to make those mistakes and then if you do make a mistake,
you're good about cleaning it up or trying to set the record straight, right?
Yes, it's important. It's important that, you know when things are right,
you, you, you you represent right and when things are wrong,
you make sure you know that that's wrong here is the truth.
And then let's keep building on that. Let's build on the truth.
Let's build on the hard numbers the facts.
Um if there's anything that we need to upgrade in our products,
we listen to our our customers a lot with our customer service team and you know,
we just pride ourselves in making sure that the customers happy first.
Well you're making a lot of people happy with the
music and the beats that you're putting out there.
And there's the other thing that's making everybody happy.
There's a lot of energy and excitement around Disney's new Little
mermaid reboot for live action princess because she's a black princess.
But a lot of people don't realize.
The first black Disney princess happened about 25 years ago.
Would you like to tell them who that is, Brandy?
She was Cinderella and Brandy 25 years ago. Just open doors.
So we were able to have a mermaid that's black at this point.
What does that say and representation? Why does it matter?
Especially as a father of two young kids, a boy and a girl, It matters man,
it matters that you know we we we get our opportunities to shine and shine bright
and you know,
I think with Brandy kind of setting the tone
again to do it again with another classic movie,
you know and and give give you know, all of these talented young black, you know,
women and men like that, that
that opportunity and then they ace it and then it's beautiful and then it's great,
it just opens up so many more doors.
So you know, I'm happy,
Disney's continuing to do stuff like that and I
know they'll do a lot more in the future.
So, so speaking of future,
what's next for you both personally and business wise for the future?
Going live anytime soon? Listen, listen, the truth will set anybody free.
So I'm on a mission. I'm on a mission.
But again, I have a job, I work every day, I work hard, we got the new R. S. V. P.
Album coming straight off the versus battles right into doing a group together and
overcoming all the challenges as young men and from all different parts of life.
So yeah, R. S. V. P.
By recon dot com, I got a new one wish anniversary album coming,
I got the old school 60 wig, you know, going into the seventies,
I got a lot of people in the movie.
So meanwhile you're trying something new with the hair as well
this
year, I'm going platinum, this is fake tonight. I got to take it to silver right now.
It's a little all over the place,
but give me one more day and this thing will be silver.
Hopefully, okay, he's gonna get there,
we'll give you plenty more days to do what you gotta do with following your journey.
So thank you.
Thank you so much. Thank you Being on the show entrepreneur.
Music superstar actor, producer. He does it. I'm just a worker man.
I'm just a worker. I'm just trying to put the, put the numbers up. That's it.
Well, he's working hard and so is Hannah.
So back over to you, have a great interview, Shannon. Great job. Thanks to Ray J.