And you're looking longterm now.
What's the hardest thing about thinking longterm
as a publicly traded company?
This is where our partnership comes from.
You'd ask and say,
"Do we have a big idea
of the vision of what the company would look like or not?"
I wanted to sell a shirt today
and I wanted to sell as many as I could at the time.
So that ability to actually have a partner come in
who helps us think better about what is not only the three
but what's the five, frankly, what's the 10-year plan
for this brand, too?
I wanna run down the hill as fast as I can
and that's sort of been the defining of the company
and that's where now having a partner
that helps us think about,
"All right, which way are we gonna go?
Are we going to the left or the right of that tree?
Which way — because we're not going through it
so we have to be thoughtful."
That's real.
We've never been afraid to go through that tree
when we had to in the past.
Is there anything that investors or analysts say
that you feel like they really misunderstand?
Is there one thing that really gets to you?
I think this is a company, that is all in the come.
I think that's where — what people don't understand
is when you look to the transformation we've been through.
This is strong entrepreneurial upstart company
built and driven by a lot of momentum
and then it was,
"All right, how are you shifting into actually being
a large-scale format company?"
And so what comes with that, the last few years,
a lot of people have had opinions about
what does it mean to make that transformation.
Still, if I look back at this chapter, '17, '18, '19,
we'll have grown this company more than
half a billion dollars over that time,
implemented new go-to-market strategy,
implemented a new global operating model,
a North American company
that's selling product other places,
upgraded our systems,
really retooled our entire management team and said,
"Who's here and who's ready,"
brought in our president and chief operating officer,
just watching all that synergy come together.
For me it's been great but it is human.
So those are the things that come out and say,
"Yeah, I don't know if it'll always look smooth on the top,"
but it means that we're moving forward.
And I think from my perspective,
being still the new boy on the block
or not a rookie anymore, I've past that stage, I think,
but thinking about the fact that this is now
the third largest athletic brand in the world,
having done that, having grown that fast
underneath of two really large brands,
that's incredible.
They were never able to do that.
We've been able to do that
so now that we've got our stuff together,
now that our innovation pipeline is stacked,
now that we're going from defense to offense,
now that we're gonna become a louder brand,
I'd bet on us.
- Every day.
And tell me about your partnership.
What's the strongest and hardest part
about working together?
The strongest and hardest part —
It's human.
Having been here for two years now
I think we know each other really well.
I have incredible respect for what Kevin has created here
and the fact that he's entrusting me to help him
get to the next level with this amazing brand
that we both want to be eternal.
It is a partnership.
It's like a marriage in some ways.
You gotta respect each other.
You gotta understand what drives each other,
what both the strengths are from both sides
and I think what's really unique about our brand,
our company, our future, is the fact that you've got
the yin and yang here to some extent
in terms of Kevin's enormous entrepreneurial drive,
understanding of brand, understanding of the merchandising
capability of a big brand,
with some of the stuff that I've done in my past,
which is also driving big brands, understanding brand,
but also having the operational experience
to be able to really help us get to the next stage.
Yeah, that yin and yang has been critical
but we work at it.
We make sure we sit down and we'll see each other
throughout the day
but we'll have sit-downs at least twice a week.
We'll do a blowout session of two, three, four hours
once a month and just make sure that communication
over communication because it is,
it's meeting where you find the strength and diversity
that comes together.
We like a lot of things but we can mix it up, too.
This is, it's strength.
You've gotta be able to do that and then walk out of it
and be a lion at the end of the day.
Never go to bed angry.
Nope, never.
- Every day.
- I'd like to talk about Baltimore.
Why did you pick Baltimore and what are you doing there?
- The company started in Georgetown in Washington, D.C.
It's where I grew up.
I went to the University of Maryland.
There was something about it.
It wasn't as strategic as you'd think.
I started the company, I had $17,000 in cash
so I could afford the rent, number one,
but really, there was something that drew me to the city.
There was something that pulled me from D.C.
and actually moved me to Baltimore which was
sort of that blue collar grit that is Baltimore,
that lunch pail work-boot mentality.
That's something that really helped build
and shape the culture and the identity of our brand
so we're 20 years into that city now
and so when you dig into something,
I'm a big believer of sticking a flag in the ground.
This isn't something of being in the city that was
a negotiation of the state of municipalities.
This is the right thing to do
and especially for a consumer-facing brand.
The consumer wants to see,
"What do you stand for?
What are your values?"
We have eight very clear ones that go from everything from
loving athletes to standing for equality
to celebrating the wins and so,
we're a brand that wants to be a fun brand
and we recognized a long time ago that the energy,
the DNA that's Under Armour is something that
can really help the city of Baltimore.
The world doesn't need another company in
L.A., San Francisco or New York City.
It is the Cincinnatis, it's the Detroits,
it's the Pittsburghs, it's the Baltimores.
So we're really proud of what our roots mean there
and we think we can make a real difference in the city
and we're doing that through so many good things,
interacting with the city.
That's when you ask,
"What do people wanna know about us?"
I wish that people would understand the 80,000
volunteer hours that our teammates have put into
all of our offices all over the world but again,
primarily in Baltimore, which is our largest hub.
There's a lot of great that this company does
and we love our hometown.
We feel that hug back from them, too.
So we're proud of it.
- Yeah, it's great.
- And what sorts of innovations are you working on
at your Baltimore facility?
- We can't tell you that.
- Oh come on.
(laughing)
- We just told you we're building suits to go to the moon.
(laughing)
- Yeah, yeah.
Baltimore, we're more focused around apparel in Baltimore.
One of the things that's really great for the company
is we opened our new footwear innovation facility in Oregon
about a year and a half ago
so we now have two hubs where we innovate.
There's some exciting stuff going on
in what we call our lighthouse right now
in Baltimore that will make people better.
Same thing's going on in Portland, Oregon.
- It's footwear solutions, it's apparel solutions,
it's sweat solutions, it's looking great solutions.
All those things, if you knew the level of expertise
we've been able to develop over the last 25 years
of this brand is pretty extraordinary.
- And even if it wasn't strategic necessarily
to start in Baltimore, it seems like you feel
a responsibility now to contribute to Baltimore.
Are you working on another real estate project as well
in Baltimore?
I can't remember
one of the things that you were doing there.
- We've got an anchor in Baltimore
called Port Covington.
- That's what it was.
- It's a great development where we were able to...
I was able to personally assemble a lot of real estate,
attract Goldman Sachs to come put $250 million
into Baltimore and also you have things which is
this juggernaut of growth which is Under Armour saying,
"It'd be a shame to waste all this upside growth,
attracting this tax base that can come into our city."
That idea for a better Baltimore,
because of what happens on the private side.
That's where as a company, as a public company,
always being very mindful of that
but knowing that we can do a lot of good
and we like to say when we do well, we can do good.
Imagine that Baltimore or Under Armour claiming that
it is a Baltimore company.
There's a lot of good that can develop around it,
not only our teammates, our own employees that we have
at UA but also it's the contractors, it's people visiting,
it's the hotels, it's all those things that come in
to really building a better city.
That, I think, there's nothing more American than that.
There's nothing, frankly, that makes me prouder than
our ability to help elevate our city as we grow this brand.
- Great.
- True.
- Thank you for saving me with that.
I just was like,
"If we're gonna go to Baltimore,
we're gonna wanna go to that place and talk about that,"
and I was like,
"I have to get it,"
so I appreciate it and they can clean it up
so that I don't look so stupid but you guys are perfect.