The Celebrity Brand Revolution: Bilal Mekkaoui’s OuiCollab Global Expansion

Anthony Codispoti : Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes and be inspired by how they’ve overcome adversity. My name is Anthony Codispoti and today’s guest is Bilal Mekkaoui, co-founder and managing partner at OuiCollab, a celebrity-backed brand venture studio that pairs the right stars with the consumer categories we are excited about. With over 24 years of experience in the tech and consumer space, Bilal has a passion for creating and scaling innovative and impactful businesses that leverage the power and influence of celebrities and influencers. They have a vision to create a plug-and-play platform to efficiently launch and support a broad portfolio of celebrity brands.

They identify and source celebrities in their network who have a hunger and a fit to launch a brand and they match with high priority consumer categories that match their profile. Now before we get into all that good stuff, today’s episode is brought to you by my company, Add Back Benefits Agency, where we offer very specific and unique employee benefits that are both great for your team and fiscally optimized for your bottom line. One recent client was able to add over $900 per employee per year in extra cash flow by implementing one of our innovative programs. Results vary for each company and some organizations may not be eligible.

To find out if your company qualifies, contact us today at addbackbenefits.com. All right, back to our guest today, the founder of Ouicollab, Bilal Mekkaoui. I appreciate you making the time to share your story today. Thank you for having me.

Thanks, Anthony. We’re going to get into in a moment how this is kind of a good timing for this interview because you’re kind of launching a rebrand. But before we get there, I want to talk a little bit about your background first. What initially sparked your interest in entrepreneurship and technology, Bilal?

Bilal Mekkaoui : It’s a good question. I mean, I think along the way, you get into doing certain things. You graduate, you kind of look at your ideal kind of job of what you want to get into.

And that was investment banking at the time. And you kind of go through the whole process while you’re working for other firms and figure out what do you really want to do yourself? And do you want to be that entrepreneur? Or do you want to continue within the field of what you got into and spent kind of, I did 12 years of investment banking.

I still have friends who are still in the same bank that we started out in late 99, 2000. And there are others who’ve kind of spun off and did other things. So I think kind of what led me to my interest in entrepreneurship, I think is just kind of working with different entrepreneurs. So I wasn’t, hey, I graduated and became an entrepreneur. It’s more kind of going through the cycle of different times through your career, which led you eventually to where you are today.

And you look back and you say, hey, it all made sense now. Technology, again, I was very interested in tech. I started off my career doing investment banking focused on tech. So kind of my whole career progression has always had a tech kind of component and focus has just been in different kind of industries, but still tech focused, if that makes sense.

Sure. My calling wasn’t always, hey, I was born to be an entrepreneur. It was like, hey, let me get into investment banking. I really want to learn this and be an investment banker and then kind of did that and that kind of led what’s the next step.

Anthony Codispoti : And one of those steps along the way was at a company called Rocket Internet. You worked there for a few years starting in 2012. So I understand that they incubate and develop internet-based businesses. Did that stop there sort of, you know, as managing director kind of push your interest in entrepreneurship?

Bilal Mekkaoui : Yeah, I mean, Rocket, that’s a great question, Anthony, because Rocket was a propeller in terms of, hey, I did investment banking for 12 years and I worked within different parts of the investment bank, right? But Rocket was a very interesting company as well. And having joined that was also a milestone and kind of opened my eyes into Rocket at some point had 50 companies within its portfolio that it incubated.

So it was great to end up working with all these different founders and kind of look at how these different founders built their companies. But to kind of be very clear, Rocket was original incubator. It was Rocket’s idea. It came up with an idea.

It kind of put all the key components and launched these businesses. Again, Rocket, funnily enough, was dubbed as the Robin Hood of the Internet when I had first joined. What that meant was the founders of Rocket were three German brothers called the Samur Brothers. They took companies that were successful in the US and just replicated them all over the world except for the US and China. So again, it’s not that they came up with the original idea as well. They took a company that did very well in the US and said, hey, this company is not present in Europe.

It’s not present in Germany or it’s not in Brazil. Why don’t we replicate the model and create that company in these different countries with the hope eventually that the company that became very big in the US to come and acquire them. But then the model changed with time where through time, and I think that’s even another session just to talk about Rocket. But the idea is this company, I had joined in 2012 and we raised 3 billion of private capital between 2012 and 2014. We IPO’d Rocket for 6.7 billion IPO. We IPO’d another Rocket portfolio company which was called Zalando within the same week at around 7.2 billion and then various other entities from Rocket such as HelloFresh which you know in the US. So HelloFresh was one of the only businesses that they created in Europe and then they took it over to the US. That IPO of that business was around 12 billion.

So yeah, I’m digressing away but the interesting part of Rocket is I was exposed to so much in a very short period of time and you kind of saw a whole change in terms of the whole landscape in terms of how things were being done.

Anthony Codispoti : Does that model still work today? This idea of let’s look at something that’s been real successful and sort of a startup capital of the world if you will in the US and let’s replicate other places with the goal of sort of that start that founding company in the US wanting to acquire them.

Bilal Mekkaoui : Yeah, I think that still exists today meaning there’s still companies that set up in the US and they obviously just focus on the US market at the beginning because it is one of the biggest markets right like in terms of a 350 million population one taxation one consume depending what you’re launching. So there are other countries that look to the US and say okay wow this is done well this is a great idea for me to learn whether it’s in Africa or Southeast Asia and they you know end up doing that. Now that’s not to say in these individual companies people come up with their own ideas that probably are not there in the US but just in general you still have that but the difference is before you had one incubator or one venture that actually created so many of these and became such a huge beast which I don’t think there are that type of businesses today if that makes sense.

Anthony Codispoti : It does. Okay so when did the sort of flicker of an idea to start your own fund come about?

Bilal Mekkaoui : It came about listen I did investment banking 12 years moved to Rocket was there between 2012 and 2015 and did so much in the space of three years that then we IPOed that business. I ended up joining another big tech business called Delivery Hero and the idea of joining there was also something else which was great in terms of you know I was part of a firm which was Rocket that had 50 companies in the portfolio and you had exposure to so many different things and then I moved to work on one company which was a marketplace food delivery business similar to Grubhub and Seamless in the US but they were based out of Berlin but what’s interesting is they were operational in 65 different countries almost under different brand names so it was great to work within one company and then kind of get the other side right like you’re not dealing with 50 different companies you’re dealing with one product one type so and then we also you know my role was there to get the company ready for an IPO which is IPO for 4.7 billion in 2017 and the idea there came up like hey I’ve been doing this now for the last let’s say you know 15 16 years at working at other institutions and getting all that experience now is the time to do my own thing and it came about with meeting my then co-founder and kind of hey our skill sets complement each other and how about we do this and we went after creating an early stage consumer retail tech firm which was based out of New York and then the idea again is it’s kind of more having ownership that this is your own baby that you’re creating and after that came the incubator which was a celebrity led incubator a talent incubator which again was a progression of what we had just done within the tech fund to take this to the next level.

Anthony Codispoti : Okay before we dive more into that tell me what was the name of the company that you were focused on a single product to taking to IPO? It’s called Delivery Hero. Delivery Hero. Okay and so I’m curious as you made that transition from Rocket to Delivery Hero was there a sense of relief that now hey I can focus on a single product or was there more a sense of like a little bit of boredom like oh man I love being involved in so many different things and now it’s just a single thing.

Bilal Mekkaoui : It’s a very good question. I got introduced to Delivery Hero through one of the main investors in Rocket who was an investor in Delivery Hero and kind of saw what I did with Rocket and thought it would be great for me to add that value add Delivery Hero and end up introducing me to the founder of Delivery Hero and we ended up kind of agreeing and I moved. It was great at the beginning to say hey now rather than you know having your hands into a big pot with so many different kind of offerings and different teams and it’s like wow now I’m part of one team and then but you’re right I think a year and a half in I was like okay I think it’s great to learn this but this is a bit boring in terms of you’re just focusing on one now and I think it’s different if you had created this your baby yourself which I later got to do which it’s your baby it’s your ownership as opposed to I came and joined the firm and now I’m really just focusing on one company but yes at the beginning it was very exciting you’re learning something new and then kind of that wears off like many things the novelty wears off and it’s you may you have to make that decision is this right for me or is it time to do something else and again I was at that opportunity that the company was doing very well it was about to IPO and a huge IPO I had two huge IPOs under my belt it’s like now is the time to kind of move on and create your own baby per se

Anthony Codispoti : and so you go off to create your own baby we are Joby right or Joby capital and then

Bilal Mekkaoui : it’s it was Joby capital which was a consumer retail tech fund invest in pre series a consumer retail tech businesses and and that kind of moved into hey because you are not like I’ve looked at the tech businesses and then you’re investing again in other people’s businesses correct so we raised quite a lot of money and part of that money we invested in early stage businesses so it wasn’t businesses that were you know it was businesses that were making a couple of million in revenue but the projection is that these grow and it felt again you’re part of something where we sat on the board and really helped these companies to the next level but again you didn’t create it you weren’t part of the initiation you came added value with obviously your background in terms of what you’ve learned and the money that you’re giving to take them to the next level which was interesting uh it was interesting it was fun and that came also with a lot of headache because you ended up investing in businesses like within the VC space right you invest in a lot of companies and you’d hope if you do very well and some are not but also for someone who just started his first VC fund you wanted all of them to do well and and you felt like you know we weren’t doing a hundred companies we invested in six to eight at the beginning and again they felt like these are going to define your career these six and eight but then your definition of defining your career is is based on someone else executing their vision rather than your vision so then you learn something else like hey this is great but maybe i don’t want to be that person where i’m relying on all of these people and all i’m doing is giving capital and my advice every three months or whenever they needed it is i want to have a much more hands-on approach or i want to create things and that’s kind of i think what led to the next next thing

Anthony Codispoti : the next thing is kind of what you were referring to as the accelerator

Bilal Mekkaoui : so yeah the next thing was the venture studio so that again came about so everything if you look back everything happened for a reason like the progression in terms of investment banking to rocket rocket to delivery hero delivery hero joby capital part of joby capital because we were an early stage consumer retail tech fund we started getting approached by celebrity led businesses i would say in the us right either they were raising money or or they wanted you know some something and that’s really when we first looked at it like wow these type of businesses you know there’s some businesses what we had seen where you know one was going through a down round of 800 million it was the onus company it was jessica alba’s company which is a great company you know that started off in 2013 and when we looked at it in 2018 it’s in this space of five years this business was worth 800 million right and again there are a lot of businesses to get to that value you’re around for like 15 20 years right like kind of building that was one and then there was a few others that we had looked at or landed on our desk hey like hey are you interested to invest on this or this is on the market and again they were one was raising 100 million like a 650 valuation and you’re like again this company was set up in 2015 and you’re like oh wow like it was too late to invest in these businesses because even if you gave them 10 million and again i’m going back to the investment thing where i’m sitting and deploying money from the fund there is no strategic input you’d be lucky if they picked up the phone to call you back it’s like they’re doing you the favor to let you in at that number with the number you’re putting right so i think the idea post that was like hey i want to see if this is a space i want to get into and it made total sense it made total sense in terms of you’re minimizing marketing costs to establish a brand in a very short period of time hence the celebrities following or talents following is what you’re using to establish a brand right what in other instances because of the tech fund we invested in all these businesses they had spent so much money acquiring customers to get to a certain point is that you realize wow this is a no-brainer if you can minimize that in a very short period of time and also get exposure because there’s a celebrity name and what i mean by that the celebrity name is in because they are in the front cover of people magazine and and what have you they’re on jimmy kimmel they’re on ellen they’re on all of these different things promoting their other stuff this makes a lot of sense and that’s but before making that leap the decision was hey can i actually really add value like with my what i’ve learned

Anthony Codispoti : with what i’ve done you want to test out the idea

Bilal Mekkaoui : you want to test it out so we invested in a celebrity led business that came to us that was seeking investment it was very early on this was early 2019 what’s the business it was called in bloom by kate hudson okay so kate hudson is a very interesting person in terms of has created a company called fabletics it’s in the health and wellness space fabletics is equivalent to lulu lemon that launched by kate hudson it’s a company that i think now does 900 million in revenue it’s also present here in london it’s present in the us but what’s interesting is you know again you looked at a business that she had created in the health and wellness space apparel did very well they were creating another brand called in bloom which is an additive business and powder format to us made sense because it still fits under the same you know kind of health and wellness space she’s authentic for that so we invested in it and the idea was you know from an investment point of view you know it’s great because are you going to get your turn or not but it’s also do i want to get into this space am i going to add value so that’s really where it came about and liked how that was progressing and said you know what especially from my rocket internet experience then i had another co-founder ryan whose background has also kind of been in consultancy and stuff like that like you know and we worked on the fun together and said hey you know what this actually does make a lot of sense now let’s you know it it was you know we were three partners back then and let’s look at creating this venture studio and the idea was let’s create it where we’re the co-founders and then you know and the idea early 2020 when we created it was i’ll go out on the west coast and meet with the studios and try to get the ceas and the wme’s of the world you know what i mean like to start getting access to talent because it’s not like i had a you know a a celebrity fund or anything like that but what happened then is covid happened so the idea of you know when things started getting a bit slightly better i would say in april you know we have done all that work is we still couldn’t travel we like to get meetings was now impossible do we park that and you know kind of focus on something

Anthony Codispoti : else we were thinking about let me let me just pause here for a second so just to kind of recap um sort of the progression of the idea and then i want to hear kind of how you guys navigated this early covid space so you know you started this fund um you were investing in these other companies but you didn’t have the operational control that you were accustomed to and so that felt a little hmm okay what can we do that’s better or different and so you wanted to kind of you know be more involved from an operational standpoint and you saw that these celebrity backed or celebrity led brands that were affiliated with a celebrity they had this growth hack that was built in basically it’s like you can leapfrog a lot of that customer acquisition costs that slows down a lot of early stage companies because they just kind of create their own buzz and so you’re like okay this is interesting can we sort of bring this idea of you know what we understand in terms of bringing money to the table what we understand from an operational perspective and you know incorporate this element of celebrity and see can we move forward with this model so you wanted to test it out with the kate hudson brand you did you liked where it was going okay so now we’re kind of up to april of 2020 and you’re like okay we want to get access to the talent we kind of have like these other pieces in place and then okay phyllis said what what happens from here

Bilal Mekkaoui : so what happened from here is that only access i have to a real celebrities and actress called courtney cox so courtney you know who has a very huge career in terms in the past my best friend is her best friend so i knew courtney socially in terms of whenever i was out in LA there’s a few times i was invited to her house in malibu so i knew her then it spent time at her place i wouldn’t say we were super close friends she was always so hospitable and kind of seeing her and getting to see how she operated like in terms of in these settings and said you know what uh this is a perfect time to because i had that was my real access to a celebrity and because i’ve seen kind of like learning spending more time whether i’m learning more about her is that it would be great to build a company with her so the whole idea came about hey you know contacting courtney and saying hey i have an idea i would love to discuss it with you because i’d love to build a company with you and kind of went into the whole reasons like you know your vision now is is kind of you know the legacy play is to build your own brand and your company and i see you being great at it and you’d be a perfect kind of co-founder and partner and kind of went into why her and why now and why it all makes sense and then kind of went into from knowing her and spending some time with her and kind of what is really the market that you want to get into and what brand you want to build like there’s a lot of dense science that goes in what is the total addressable market what does that look like minimum repeat sorry minimum returns maximum repeats a very high margin business she’s all about her aesthetics she’s ocd in real life she was ocd as monica as her character authenticity couldn’t be more real and you know she and that’s kind of what went into hey we would love to sign to create a a home brand with you and rather and own the whole home but the idea at the beginning when you’re launching a direct consumer business you’re not going to be selling chairs and lamps and and all of these things it has to be home fragrance right so that’s really kind of the whole and i think she loved the idea in terms of kind of hey like yes i’ve been wanting to build my own company and this is the perfect time to do it and kind of everything aligned all the stars aligned and then we ended up negotiating you know with her managers over the next three months kind of what the deal looks like and how it’s going to work where she’s a you know a complete owner and co-founder and and all of that what’s expected from us what’s expected from her and then kind of going around and saying who is we have kind of you know the platform to provide a you know the things you need very similar to what rocket was about you had kind of these experts in terms of whether it was hr tech finance all of these things but then we hired the day-to-day steos flash co-founders who needed to have experience in that specific sector and the idea is you go around and saying who is the right person to onboard to help you build the vision and the company you want you can try to build it yourself right but you also have to be smart in terms of identifying i need everyone who has a specific kind of advantage of putting them together and that’s why this is really going to make sense to to succeed so what’s the name so sarah yanke so sarah yanke was uh the choice he ran a pnl of 100 million at loria she spent her time in fragrance very hungry young uh and that was the idea and we got sarah and kind of you know introduced her to courtney and they got along and we put the whole thing together and then we went through the phase of what are the products we’re going to create and uh what are we going to go like we already had an idea what is our three-year kind of thing to market we were going to start off with scented candles and then move into the other things and then we realized during covid you had a few other celebrities even though they hadn’t launched them at the time when we came up with the idea but during that process you had celebrities who launched their own candles and it’s like hey we’re not just going to be another candle like we and then you know sarah did a bit of work and the team had discussed like you know kind of what is the next thing she went out and came back and said actually you know cleaning products we do scented elevated with courtney like kind of really being on top of everything getting the right nose to get the right fragrances we also have a cc fragrance which is courtney’s own scent that she’s always created on her own anyways is her perfume that we ended up creating some of these products so yeah we we created 24 different skus at launch where we ended up launching january 26 2022 we had hand soap just soap surface cleaner room spray candle in four different scents but what’s interesting she was on ellen on the day of launch and she gifted ellen a home court set and you know the rest is history we kind of that was kind of the exposure people we sold out that day in terms of at least what we were and then it was the tail end of covid so we also had obviously supply chain issues but we still managed to restock restock a few months later and the business has been doubling since which is great we’re three years in profitable this year so it’s it’s all you know gone in the in the direction but it’s a testament of having the right team the right people the right you know all of these things and along the way we’ve had ups and downs like any company but it’s kind of ironing those things out from a you know product delays from lack of certain ingredients because there were still supply chain issues even a year and a half later you couldn’t get a fragrance in some of the sense so we were out of stock in some businesses sorry i’m rambling on but i’m getting excited to tell you about like the whole way of creating

Anthony Codispoti : these now this is this is great your enthusiasm is infectious and the name of the brand with Courtney Cox is called home court right home court yeah yeah okay and so you talked about wanting to sort of own the home space but you’re not going to start out with chairs and lamps and that kind of thing why start with the fragrance category is it just you know sort of better margins helps you guys kind of get your footing that way or it was the thought

Bilal Mekkaoui : it’s like i told you you need to look at what is the total addressable market it needs to be over a certain value so let’s say home fragrance is over 10 billion or a higher number and again i need to create a very high margin products and high margin infragrance are are a higher kind of percentage right and again thinking of maximum repeat so if i was to sell a lamb which again is heavy it’s like how do you get you know and some people might not like the lamb they will return it and the design of Courtney i’m sure also is going to be so beautiful and great i’m not sure from a cost perspective we’re going to be able to get a lamb that costs you 50 dollars or you know kind of a 100 dollars so again you need to be mindful in terms of the consumer you are launching on instagram meaning you’re using that following to also buy and you need to be mindful and Courtney was always very you know specific that she’s you know she cares a lot about her following and she wanted her following to have access to whatever she’s creating so again we went into home fragrance because it was a market to go after because meaning even during covid you looked around in terms of the cleaning products because you spent much more time at home and that’s again testament to Courtney you know identifying these things in sarah where the cleaning products and stuff like that were very old school you’d put them under your kitchen shelf could you create something that’s beautiful looking and things that’s not super expensive and smells great right so again you have to identify what you’re about your niche and then does it and test it if it’s going to work or not

Anthony Codispoti : and so you found certain things were definitely working you guys sell out on the first day like I think you said the business has been doubling you know each year since then what did you learn that surprised you maybe it was a little unexpected like oh let’s not do that again or let’s make sure we do this that we didn’t do before

Bilal Mekkaoui : yeah it’s catch 22 right like we could have probably delayed our launch a bit later because hey we wanted to have much more skus meaning but it’s like you have to think about you raise a certain amount of money to create this company and time is ticking right on a monthly basis you actually have expenses and there’s a certain time frame that you need to launch and so when we launched it we thought it was the perfect and I mean looking back in hindsight it was the time to launch like everything I really stick by this everything happens for a reason so you know you learn things you know again you had some bottles that ended up and they were defective and the defective rate was higher and it’s like even though you had someone on site who checked these bottles they still ended up but you’re a very young brand right you’re literally just starting off and you’re going to experience a lot of mishaps and a lot of things that are going to come your way it’s how do you tackle these and keep your head together and not freak out which some of us you know have a tendency hey like oh this is not working and you know you have to keep your calm and that’s what a good team is because you support each other where everyone has a certain you know kind of brings something to the table That’s what makes it great team.

Anthony Codispoti : And so then tell us about the other brand that you’re doing. Oh, Norman.

Bilal Mekkaoui : How does this work? Yeah, I mean, Oh, Norman came about in terms of, listen, we launched, we spent once we had kind of put all of this together and we were in the production phase. That takes a while, right? In terms to launch home court, which was between 21 and January 22. So the next one is that we wanted to create our next kind of also talent led having lived in New York. You know, got a therapist and a patent was the emotional attachment that I ended up having with my pet and amount of money I spent on my pet.

And kind of, you know, with the team in terms of, hey, this is a great category. It’s underserved that there’s no talent led celebrity type pet business. You know, there’s been a lot done in alcohol and there’s been a lot done in beauty.

And our point is let’s go after categories that are underserved or there isn’t really, you’re not jumping in and competing. And then also purposeful. You want to create brands that, you know, there’s a certain thing, whether it’s sustainability, whether you’re giving back, like if it’s pet special, how do I help these pets? Like, you know, so there’s always a quite a bit of thinking. So the idea there between, you know, me and the team as well, you know, Ryan, and few others in terms of let’s do a lot of work on the pet market. How big is the pet market is 600 billion market. There’s where 84 million pets in the US in some instances, two pets in every household.

So the idea, I mean, I lived in a building in New York when I moved into this building. I didn’t speak to anyone once I got my pet. It’s like you realize 90% of the building had pets.

So you kind of like pick things up yourself, right? Like what’s missing? What’s out there? So we did a lot of work on pets. We went around in a survey across the US and does this make sense? And, you know, and then kind of tried to see who is the right person that we want to build this with.

Anthony Codispoti : And yes, so we started with the idea in mind. This is the space we want to get into. Validate the space. There’s a need here. We can go after this. Now, how do you find the right celebrity partner?

Bilal Mekkaoui : How do you find the right celebrity partner who also cares a lot about this, who’s been dreaming about creating their own company?

Anthony Codispoti : Is that kind of alignment that important though? Can you put like a good looking popular celebrity’s face on it and it’s going to work? You can.

Bilal Mekkaoui : And it could work and could not, but I don’t think that’s our choice. Our choice in today’s world, authenticity is key. Meaning you need to pick the right person. Even though like you pick the right person, pick as in like it’s like marriage, right? Identify who the right partner is and that you’re going to build this with. The idea, we’ve been very lucky, but both with Courtney and Kailia’s, they’re so heavily invested in terms of this is their vision and what they’ve always wanted to build and do. That we are lucky in that aspect as opposed to get just someone and say push it. And we ended up speaking to different people with all honesty and people who did really care about their pets and like to click lots of pictures with their pets. But the authenticity wasn’t there, meaning it didn’t feel quite right or their managers would be like, hey, they’re interested obviously in their own career, whatever they’re doing. So the focus is on there and we cannot be posting lots of things with dogs. And then that takes away in terms of what we’re really trying to create here, right, long term.

Anthony Codispoti : So what was it about Kaylee Cuoco from Big Bang Theory that felt authentic and right?

Bilal Mekkaoui : Oh my God, I remember I was in Dubai traveling on a work trip and I got a call and it was like 11 in the evening over there in Dubai and I got on the call with her and the team. And I literally got off the call and I was like, she’s the one. I don’t know what to tell you, her energy again on the phone, but and it’s like she knew, like she didn’t understand, you know, kind of for pets, why do they still have these cones?

And in terms of when they take their medication, like the way they spit it out and like, why hasn’t anyone thought about this and that? And then I got to learn after that even, it’s like, hey, she has a pet farm and she has 100 adopted animals on the pet farm. She’s such a great big animal lover. And then she has six adopted pets from pet shelter. And then, you know, and then it just got even more. I mean, as soon as I got off the phone, I would say I’m like, oh my God, she’s the one.

But then you learned all the other stuff, which was even more amazing. But I do have to say Courtney did call it out. Because, you know, Courtney was our first one. And then I approached Courtney to tell her, hey, we want to create a pet brand business.

And we’re thinking about xyz. And she said, I think Kaylee would be a perfect person. Oh, so that’s how you got the introduction. We didn’t get the introduction then because kind of we needed to do more work time at past and different, you know, we had different businesses. And then Courtney’s managers, who are also Kaylee’s managers kept saying, hey, you need to speak to Kaylee if you’re thinking about pet brand is and time pass. And then when we ended up speaking to Kaylee, I actually told Courtney, you actually did call it right. And that’s why also like Courtney sits on our advisory board as our first company that we created it with her is to kind of also validate in terms of what we do. But also because she also really is very good at this. And also, you know, her network, whether it’s in the music world or in the celebrity world, she can call out in terms of who are the right talents and the right products.

Anthony Codispoti : So Courtney can continue to be a perhaps a conduit for you to some of these. Yeah, as you develop new brands.

Bilal Mekkaoui : Yeah, as we develop new brands. And then going back to Kaylee again, sorry, like, yeah, the connection was there. It’s quite important for you to form some form of like, Hey, this is not, you know, it is a job at the end of the day, but you’re built, these are like your babies, meaning you’re creating something from zero. And you want to make sure, you know, the people who are invested are also invested for the right reasons. And again, here we went through the same process in terms we did this, then who is our right kind of CEO co founder. And then again, we were very lucky in terms of ended up meeting Katie Hunt. Actually, my colleague Ryan reached out to her through a LinkedIn, I think even though we had spoken to other potential people, and then we got on the phone with her. And again, also it felt very right and kind of put it all together.

Anthony Codispoti : So there’s a third brand now with Katie Hunt?

Bilal Mekkaoui : No, Katie Hunt in terms of being the CEO’s co founder of Norman, right?

Anthony Codispoti : So you it’s like you have Courtney, Sarah, we have Katie, and Katie and the team and both teams have done a phenomenal job. You know, they you help bring it all to life, you put everything together and then they need to, you know, kind of live on there. And then, you know, it’s their baby as well to grow it to the next level, right? So and you create your and each one creates their own team. Now, so our, our value is obviously, you know, at the beginning, we’re very well and very involved on a weekly basis every few days, then it becomes, you know, once the thing is launched, and, you know, you step back a bit for them to have that breathing space. But the idea is that you’re always there, you’re on the board, you’re, you’re helping handward rather than every week, it becomes every two weeks and it’s every month.

But still very heavily involved, like with all Norman, we have a weekly call with the with the team who are great. And you have to give it to these teams for creating these successful businesses, right? Like, you know, you’re entrusting them, you’re just trying to give them everything. All right, but also they end up facing a lot of challenges and some things they need to figure out on their own and other things. They need your help on. So do you feel like you validated the concept with these two companies?

Bilal Mekkaoui : I think we did. I believe we did. At the end of the day, it’s not just about, you know, the bottom line and what the number is, like from an investor point of view, that’s great. But it’s like we have two successful brands out there in the space of the last four or five years, like in the space of last three years, right? Okay, we started it in late 2020, early 2021, we launched home court in 22, we launched on Norman, October 23. And these are very well recognized like an on Norman, you’re on twoies, you’re in pet care or X, it’s like a lot of traction in the space of such a short period of time.

Amazon, you know, Kaylee was the lead celebrity on Amazon Prime. So yes, I mean, you couldn’t be more prouder of these business. Again, there’s different types of celebrity led businesses, you have the Fenty beauties of the world in the schemes and, you know, kind of good American and there’s some very big businesses out there and have done extremely well. But I also do believe there are some that we never get to hear about which haven’t done so well, right?

So it’s kind of, and it’s again, you don’t know what the reasons like you get thrown so much at you, it’s just like how do you manage to survive is the miracle in this thing.

Anthony Codispoti : So with where you are today, Bilal, do you feel like, hey, we’ve got these two great brands, we really just want to focus on growing these and maximizing the reach that we can, or are you looking towards brand number three, brand number four, is it time for that yet?

Bilal Mekkaoui : Yeah, I mean, it’s time for me from a founder perspective. And that’s the whole point about, you know, kind of rebranding creating this company we collab, like we went from Joby Brantz to we collab where now, hey, I would like to continue building the US franchise, obviously with the right talent and with the right group, but also to take this international in terms of there’s other countries internationally where hey, similar again to what I learned from Rocket, right? Take that model, India is a huge market in terms of my eyes in terms of, hey, India, you have Bollywood, you have all these celebrities or talents, yet the brand equity of those is probably what was in the US 20 years ago.

It’s kind of what are the brand deals they’re getting to promote, yet not creating their own businesses. Everyone tends to look to the US in some shape or form. And then I think celebrities all over the world have also learned the game like, hey, look what they’ve done in the US, like, look at these businesses have turned into billion dollar businesses, why can’t we do it? So again, it’s identifying whether it’s the Middle East or India, where you have a large population in terms from an influencer or celebrity or talent that you could probably take advantage of. So the idea is to continue building the US franchise, but also, hey, I would like to also create some strong companies in other parts of the world.

Anthony Codispoti : So why change the name? What’s behind the rebrand?

Bilal Mekkaoui : The rebrand is a good question. Jovi Brands was, you know, the stories was founded by my other co-founders and kind of each one has gone to do different things in terms of either focusing on one business or creating something of their own.

So the Wee collab is just again, the Wee is an OUI from a branding perspective to me, it’s a great one in terms of kind of my surname, the end of the surname, but we is in French, we collaborate, we build, we innovate, but using the OUI part, it’s great for me, I think a branding perspective. And then again, it’s not just about brands. While if you look at kind of having a Jovi Brands name, you think just predominantly, hey, it’s a brand, I’m just creating a brand. You are creating brands, but the brands could be an AI venture using it. The ethos behind it is you’re still using talent to establish something, but not necessarily you’re creating a CPG type product that you’re just trying to sell and put in your hands. It could be potentially other things to again evolve with how the market is going.

Anthony Codispoti : So as you look to expand into other markets, take the same concept and use in India, the Middle East, you mentioned, do you think that it’s going to be hard to connect with the talent there?

I think you kind of, I mean, in a way, it was very serendipitous that you had this connection to Courtney, especially at the start of COVID where you couldn’t take meetings like you normally would. How are you going to get into that talent space and these other markets?

Bilal Mekkaoui : Very good question. Listen, I think having a home court or an ornorman under your belt in terms of being one of the co-founders does help and I keep going back to these are very well recognized famous people in other parts of the world, right? So they don’t just, they transcend globally.

So at least as a case study that works. Middle East and India again, kind of like I have the connections like don’t forget, I mean, I’m living in East, originally I grew up in London, worked in the US, but generally have worked in many different places within the rocket, like I literally was living in a suitcase for those three years. So it’s kind of identify your niche, what are you good at? So getting talent in the Middle East, again, you get introduced to really strong people who let’s say there’s a lady that I got to know over the last six months and she’s amazing.

She has, I wouldn’t say she has a talent agency, she does a very good job in identifying who are the right creators and talents and connect them to the right brands and the idea is this is what she does, but getting to know her it’s like rather than we just connect them, are there the right talents where we can build companies with them. India again, is something that came about where like listen, I don’t have like you said, I don’t have access to Bollywood. I one of my best friends is Indian and is also very well connected. But funnily enough, we just signed something in India and it came about with an athlete who’s very well known and his daughter used to be in London and she’s an influencer, she has an eight million following and again got introduced to her and you know, again, through a network of introductions and realized, wow, she’s amazing to build something with. He’s someone who has a nutritional background, that a master’s here in London, UCL has gone back to India and is really behind the foundation of her dad who’s a famous cricketer and herself and her family. And you’re like, wow, I’d love to build a health and wellness business with her in some shape or form. So again, like sometimes the stars align differently in terms of different things. That doesn’t mean I would like to stop doing stuff in the US not at all.

But again, it is a crowded market in the US meaning, you know, every day we see some other celebrity trying to launch something which is great. But it’s like, how do I carve out, I don’t want to be this person in terms of, you know, doing anything or taking anything just for the sake of it. I want to be able to choose the ones that I care about and turns from a product perspective and some things that, you know, resonate with what I care about and what they care about and then therefore if it works great.

Anthony Codispoti : So how do you best leverage someone’s celebrity? You talk about Courtney going on, Ellen, you know, I think about other celebrities, they’re making posts on TikTok and Instagram. But from the experiences that you’ve had now over the last few years working with two great celebs, what’s the best way to kind of put that to use?

Bilal Mekkaoui : I think that goes back to them, meaning it goes back to them. How much do they want to use their friends in terms of creating, but I’m not talking about those two specifically, just take generally celebrities themselves are the new entrepreneurs per se, right? Like before, I think if you look at this kind of holistic approach, you know, they were very good at their job and they did their job very well and they did great income and maybe they invested in real estate or whatever or invested in other businesses if we never heard about and also made money or lost money. But I think now celebrities have gotten hold in terms of how this actually works. You know, social, there’s a social following and before celebrities, in order to have direct access to their fans came through either the billboards or the magazines or kind of the shows, but Instagram and social media changed that where they now have access to that following all day long and they can curate whatever they want. So think of them as their own publishers. So meaning they, they are their own publishers of their own game and they become very good entrepreneurs. Like if we looked at some of these Kaz amigos, Aviation Jinn, The Robe in terms of Selena Gomez’s brand, like there’s so many who are these are multi-billion dollar companies, right? So and they’re leveraging their friends to a certain degree.

You cannot get into a business and say, I will only do this if you contact your friends. It’s a choice about the celebrities, how close are they? You know, with Courtney, we had her and Ed Sheeran do the first anniversary for Home Court and he was on her lawn and they sang, you know, Happy Anniversary, which was great. We had Robert Downey Jr., who got sent a gift and on his own ended up like, you know, this wasn’t like, Hey Courtney, tell me, can you post something for me?

And he did this amazing like thing for Home Court. So it’s again, all authentic. And, you know, Kaylee did the same thing with Ellen, she sent her something, Ellen had sent her something and they both posted for each other. So it goes back to, I think the celebrity, it’s not part of the celebrities are also very careful, right? Like you’re not gonna, you’re creating a company with them and it’s very clear what they’re doing and what you’re doing and what everyone’s doing. You know what I mean? It’s not part of the game.

Hey, I expect you to, you know, contact your friends and your friends to post about it. Like there’s a, it sure doesn’t hurt. It sure doesn’t hurt. It sure doesn’t hurt.

Anthony Codispoti : So we’ve talked a lot about number of successes in your career, current ongoing, successful projects that you’re working on. What to shift gears and talk about a serious challenge that you had to overcome at some point, whether that’s personal or professional. How’d you get through it and what did you learn?

Bilal Mekkaoui : I mean, I cannot tell you one, there’s so many in terms of challenges and what I mean by like life throws at you honestly, sometimes, sometimes everything is going smoothly and then something just unexpected, right?

Like, I don’t even want to name them all because in all honesty, it’s like there’s been quite a lot on the personal side. I think, listen, you know, you also have your own life to deal with. You have family, you have your friends and sometimes things happen there. I lost my dad at some point, which played a big part also in terms of, you know, kind of the grief where you’re doing your job and you’re building these things, but you’re also having to deal with your own grief, but you also have teams relying on you and you have things and it’s, and that grief sometimes you don’t literally deal with it on day one. But a year later, you’re eventually going to have to deal with it and it eats away like so many things, you know what I mean?

But that’s part of the process. So that I think is a hard one or someone in your family gets really sick and you also have to take care of them or someone even on your team gets sick. And you have to be there because it’s not like, hey, you know, it’s like, how do you support them?

How do you, so there’s always what you learn, I guess, through life on a loan and be philosophical is like life throws so much stuff at you in all honesty. And everyone tells you how you deal with it. Yes, but it’s not, you deal with it, you have to get on with it. Otherwise, you know, it’s kind of like you cannot continue, you have to deal with it. But I think it’s easier said than done, like, hey, you have to deal with it.

People deal with it in different ways. Like sometimes, I think, wow, this is, oh my God, that’s like my career is done. Or oh my God, I’ve disappointed this person or oh my God, I made the mistake.

Like, you know, like I screwed up and something and was never my intention to screw it up because I forgot to include something in a contract, right, or whatever it is. And you have to deal with it. And you have to lean into the support that you have around you, whatever that support is, you also have to take time for yourself and know this is not the end. But you know, honestly, like, I think that’s like this will pass that I love the saying this too shall pass. And it does. But in the heart of it, it feels like it’s the end, it’s like everything crumbling down. And you just have to kind of, you know, breathe and swim and get there. Sorry, I know it’s abroad because I cannot pinpoint to one I can tell you.

Anthony Codispoti : Yeah, let me kind of narrow in on what I heard you mentioned there, you know, the loss of your father, which, you know, had to have been really trying very traumatic. And, you know, probably did some grieving in that moment. But I also heard you say that I didn’t fully grieve it kind of, like, sat there with me and kind of ate away at me for a while. And in that particular instance, kind of went and how did you get to a point where you’re like, I mean, I got a I got something stuck in here, I got a I got to deal with it, I got a process this more.

Bilal Mekkaoui : I think a year in what I mean by that, I kind of shut off in terms of it happened. I was young, I was, you know, kind of 30 years old, and my dad was 64.

And we, you know, he got sick, he was in the US on a trip, got sick and was in hospital for three months. So the idea was, I think afterwards, you know, at the beginning is like, get to the funeral, do the funeral. And then, hey, like, I remember with my grandfather, I kind of mourned for 40 days, where I didn’t go out, like whatever it is, like, I would obviously go out, but not in a social setting. While with my dad, I think if a few weeks later, I was at friends at having dinner, it’s like, you kind of shut it away, in terms of, and I think a year later, like if we continue like this, like literally, I would have run my life to the ground mentally, emotionally, and it just wasn’t sustainable.

And even then, I think going to a therapist and discussing kind of what happened when I found out my dad got into hospital and post that, I’ll give you an example. I used to love watching ER. I couldn’t watch ER after my dad passed away. As soon as it was on TV, I felt this thing in my throat, I would get up, leave the room. And I think afterwards, obviously, when I went in, and I just went through everything that had happened, how it affected, and people, you know, have different effects.

That simplest example, I tell you, after that, then watching ER and television was different, as opposed to, I could watch it as opposed to I needed to get out of the room, I needed to change the channel. Again, this is something I think everyone goes through, meaning, you know, someone close to you that passes away, or that you witness someone, unfortunately, going through a health thing, and you have your own responsibilities, meaning you have them as your responsibility. But the other responsibilities is if you have people relying on you or your funding businesses, you need to go out and raise money, that doesn’t stop. You might, unfortunately, not be giving it to 100%, but I don’t know, you still have to do it. You still have to pick up yourself in the morning and force yourself to go to the meeting.

And in the meeting before, you’re about to crumble, and then you go in and you shut down. And that’s one example. There’s been other examples at work where one company we invested in, which we put a large amount of money into it and really thought it was going to do so well. And everything on paper said that. And then even they had a great account. And then there was a change in the account that they had where there was a new management team that came in, and they literally decided not to use them anymore, even though they hired 60 people for that account, which was signed. And then you realize, wow, like literally everything I put in, even though I had done all the right work, and ticked all the boxes, look what just happened. And you have to think about the company itself, where the founder is about to like have a heart attack or like kind of, and you have to pick them up. And then you have to think about your investors who lost a large chunk of their investment. And it’s your career. So there’s, I mean, that’s one of them.

Anthony Codispoti : So that particular moment, not only are you dealing with your own grief and your own stress and your own regret, you’re having to help all those people around you who have been affected by this cyclone that hit out of nowhere. Exactly.

Bilal Mekkaoui : And it’s full circle because it’s happened to me in other instances where now in my own businesses, and sometimes things don’t, and then you have someone on your team say, hey, it’s going to be fine.

We’re going to get through it. And then you learn these things to become that person as well. Either you are that person, and you lose it in that instant of craziness, or you get to see it in other people. Like I’ve learned also things from my other co-founders or my other colleagues.

So you know what I mean? Which, you know, I might be older or I might have more experience. I still learned some very interesting facts. And I say, well, thank you for actually teaching me that.

Anthony Codispoti : No. Bilal, I’ve just got one more question for you. But before I ask it, I want to do two things. First of all, I want to invite all the listeners to go ahead and hit the follow button on their favorite podcast app. I’ve had a really great interview here today with Bilal from WecoLab talking about, you know, his connections with celebrities and how that really adds fuel to the fire of growing a brand. And you want to make sure you get more of these great interviews. But Bilal, I also want to let people know the best way to either get in touch with you to follow your story, those of the brands that you’re involved with, people who are listening today, they’re like, I want more. I want to keep track of what’s going on there. What would that be?

Bilal Mekkaoui : I mean, LinkedIn is always usually probably a good place. My email, I’m happy to share my email privately, if you think, and if your followers want to get in touch. And yeah, I mean, in terms of, and then we have the website and all of these things to see the future ones. And I just think from a LinkedIn perspective, you get to these, but I’m happy to also speak to people, you know, they have certain questions within their own kind of career or path or whatever that’s come across.

Anthony Codispoti : Which website should we point? Sorry, Bilal, which website should we point them to for now? Is it WecoLab? It’s WecoLab, yes.

Bilal Mekkaoui : That will launch in two weeks.

Anthony Codispoti : Okay, by the time this podcast is out, it’ll be, yeah. Yeah, so WecoLab. We, OUI, CO, double LAD. Great. And we’ll include links to your email as well as your LinkedIn profile in the show notes. But last question I have for you, Bilal. I want to stay in touch. This was a great conversation. A year from now, you’re celebrating something. What is that something? What are we celebrating together?

Bilal Mekkaoui : I think celebrating is, listen, first is that it sounds corny, but you’re actually content and happy with where you are. It sounds stupid, but because you go through so many ups and downs and tries and the last couple of years have been also a bit, you know, like markets have taken a different turn, the world is going crazy. And it’s like, listen, we should be very lucky in terms of we have a roof over our head and, you know, being around people you love. So I think celebrating without the corniness, but it’s true.

Like, at least you have to be grateful to that. I think from my business perspective, is that to continue seeing the brands we build doing extremely well and everyone, you know, is putting everything that they want and need and very proud of what they’ve done. And for me, it’s like to kind of continue replicating building or creating these great brands with the right people internationally or even furthermore in the US is for me to look back and say, Hey, well, I launched something in India. I’m launching something in the Middle East.

There’s another one in the US coming. That’s kind of, you know, what I would like to look back at and say, Hey, these two that we’ve created have done great and continue to grow and, you know, make everyone make all of us proud. But I would like, at least from my personal perspective to at least internationally also been able to do something.

Anthony Codispoti : So the first part of your answer, I think really hits on something important, this idea of being content and happy, right? Like enjoying sort of the moment in the space and the place that you’re in now. And it in my experience and tell me this if this is true for you, it’s challenging to find that balance where you’re both happy and content with where you are in the present moment, while still having that drive to do and create and achieve more. Have you stumbled across anything that’s kind of helped you sit on both sides of that fence?

Bilal Mekkaoui : I’ve stumbled upon where sometimes things get really bad, meaning like bad unexpectedly, like, you know, and it’s like, Hey, I need to make these things good. I mean, I don’t know how to explain it. I mean, being on both sides, what’s helped me specifically is taking that time where I work out in the morning, or I take that time to myself to kind of really set the day so that no matter what happens, that I have that time where I’ve kind of given my own space to really start kicking off my day. Again, podcast, I love some podcasts that I listen to in terms of that. Also, it’s great to hear other people’s stories like now I’m going to be listening to your podcast a lot, but it’s also, you know, there’s a few podcasts out there that I in the past have listened to, like acquired and diary of a CEO, I think it gives a perspective to people of how very successful people or even not just the average person has gone through.

And I think it’s always great to listen to these stories. Reading, you know, everyone keeps telling you reading and then to do all of these things and work and find time to read. And like, you’ll like, you need to find your niche of what what works for you. There’s a great book called, you know, Big Magic, which I thought also helps or the art of creativity, maybe for yourself. It just varies, I think, right? It’s kind of carving out what works for you and figuring that out.

Anthony Codispoti : I appreciate you sharing that. The Law of Macauy from Wee CoLab. I want to be the first one to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us today. I really appreciate it. Anthony, thank you very much. This was great. Folks, thanks for learning with us today.