14 minutes of eComm Wisdom: Sean Agatep from Vincero

Well, welcome, Sean. So glad to have you here. A big fan of what you're working on with Vincero. For the audience who doesn't know, what exactly are you selling on the internet?

So Vincero sells men's accessories. We specialize in watches, jewelry, things like eyewear, any sort of fashion accessories.

And we are here to be a part of the gifting moments in your life. So we're heavy on engraving and personalization on our watches and our jewelry collections. and we built Vincero with the intent that you can have well made intentionally designed high quality pieces that don't have to cost $5-10k.

So we take a lot of, we take a lot of care on the product design and development. That's where the roots of the brand actually start.

And when did you, when did you start this business?

So my buddies and I moved out to, Guangzhou, China in 2010. with the entrepreneurial bug, we were all business majors. We kept trying to start a few different, different enterprises and a few different things that would work. We imported American wine into Chinafor a couple of years, which was a fun young man's game, probably took 10 years off my liver, but we were doing sourcing and manufacturing. Our business and our professional careers developed in the factories in China and Southeast Asia. So we had a very unique perspective on on how to do business, how to run businesses.

And more importantly, we learned how products were actually made. And we saw a lot of brands, a lot of companies blowing up on Kickstarter at the time, and we knew how to make products. We knew, the right way to make products. And we had an idea for a brand of stuff that we would want to wear ourselves personally and stand behind.

And so in 2014, we moved, some of us moved back to the States, but we launched Vincero via Kickstarter. and we're coming up on our 10th year now.

That's incredible. And

Did you guys start with a watch was it? Was it a specific product?

So our first product was a, automatic, Japanese movement watch that we figured out a way to cut, Carrara and Italian marble really thinly to put it on the dial of the watch and the links of the watch itself, which was a unique scale that only could have happened if we were out in China and we were working with the factories.

I was going to like quarries grabbing marble that would cut, taking it to the factories, having them cut it down. We had found a different guy down the street that could cut the marble. It was a whole process and, it was a fun product and it was a unique product to make. And

it's still in our collection today. There's different versions of it. We actually, this is top secret news, but we've got a new version of it coming out in August for our anniversary sale. But that was the first product, we expanded the watch, portfolio for a few years. Most of our watches as well, they have an Italian marble case back on the back of the watch.

as just a little, craftsman hit on the heritage of the brand. And, we've been expanding our jewelry line, as well as our sunglass line as well.

Do you feel like, like the business for I the first couple years was inherently very different than what it's like today? And is it easy for you to split up the journey over the last 10 years into phases? Into some buckets of just different areas of focus or different ways of doing business?

Just top of mind here, probably split up in 3 phases. The first block, we'd call it act one would be strictly as a watch company. So we were riding, especially in 2014 to 2016. We were riding the wave of fashion watches being very popular. Yeah. I think everyone at that time, uh, it was, it was just a hot category.

We never wanted Vincero to just be a watch category. So we started expanding it and really flexing our development muscles and different product categories. So that next act would be the standardization of watches and then really figuring out how, firstly, how to make product products in different categories correctly, you know, jewelry's a completely different selling or manufacturing process that watches luckily watches by its nature is a very complicated and intricate process.

I mean, you're dealing with 7-8 different suppliers for one watch, so having that foundation and applying that knowledge into different, categories, that would be that second block of really understanding how we can really make a high quality sunglass or even how to make sunglasses with who the best people are that are making them, how to do that.

that would be that second block.

And this third block is more the standardization and we know the categories that we can make. We've been making all these products for the past couple of years. And so now it's more of. Okay, we can stand behind all these products. We like our style. We've got a great, we've got a great base of customers that have naturally gravitated towards using us as gifting moments within their lives.

Now, how can we enhance that experience for them? So we're going very heavy into the personalization side of things. Being able to capture those sentimental moments for people and really, be that meaningful, impactful gift for people.

And so that's like a relatively new finding then for you guys, it seems to have acknowledged or notice that gifting is really when you guys are firing on all cylinders are really connecting with consumers

versus the previous act, when you had rolled out a few different new categories for Vincero. that might've been selling products year round, but now you're really focused on capitalizing on those key gifting moments. Is that fair to say?

the way you say that now, it almost makes me think that maybe it's just a maturity of where we are from a leadership standpoint is because when we were making these other products in our late twenties and it was like, Oh, this is cool. I would want that. This is cool. I would want that. But now that we're all in our thirties, there's I think there's more of, making sure that anything we do is done with intent and done well, and it's meaningful behind it. And the thing we always kept coming back to is

a watch is a great gift, right? And how do you tote that line from it to being meaningful and impactful without it being a significant purchase? Also without it being like a cheap sort of okay, here you go. So,the learning process behind that, I don't know if I'm getting off pace here, was really under, was really understanding our customer and our audience and who they're buying for and what they care about. And refining the catalog to, to really create an offering that's significant. That's also why we do a lot of limited edition drops. That's more fun from the product development standpoint, as we try to come out with a new colorway or a new watch that, that also has a little bit of a meaning and story behind it.

We do that every couple of months. I'm rambling here, but that's kinda the genesis behind it.

Is there a specific routine that you guys or playbook that you guys run with every time you do a product drop or you release a new product?

Yeah, there's an ideal playbook, but there's always pivots, right? it's, and I think something to keep in mind is this takes time, right? It'll, it takes a couple of years. It took us a couple of years to get to this point where we feel comfortable And confident launching product drops because, the development cycle was probably 6 months for a new product.

And then you've got 3-4 months of production. So like you have to be planning this stuff at least a year in advance. And you also have to have confidence, especially eCom side of things, it moves so quickly that what was, what made sense last year, you have to make sure that it makes sense that the following year.

So being able to identify. Hey, yeah, it's just a fad or a trend. So we need to stick stick by what's meaningful and significant to our core demo and what value can we provide that's unique from what we're already providing. Otherwise it's like another drop is just, it's then you're in the fast fashion game, right?

Where it's okay, we made a yellow one now because you have the blue one, right? That's let's make, let's put some meaning and significance behind it.

Yeah, the one year time period to prep for a drop, that's, that's super long, that's longer than what I would imagine, but to make a quality product like you guys do, it's probably the fastest you can make it, so that makes a lot of sense.

when you're going into the new product categories and new drops, you're having to put some money on the line to pay for the research and development. And to pay for the inventory and then get it out there without necessarily knowing that there's going to be purchases or demand in the back.

Of course you're projecting, right? Like how difficult is that? Are there any tricks that you have or that you've developed over the years to get a sense of what's going to be successful and to what extent it's going to be successful.

Yeah, that's always the tough part. Inventory planning is definitely an art, not a science. we err on the conservative side and our team would rather sell out sooner than having too much inventory of something. Also that scarcity model enhances or improves the consumer sentiment of okay, there actually is a fixed finite amount.

I need to either get on this or like the next time it comes around there's only going to be a fixed and limited amount. Also our product team is great in establishing relationships with the right suppliers that we come to them And they know it's like, 'Hey, we're working with you.

We'll give you this consistent business. We also, this is part of our business model. So we need you to support us on this side'. And we've got great partners on that side of things.

Now I have one question on the website side of things. Um, I feel like, uh, I had spoken with the team at Ridge a while back, and they talked about some really interesting upsell moments that they implemented on their website, which were key to their growth.

Have there been things that you've implemented on the CRO conversion rate optimization side of things that have, been killer for you guys?

Yes. and it's all part of learning and testing. we are constantly refining our product category or our entire catalog to every core product has to have a complimentary piece to it. So, for example, our watches, we intentionally designed to where they have a complimentary existing extra watch band and an extra strap that you can switch off.

When we started doing this on metal band watches, you could only use a tool to pop off the metal band. I worked with our factories six years ago to refine that, that, that connector piece. and so that was able to unlock, even with our metal band watches, you can easily, like an individual person can swap out the band fairly quickly.

So that's probably the key driver and the component from the watch side of things. And as we've expanded. Into these other categories, with jewelry, there's a lot of jewelry stacking or complimentary products as well. there's that side of it as well. So like it's a more of a long form process, but having those incremental wins over time and figuring out, all right, one, does this product sell?

Okay. We can sell this to what do we sell with it is how we approach it.

And when you sell, when you say, does this product sell, is that like a hard, is there a hard metric tied against that for you guys? Or is it also like an art more than a science?

It's definitely an art. there's certain products where we have high confidence in, but we will go in there with a set expectation and kind of see how things go after the first 30, 90 days.

And then depending on the time of year, cause we are a very seasonal product. Sometimes when we launch products, we didn't really give them the best chance for success. So we, anything that we launch, we, if it, so limited additions is one thing, but anything we launched that we expect to be like an evergreen product in our category, it needs to prove itself to be able to convert on its own, through ads.

So that's. Yeah, that's the long story about it.

Yeah. And when you say through ads, is there, I assume there's a lot of meta activity going on there. are there certain, like CAC metrics you're trying to hit or is it again, like a case by case scenario, a bigger picture? Is there a formula that you guys go by that says, okay, this product is we have 95 percent confidence that this is a product.

going to be a product that we have ongoing on Vincero.

That's for the scientists on the marketing side of things. I don't know those numbers off the top of my head. I just, I'm in the meetings and say yes, when it works. it's again, it's different by different, by, for different products.

So watch is at a hundred, like a $200 price point. You're, or even our, some of our collections go up to $500-$600. You're okay with different conversion metrics versus on our jewelry side of things where you know, a $70 or $80 bracelet has to prove itself in a different way. But yeah, that's the scientists on that side.

Awesome. Cool. one last question for you is, are you wearing a watch right now?

Of course I am. So this is our new, it's actually coming out in the fall. So we're testing and stress testing these samples to make sure, production is running in now, but.

It is, our new field watch that we made out of the case made out of titanium. So it's the first one that we've made out of titanium. We've got a Japanese automatic movement in there. We're trying a new band out where it's a Velcro strap. I don't think we ran this in the production, but, yeah.

And the ironic thing is, I hate to say this, but most of the watches that I wear personally, a lot of them are like the broken ones, because I take the samples from the first round and we stress test them and we make sure that they work. and,outside there, I guess they're broken intentionally, not because of the quality behind it, but it's because we grab them from the factory before they're actually finally allowed to do all the final assembly, because we stand, in ourwe have a less than a 1 percent defect rate because our team out in China, QCs, everything, one to one, we're probably one of the only ones at our size that.

We've got our team that physically checks every single watch before it goes off the line. So we stand behind our products. and a lot of that is from the QC side of things, but also from us, we're testing and using it first to make sure that we would actually wear it and like it. And ultimately, if we didn't, if we're not stoked on the product, we're not gonna, we're not gonna launch it.

Super cool. Yeah. I'm excited for that. The titanium bit as well. Andwe'll link to every, to your site, of course, in the description of the YouTube video. but Sean, thank you so much for your insights. Much appreciated.

For sure. For sure. Appreciate you letting me ramble here.

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