Page 102 - Midas Touch

up” is actually not accurate. Picture a shark feeding frenzy. Fans would
crowd our tables, wave their credit cards, hand us lots of cash, and say,
“I’ll take one of those, two of that, and do you have any of those left? I’ll
take it.” They wanted to take home with them a piece of Pink Floyd, Duran

Duran, The Police and the other artists they loved. They wanted to make
those brands and those bands more a part of their lives.

Different bands had different customers, and the bands had to be true to
their own unique customers. For example, the fans of Duran Duran were
different than the fans of Judas Priest, Van Halen, or Boy George. They
wore different clothes and they used a different language. They just acted
differently, and probably were very different attitudinally. If a band

stopped being true to themselves, their music, and their customers,
business dropped off, sales became difficult, and profits declined. If they
put out an album that messed with the fans, we noticed it. When a band
came back on track with the next release, bringing out hit songs their fans
wanted, business picked back up. Talk about the market giving you
feedback!

One of my personal favorite bands of that time was the girl band, The Go-
Go’s. I loved their music, their sexiness, and their fans. The problem was
that their fans did not buy my products. My products were targeted to boys
and young men. Very few of my customers were man enough to wear The
Go-Go’s products. I passed on that band, even though I loved the brand and
their music.

The End of Rock and Roll

By 1984, my love affair with rock and roll was ending. While I still loved
the music, I was tiring of the business. Something inside of me was
changing. I was growing restless, often irritable, and less patient. I had
learned my first lesson on the power of brands, and it was time to move
on.

While visiting my factories in Korea and Taiwan, something inside of me
snapped. I saw everything clearly, and I could not do it anymore. In my
factories, I had young boys and girls working in hot, humid sweatshops
producing rock-and-roll products that made me richer and those kids
sicker.