Headspace: Andy Puddicombe and Rich Pierson

We knew the business. That we had wasn't working. And so with the last bit of cash that we had. We managed to pull in every single favour that we had left, um our friends and family had said, Look, we really love you guys, but we're not we're not giving you any more money. This is a terrible business, like well done, but

Enough's enough. From MPR, it's how I built this, a show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built. I'm Guy Raz, and on today's show, how a Buddhist Monk and a stressed out marketing consultant sat down at a Starbucks. and wound up launching Headspace.

Meditation app that has millions of users around the world. So we've had several episodes that feature co-founders, and if there's one thing that's clear, it's that all of them brought different skills to the table. At Method, Adam Lowry mixed the ingredients to make the soap, Eric Ryan designed the now iconic bottles. At Reddit, Steve Huffman did the coating, Alexis O'Hanian did the content. And at a way, Jen Rubio focused on building buzz for the suitcases. Steph Corey figured out how to get them made. So you get the point, right? And it's almost hard to imagine any of these companies making it without both co-founders. And that is also probably the case with today's story. because it's a story of two totally different people with totally different strengths.

One of them, Andy Putticombe, trained as a Buddhist monk for more than a decade. The other, Rich Pearson, was a rising star at a top tier advertising agency in London. They met because Rich was spiraling. He was burnt out and looking for help. And Andy was the person he happened to come across. At the time, Andy was offering one on one meditation sessions out of a back room of a doctor's office. Neither Andy nor Rich could have imagined that eventually The two of them would build a meditation app. Headspace. now used by millions of people, and a business that generates more than a hundred million dollars in annual revenue.

And the story of how they came together at the exact right moment, each with the exact skill set they needed to co-found and build Headspace. Well It's a pretty long journey. And Andy, the Buddhist monk? He would say that it took as long as it was supposed to.

But it actually starts when Andy was growing up in the UK in the 1980s. He was first introduced to meditation as a kid, around the time his parents' marriage started to fall apart. Yes, my parents split up at ten. And and my mum was Mm. I think she was she was looking for a way to cope. Meditation definitely was within her kind of sphere of of interest.

And in Bristol there was a a local group, it was a TM group, Transcendental Meditation Group. And she decided that she was gonna do a a six week course. And my sister I found out was going along with her and I didn't want to be at home on my own. So I asked if I could join them. Yeah, and it led to actually kind of a couple of years. Of doing that kind of thing into my early teens. This is in like the early eighties when

Meditation was by no means um mainstream. I mean even sort of Western Ohside of Mainstream. Yeah, and and did it feel weird or different w when you were a kid? Did you feel like this was a little uh unusual? It did, but I don't know if I had that point of comparison. You know, as a kid you don't necessarily have the this is this is weird and that's not. My mum was going there, so I was going there. It wasn't until Um I told a really good friend of mine, he's still a very good friend of mine.

I shared with him, confided in him that I'd been going to to do this thing.'Cause I knew it was a little bit kind of Weird. And um And I went into school the next day and um All the other kids in the class were sat on their desks cross legged.

sort of ombing um at me as I walked in the room. And it was at that point I I think then I registered that oh, okay, this is definitely not something that is mainstream. It's probably not something that I'm gonna be able to Talk too much to other people. And what what was it? Was it Focusing on breathing. Do you do you remember what Those group sessions were like?

With TM it's typically a mantra, so you're you're given sort of a a word or a phrase and you repeat it over and over Yeah. And At that time.

I found it really, really difficult as a as an energetic young kid to sit there and be still. And to focus. But it was definitely something that I still found, you know, I still look back at it. with a a sense that it was it was a very positive influence at uh an early stage in my life. When you were like

sixteen. 'Cause in in the UK it's a little different than in the US, which is it certainly at that time, like the drinking age. Yeah. Probably wasn't really enforced, and it was typical for fifteen, sixteen year old kids to to go to pubs and get pints of beer and drinking cultures is very different there. Were you into that? Were you part of that? I was very into that.

By that stage I was playing in a rugby team as well, and it was very much part of the the culture. Yeah, we'd go out uh at the weekend with our with our fake ID and go and find some drinks. Um I read that um around this time, like in your teens, um

why you were at a a pub. One night. Um You went through a a a kind of a pretty traumatic experience. Yeah. Um what what happened? Um it was um Christmas Eve, we'd had a party at the local rugby club in in Caesar.

And so it was Christmas morning by the time we all sort of came out onto the the street. And we were standing in a a big group outside the the club and uh A drunk driver came down the road and crashed into to the group of us and I was just very lucky to be standing on the edge of the group, but it it killed two people and an injured sort put in sort of critical, like intensive care, like twelve twelve of the group. And

You know, every single one of us there that night dealt with dealt with it in a a different way, I think. We were all very confused. You know, we're still young, like eighteen years old, you know. I don't know if we ever really kinda know how to deal. With that kind of thing.

Um I just wanted to get away. I think we often do this, right? Like The idea, the sense of getting away in a physical way, kinda we think that we're gonna be able to outrun it mentally as well. And of course he never can. So Yeah, like I I think

A really to this day, you know, kind of a really important And impactful. part of of my own Journey. Yeah.

So So I guess eventually, um you left home, you went uh you went to college and you started um studying at a a a place called De Montfort U University. By the way, where like where is that? Yeah, that's in um it's in Bedford. So it was a sports college. And actually I didn't go straight there, so my grades weren't good enough. So I went and spent a couple of years in actually here in in the US doing some coaching of sports. So I already trained prior to university, I trained as a a personal trainer. So I was already working in sort of gym and things.

I'm really enjoying that. Um Till eventually, um when I was twenty one, I got in as a They call it as a mature student in England. It just basically means your grades don't have to be quite as good and you're a little bit older, so they let you in. I think it's a pity thing. And I I started studying sports science. So you um You're at university.

And you decide to drop out. I'm in the middle of it. Why? What happened? Yeah, so I was

Just increasingly You know, I just felt this sense of disturbance or unsatisfactoriness. I kinda felt like I was doing something I enjoyed But I I just didn't feel like it was

really making me happy. And at the time I was going out with this girl, um, who lived there kinda locally. And we we talked a lot, you know, she was really into to Buddhism and stuff and And you know, she talked with a huge amount of admiration about these monks and nuns that would go away and and meditate and try and understand their mind, you know? And

And it was just into the second year. Um it was pretty early on. Just had a day. You know, where All of a sudden that seemed to make

A lot of sense. I just It was like an inexplicable feeling that I I just had to do this so much so that I went into university that same afternoon and said I'm gonna leave.

This is what I'm gonna do. So just I just want to understand this. You are in your second year of college. Yep. You're kind of just something's missing which is not unusual for a young person in their twenties, early twenties to kind of experience Yeah and

You decide that Wanna Go and study Buddhism and become a monk. Yeah, I mean just Yeah. Yeah.

I would frame it ever so slightly differently. You're absolutely correct. But my experience of it was not that it's not that I Sat there and chose to do it. I genuinely felt nothing else made sense. It was it didn't even feel like a choice. I didn't I didn't sit there for days thinking, should I do this, shouldn't I do this? What are the pros, what are the cons.

Uh it sounds I'm aware of how strange that sounds to just suddenly think one day you're gonna quit college and go and become a Buddhist monk. But At the time. For what it's worth, it felt like a calling that I couldn't sort of ignore.

So this is like sort of really pre-internet. you know, browser days. So you could just like go up to the internet in your university library and like look up, you know, how to become a Buddhist monk or like where do I go? Yeah. So where did you So you decide that you're gonna drop out of university and How do you even find out what to do? I mean, firstly I just love the idea that that's even

kind of a search option on on Google these days, how how to become a monk. Um but I I guess it is, and there are probably people kinda googling that. But no, back then I'd read a little bit. And most of the stuff I had read was from South East Asia. So it has its home in in Thailand and Vietnam and and Sri Lanka. Um, so I started thinking, Okay, I'm I'm gonna go to Thailand. I knew of a teacher who um was there who I really kinda respected, I enjoyed their writing. So I thought, Okay, well I'm gonna I'm gonna go there But This girlfriend of mine said, Oh, a friend of mine's just come back from from the Himalayas. She went to visit the Dalai Lama. He was in northern India in this kind of small town.

I went and got a a lonely planet guy from the local library and uh looked it up and thought, Well, that looks interesting. Okay, maybe I'll fly to Delhi instead and you know, if the Dalai Lama's there, it must be a a pretty good place. So I flew into I flew into Delhi. Um I think um I'd done a little bit of research and I printed some stuff out before I went and I knew of a retreat center. So I went to the retreat center and said kind of, you know, this is This is what I'd like to do. Could I just start off maybe by working here, kinda maybe doing some retreat. And

I was there for probably six months or so. before then going on to Thailand and Burma sort to actually train in a in a monastery. And when you got there Um to Burma. Wha like what was the commitment you were making. Like how long w were you gonna be there? In that particular tradition you don't make a time commitment. I did it later on in the Tibetan tradition I did. Um but I started training as a as a novice monk and it was

Ever with uh Of all the training. It was really full on. It was way more full on than what I'd come from in in India. Yeah, w I mean what do you what do you mean like what was a typical day like? So in Burma, um it was Just meditation.

So we were doing an eighteen hour day. So it's eight hours of sitting and eight hours of walking meditation all in the same room. Plus in the two hours for for eating at five in the morning and eleven um you'd have lunch and then no eating after midday. And then You'd have

Somewhere around three, three and a half hours sleep at at night time. And that was it, seven days a week. Wow. So it was It was a really I mean really kind of quite extreme retrospectively. I think I would have done things a little differently. Um

Th there was no one there, there were no English people there. Um there was no one who spoke. really English. didn't really speak any English, so every afternoon I had ten minutes with him. And I'd go and sit there.

And he'd look at me and he'd sort of smile and look very kind of warm and happy and Sometimes I'd sit there and I'd smile and kinda laugh and other days I'd sit there and I'd cry and he didn't really have anything to say'cause he didn't speak English. Sometimes he'd just speak Burmese anyway, and I would just sit there and kind of, you know. So there wasn't a lot of instruction taking place. Yeah, I've I've talked to people who've done Vipassana, which is like ten days silent retreat, and who who've had like in certainly in the first few days, really broken down, you know, really just emotional breakdowns is so hard. Um feel so isolating. You must have experienced that.

Oh yeah. Yeah, I definitely I I I met a part of myself that I had never previously experienced and It was vulnerable, it was painful. Challenging in the

Ways yeah, I don't even know how to describe. Were you still thinking, Yep, I w I wanna become a monk? Like I I I mean, to to me, I think ninety percent of people would have just dropped out of that point and said, Uh, this isn't for me. I think there's different ways of looking at that guy. I think through the lens of a Buddhist monk, I think you just look at it and say, Well, it's karma, you know, kinda that was my journey and you know, this is the journey I'm on and I kind of it did

You know when you're living your life and it just feels like you're in the right place in the right time, even if it's difficult There's still a sense that this is This is just where I should be right now. So even when it was difficult. I still felt

That this is where I should be right now. Yeah. But Yeah, eventually kind of there was a point where I think I kept getting ill in Asia as well, you know. Like that is the the additional challenge. It's not just the challenges of the mind, it's the challenges of the stomach and the bowels as well. And I remember eventually a a a teacher from Australia coming and he said, Look

Honestly, you said if you wanna kinda go and do like a a year retreat or a two year retreat or something like that He said I'd probably try and do it in the West if you can. He said, Find a good teacher, but he said it's so much easier to do that. So I s yeah, I started sort of looking at some some other places as well and And I met this teacher, this Tibetan Lama.

And um You know, we talked a lot. By that stage I'd already kind of done multiple years, I don't know, probably four years, something like that, of training. And we talked to we talked a lot. And I was so moved by his warmth, by his compassion, by his sense of joy. things I'd not necessarily I'd witnessed a lot of awareness and focus and attention in other monasteries, but I hadn't really kind of seen this other sort of side.

And yeah, I made the decision it was really easy, again, kind of actually. This is what I've been looking for and yeah, now I don't know, how many years later, twenty five years later, he's still he's still my teacher now. Hm. So Andy I mean. During this period like I I assume that you'd go home now and again, um, you know, to visit family and friends. And when you did, like what did they think of you?

Did they feel like you changed a lot? Yeah, so I do remember going back, um, so I was I'd f fully ordained And I remember walking down the high street. So I mean this is a small town in the southwest of England I'm walking down there in my bright sort of maroon robes.

And seeing kind of old school teachers and you know, old mates. And then saying to my friends kind of, Hey, it'd be great to all meet up together and um and they're like, Sure, yeah, just come down the pub, we'll be there, like where we always are And I'm thinking in my mind, you know, there's this conflict of Oh I'm a monk. I can't walk into a pub as a monk and Maybe it's okay if I just drink water and look. They're not gonna meet me anywhere else,'cause like genuinely, they've been sat in those same chairs for many years. Yeah. They weren't gonna give them up. So I did. I I walked into our our local pub where we used to hang out as teenagers, and I sat down around a table. I remember there were eight of us around this table. I drank water, they drank beer. And we talked about the Himalayas.

Yeah. I s I never felt like I I lost touch with character or the person that I grew up with. It wasn't like a different person. Yeah. It was just I was having a different experience. Okay, I I wanna I wanna kinda fast forward just a a couple of years to

to the early two thousands'cause I guess at a certain point you actually w wind up in Moscow in Russia um teaching at a meditation center there. Yeah. And and I guess you were sort of were supposed to be there, like waiting until you get a spot at Like one of these long term retreats. Is is that right? Absolutely. So there was a there was a four year retreat coming up at one of the monasteries. And this retreat just kept getting pushed back. So I found myself in Moscow for a number of years kind of teaching meditation but waiting to go into long term retreat and So I think on the one hand I was thinking, okay, I wanna make a a long term commitment to to retreat and better understanding my mind. And on the other hand I was getting this

What does it mean to teach? Meditation, you know, and it wasn't what I'd set out to do. But I kind of accidentally found myself in a position where where I was I was then teaching. You were teaching meditation in Moscow to Russians in English? Correct. and mixed in with the Russians were a bunch of expats who lived in in Moscow. And I got to know people who would come along to these centers kind of alongside the the sessions that we'd have at the centre, I'd meet up with them. And then

one of the expats had invited me to to go in and teach his execs, uh an oil company in in Russia. And he said, look, you know, kind of you can't come in dressed as a Buddhist monk, you know, it's it's an oil company, we're in Moscow Um and and that had got me thinking about this whole idea of, you know, demystifying this and trying trying to make it more accessible. You go back to the UK in 2004, after um a couple years in in Russia, to study Circus arts. This is a total like left out of left field. People are gonna listen to this and say, Wait, what? Wait, I thought you were a monk. You were doing joined the circus?

What what's What's the story? Yeah. So It sounds crazy. I know.

It it It actually stay stay with me, guy. It it does actually make more sense than it than it first sounds. What happened was I was in Moscow. And I'd already made the decision actually to Sort of hand back my robes. To no longer be a monk. Mm-hmm.

W why? Um so I found increasingly over the years that I was there that as I say I was meeting people and I was finding a way of Talking about meditation in a way that I had never

experience myself And but that seem to really resonate with people. You found a way to explain it to people language that you Exactly. Exactly that. So I found myself

Living in Moscow, still teaching in the meditation centre, but no longer living as a monk. Mm. And I hadn't done any exercise for ten years. And I was really excited about doing some exercise. And a friend of mine there was doing a degree at Moscow State Circus. And he said, look, you know, I used to love acrobatics and stuff and juggling and he was like, Oh, why don't you just come along, you know, meet some of my teachers.

So it did and I d I don't really kinda know how it happened, but I was there and one of them said, Hey look, you know, you can do a degree in this back in London. And I was already thinking, Okay, how do I make this transition from Buddhist monk Living in the monastery.

Making this content more available. Yeah. I had no money. As a monk you give away all your belongings. So I'd given away all my clothes money, everything. So I was thinking, how am I gonna go from Russia back to England? And I kinda saw an opportunity, I guess, as a now a very mature student, um, at thirty two, um I was I was in a position where the government would essentially Kind of pay for everything. Like, fund your education to study

To study circus? So yeah, so so they they funded not only the degree But they also funded my my living as well. So, you know, I was I got into a situation where I didn't have to find Kind of a job. When I went back to the UK. So by during the day

I went to school and studied studied circus arts. It was uh it was a big big difference. And meantime, in your mind you had this idea of I think I can make meditation more accessible. Yeah, I mean every available I was up at four o'clock in the morning writing content and trying to work out kinda okay well what is this thing that I wanna do? But alongside that, running in parallel was I managed to find uh a place where I could teach teach meditation, just doing one to one at that point. I found a a doctor um who ran an integrative health center in London where they had everything from sort of rheumatic specialists to cardiac specialists, you know, right across the board, all different disciplines. And he had heard of mindfulness.

And he said, Well look, if you can make it work here, then I'm I'm happy to to give you one of the The clinic's rooms. who were the kinds of people who were going to see you? Were they to were they people who were suffering from medical ailments, were they people who just had work stress, or Were they kind of hippy dippy kind of people, or people in suits and ties, or Yeah, they

The I I deliberately chose that clinic. um or that kind of approach because I didn't want it to be in a an alternative kinda health clinic or something like you know, I wanted it to feel really kind of mainstream. That was that was intentional. It was also in the city. It was in the financial district of London. So most of the people I was seeing um worked in the financial industry, they were struggling with depression. Anxiety. Insomnia.

Migraine. It was broad. But I would I would say that they were all struggling with many of the the things that we we all suffer with in in life now. So in London were you convening like larger meditation groups or was it mainly one on one groups? So I did I'd started with some workshops. So the the in the clinic I was primarily

Yeah, but by that stage I'd I'd finished kinda studying um at the at the service school. I was working full time in the clinic, seeing anything from six to ten people a day. Um and I started the weekends, I started I did a few a few workshops, but it only really changed to sort of much larger larger groups after I met Mine now very good. Good friend Rich. Um, who's the co founder of Headspace.

Uh so this is probably a good time to bring you in, Rich. You've been sitting here patiently. Yeah. And that's I understand it. Like you when you met Andy, you were uh I guess in your mid twenties and working in London at this sort of high powered ad agency called BBH. Is that right? Yeah, I was working on Kingley Street, right in the middle of the sava, yeah. Right. So so your like sort of day to day life was uh probably like w working all day and like not getting much sleep and w was that m more or less what it was like? Yeah, I was working a lot. Like we you know, if we were pitching He would often work fifteen, sixteen hour days and we would w it was client services, so you were you know, you were at the behest of clients. So you had to work crazy hours. But at the same time there was just a lot of

There's a lot of drinking and partying that went with Yeah. um and it was a way to kinda really let off steam. Everyone worked really hard and played really, really hard. It was very hard living, I would say for for in those early years when I when I was working for sure.

Um, did you like that life? Well, I'd loved to be honest with you, I absolutely loved it when I I felt like I'd found my career calling and I love that I could be around creative

People and come up with Creative kind of products. Over time though, I think when I gave up drinking. Um when I kinda decided that I was not gonna kind of live as hard.

Yeah, I just knew I didn't want to do that anymore and I kind of I felt the kind of the shallow nature of selling people things that they maybe didn't want. And I just wasn't getting I just wasn't getting any joy from that experience. And I didn't know what I wanted to do and I was getting acupuncture at the time because I was just getting more and more anxious as I kind of didn't really feel feel like I understood my place in the world. And then that the the person that was giving me the acupuncture, said look and I was obviously telling about my job and how unhappy I was said look I've got a I've actually got a course

Starting next month. Have you ever thought about being an acupuncturist? I think you'd be a Brilliant acupuncturist. I've never considered that. And but I yeah, I went in then the next week and and I quit and decided that I was gonna go and become an actual

Yeah, that's how that happened. Wow. So did you start taking classes? Yeah, I I just felt like I wanted to do something that had some Impact so I started the course. three days a week in a normal academic kind of calendar.

And then I was freelancing for the rest of the time to kinda make money. Um freelance advertising. Well freelance is kind of just marketing of advice. I it's weird, when I kind of Quit my job. lots of people reached out and so I kind of managed to cobble together

Quite a few. independent jobs that was enough to kinda pay my you know, pay my mortgage and I got a flatmate and I managed to kinda survive that way and pay for my course. So you're doing that, and how did you come across Andy. I mean at that time he's teaching meditation in in the city in London. Um

Did you hear about him from someone else? Yeah the one of the there's a guy called Adam Breden who had a business called All Star Lanes and he had asked me to help him out with some marketing, so I was helping him. Yeah. We'd become good friends and I was open about you know, how anxious I was feeling and just how that was getting progressively worse.

And he'd been getting one on one lessons. From Andy. Um and he suggested I should go and meet Andy. Like Andy had this clinic and he wanted some help with it. So it was this skill swap. You know, I met Andy and he had the clinic And so he said look, why don't

you know, I put you through the the clinic experience and I think I can help you And maybe you can help me with some ideas for the clinic. that Rich could help you with did you think He might be able to help me figure out a way to Get this out to more people.

Yeah, I think I think exactly that, you know. I I could see that it was working for people and people who previously wouldn't have looked at meditation were getting benefit from it. At that time I was starting to put together I was thinking like Do I start trying to train other people to teach meditation? Do I try and take this into workplaces? I just didn't really kind of I had no idea. I Pl zero business experience, but also no idea how to to brand it or anything, you know, kind of and I just thought that that Rich could could help sort of

Help me, yeah, take this idea outside of the the clinic and beyond. That's right. So we there was a Starbucks that was over the road. And so we would before the session we would go over the road and he And he'd tell me all his ideas, I'd give him loads of ideas. Um, and then we go over to the clinic and he would teach me meditation. So I really kinda started it was a very much an exchange of skills with no real sense of where it would

Where it would go. But Anti, I mean w what did you say to Rich? Like did you say, Hey, you know, um I wanna start an education company. I wanna make uh like pamphlets. W like was it Was it not that specific? I think it was more about I really want to demystify meditation. I wanna get meditation out there, wanna get more people meditating. I don't know how to do it kind of outside of the clinic. At which point I said, How do you feel about the name?'Cause is called I really wanted to mystify meditation. I said, Talk to me about the name. It was uh it was called a sunya which Andy can

That was the name of your clinic? Asunya? Yeah. So sunya, sunyata, and asunyata, which sort of the old Sanskrit words, but Um Asunya means kind of bringing the Um making something real out of emptiness. And so like the the sentiment of it was kind of right in the sense that kinda I wanted to bring something into the world that kind of, you know, people hadn't necessarily experienced. But I mean an old Sanskrit name.

Probably not the right way to demystify something. So you guys start this process of just kinda brainstorming in the meantime, Richier Going through A course, right? Like a meditation course. Yeah, and he's teaching me.

as he would his clients in the clinic. It was a ten week course and it was just a really good kind of training experience. The aim of it at the start, it really was just a kind of simple exchange. This was like a almost like a barter. It's uh it's not a great word, but like you you gave Andy you gave Rich free meditation sessions and and Rich you gave Andy free consulting. Yeah, that was very much how it worked. Yeah. Get the better end of that deal. Like who who's gonna lose more money. Because Rich, you're probably tracking on money for your consulting fees. I think I go to the better. No, I d I No, honestly. I d genuinely I could kind of, you know

I mean. When I the second time I went to see him, I I basically wrote out a stream of consciousness of everything that was in my mind. Because I I couldn't make sense of it. And so I I didn't know how to explain in words what was going on in my mind. And so I just made bro this m when I think back at it, this this madness of uh Like double-sided kind of 18 sides of pure drivel, really, when I when I think about it. And Andy, I gave it to Andy and said, look, this is what's going on.

And he patiently read. Every single word in front of me. And never like a look of judgment or anything on his face. And at the end of it was just like look, I think one, I think this is like very normal and two you know, I I think I can help you with it. And so to hear that

When you felt Desperate. is I yeah, one of the like the kindest things anyone can ever do for you. So I I think I genuinely definitely think I got the better I got the better end of the deal than than Andy. So Andy, I imagine that most of the people who came and saw you really liked you because you are there to help them.

What did you like about Rich, or what did you did you I mean m there must have been some kind of connection between the two of you Pretty quickly. You know, obviously we we got on very well, but we had a shared sense of anything is possible. Just I think that was just our character. I think whether it was we were born with it or we kind of got bought up in different households, but we both had a shared sense that anything was possible.

We both shared a naive optimism and ambition, I think. We both got energy from being with the other person. So You're Meeting regularly.

And you're kinda brainstorming. And at what point Did the two of you say hey? Let's do something together. Was was it the feeling from the beginning or or did that Well I think I'm not sure. Yeah, I don't think it w right from the beginning I definitely didn't think that that was gonna be the thing. I thought I was genuinely just helping Andy and I just felt very

Grateful that I was getting help with my anxiety. And so I just thought it was genuinely like a A skill swap, but the I think the moment it kinda became clear was when we were talking about

What it could be. And we got a sense of that kind of shared understanding and Andy actually said to me Would you come? Would you like to work with me? And I thought he was saying

It's my business, would you like to come and work for me? And I was like, Yeah, sure. I can't afford to to kinda pay you. Um but would you do it? And I was like, Yeah, of course. And it was at that point that Andy said to me, No, I like as a Fifty fifty partner. Like I won't.

I want let's start this thing together. And that was the first time genuinely that I thought Oh. He actually wants to do a a business with me. We come back in just a moment.

At Rich and Andy turned the one-on-one meditation experience in the clinic into an app. used by millions of people all over the world. Stay with us, I'm Guy Ross, and you're listening to How I Built This. from MPR.

Welcome back to how I built this, I'm Guy Raz. So it's right around two thousand ten when Andy Puttycomb and Rich Pearson decide to go into business together. But at this point they still don't really know what the business is gonna be. They have a hunch that Andy's meditation training could help a lot of people.

Problem is. How do you scale Andy? The very first idea actually that I think on the first or second. I said

You should put some on that. And Andy's like. Yeah, I l I like the idea, but it's it won't work because traditionally it's always been taught in a kind of teach to student model like in a kinda in live in person.

And so That's when we started to play around with the idea of events and live events. So you were going to be uh like a live events Business. We were. We were for several several years. Yeah, we were live event we did live events. And a curiosity, I mean Rich was kinda marinated in this world. He'd been in advertising and business development, like this was a a a a totally

normal pursuit. Yeah. But you had been like you had given away all of your stuff. Right. Like You were you were like living in monasteries and wearing robes, like Was a part of you uncomfortable with the With the idea of like

A business? Yeah, I don't know if We really thought of it as It was almost more like

Kinda how do we just change the the behavior and the way people think about something. Obviously to survive while I was working at the clinic. Um, I'd had to charge money. And so I'd kinda got past that point. That was At the beginning of the clinic, that was a really big leap for me to charge money to teach somebody meditation felt so fundamentally different from where I'd come from.

I spoke with enough teachers that really kinda coached me through that and helped me get understand that well that is the reality of living in the world, like your land or He's gonna want some rent. And if you have a skill, it's kinda okay to put a value on that and uh In in order to share it. So I'd gone through that kind of more through the clinic process. So by the time we got to to Headspace, it was more about just this big idea of of demystifying meditation and getting it out there.

So you guys needed to to build an events company or to and event events company is probably not the best description, but this idea that if you wanted to spread this idea, you still needed money to mount events and to advertise and so So where did you go first? Well, we went to um Andy had some clients at the clinic that he you know, he'd worked with and people that he knew in Russia that had kind of contributed. So friends on that side. Went to my dad

My poor dad. I've Which is that, by the way? Like have to give him a shout out. He was Amazing. Yeah. I mean honestly, if it hadn't have been for Ian, like we we wouldn't have we wouldn't have made it and He I remember going down to to see him going we presented him with this this big kind of pitch. We put together a business plan and everything.

And at the end of it he said, I don't know if it was like it's a terrible idea. He said, I don't think this idea is gonna work, but he said, If anyone can make it work, he said, I think you two guys can And He said so uh you know, I'm prepared to I'm prepared to give you a tenth of what you've asked for. But it's it's on you guys, not on the idea. Yeah. And I read that um that your dad invest it or gave you fifty thousand pounds um to help start it. But I'm w I mean I'm wondering, I mean did you tell him, you know, oh we're gonna have events and people are gonna buy tickets and you know, we're gonna create a sustainable business that way, or or was there more like I don't I mean I how would he have seen a return on his investment?

The b at the time it was purely just the events. And we felt that we could build a business from that and that was the business that my dad quite rightly actually in hindsight said would never make a good business and it didn't Um but The thing that I would say is one

he never ever once asked for any shares in the business or any return for any of the money that he gave us. And to the point that actually when we finally did do a fundraise in two thousand fifteen, like our first proper fundraise. That was when we kinda forced him to take shares for the amount that he'd invested in the early days. But he never genuinely he said to me, I was never expecting to see any of that that money back. And and how did you come up with a name Headspace? It was one of those.

Beautiful moments. And trust me, there were so many bad names that we'd uh I don't remember them all, but we were we were actually going I think we were going down to um Was it down to your dad? And we were on the way on the way down there and And Rich kind of said, I really feel like it just it needs to have something very tangible in there. Like the mind is so intangible, like you know kinda the word head I think is really kind of clear what it what it's about. And I was sat in a passenger seat and I said, Yeah, but it needs to feel spacious. Like that's what people want. That's what people are looking for And we you know, we looked at each other and went, Headspace. It was just one of those and we I mean we've spent months trying to go to brainstorm all there's so many bad ideas. I know that which sounds like a bad German techno club in Berlin. Um Um there was recognition, there was like Mind Space. Oh there was Mind Lab. Mind Lab, Mind Gym. Yeah. I mean every combination that was the none of them good.

No good. All right, so you have a little bit of capital to work with. It's two thousand ten. Yeah. And what's the first Thing you do? Do you like mount an event?

Tell him how you spent the money, Richie. Tell him how you spent the money. Well, there's a few things. I mean I win stuff but the the I felt Well we've both felt that Meditation was really intangible and you couldn't touch it and you couldn't see it and you couldn't

What is it? And so we really wanted to create A physical experience. So we spend of the fifty thousand pounds we spent twenty thousand pounds of it on the the kind of physical collateral to give out at the event. So we we

We designed these beautiful cards, about sixty different cards. leading you through the ten steps of meditation, tips for how to sit. And it was really the first version actually of the Yeah. Twenty grand went on that.

And then I remember sitting on the back of Richie's moped, travelling around London, looking at trying to find the right venue. And we eventually settled on on BAFTA. Um the the art and film But film and television kind of fairly kind of luxe kind of feeling. Um Just as far away from the community center vibe as we could get.'Cause we were trying to, you know, put meditation in this new space and I think it was ten thousand pounds a day. So basically on that first event, I think we'd already blown thirty before we even kind of turned up. Okay, so so this first event happens, I guess, in May of Of two thousand ten, right? Mm. And by the way, how many people showed up?

Yeah, we had about two hundred people there. So it was it was And this is in in in London at Bafta. It was in London at Bafta, yeah. And it was off the back of We'd had an article in the the times and it had launched about four weeks before the event. It was double pastebread, which is really hard to get.

And it said Britain's And he's wins it. He said Britain's top meditation guru, The Expert's Expert, and it was about how Andy had been training some politicians and sports, you know, professional athletes who had been coming to the clinic. and it was a kinda profile piece on on Andy. And that one Help sell.

Tickets to the events. and secondly, it started a process where we managed to get a book deal, a three book deal with Hodder and Staunton and the advance from that. Which I think it was still at that time it was like one of the highest advances paid for A debut non fiction author really funded

the rest of the business, yeah, it really did. Yeah, exactly. It gave us it, a hundred and eighty thousand. Um which at that time, at that stage in the business, that was huge. Transformational probably, yeah. Yeah. 'Cause I have to imagine that the events that you launched weren't really generating 'Sive, right? You've got to pay for venue space and Yeah, or maybe provide. You were losing money on them, guy.

So Describe what they were like. Tea? Headspace moments was In the taxi on the way to the first event with Andy and I just looked at him and I've been so busy trying to work out all of the the you know To get the event, I just turned to him I said, But what have you got planned for the day, do you know? Do you know what you're gonna talk about? And he's like

I'm just working it out and I was thinking we're like five minutes from all these people turning up. And it started like the first event was Andy on stage for eight hours with some breaks. This isn't it is an all day event. You gotta feel you gotta feel sorry for the audience, but it was it was just it was me, it was me and fact probably I'd say all the Bafter ones, right? So probably for the first I don't know, six or eight events we did, that was the format. It was it was eight hours on stage. A break for lunch, like a couple of breaks kinda midway through morning and afternoon and and then a break for lunch. We did We used to try and put them on every four to six weeks. And they got shorter. Yeah, as they got shorter, so we went from a full day to a half day, from a half day to sort of

Two hours and eventually uh down to forty five minutes or something. Um and I think the shorter they became the more often we did them and we would do maybe sort of Two or three in a day on a Saturday, rather than sort of one big one every six weeks or something. But it was It was like hindsight's no sight, but we got to speak to pretty much every single person that came to those events. And What's it like?

Think back to two thousand and ten. the UK, probably the most cynical market. in the world at that time around this type of subject matter. So it was just really interesting for us to see how different People responded.

We got feedback. cards that were very detailed that we made people feel fill out. But it was brilliant because it that really that input and that feedback, it was just a big research group for when we eventually did launch the app. So I guess it was twenty twelve when you launched. the first version of the app, um

How did that How did that happen? I mean, it sounds like Rich that you had already in your mind you were thinking we've gotta put out an app And Andy, it sounds like you were a little r bit reluctant about doing that. So how did you kind of Come to terms with

Turning it into an app. So We talked about how could we recreate that ten week journey in the clinic. How could we kinda give somebody that sort same level of sort benefit. Um and definitely I I was reluctant But then when we I think eventually they just locked me in a studio or something and said just just try and record some stuff and see see what happens.

Um but like I Yeah, we together we chatted and translated the the ten week course. Into a three hundred and sixty five day programme. The reason that we got to that point was that We knew the business.

That we had wasn't working. and our friends and family had said, Look, we really love you guys, but we're not we're not giving you any more money. This is a terrible business, like well done, but enough's enough. And so with the last bit of cash that we had We managed to pull in every single favour that we had left. And where were you recording the audio? I mean, did you have to get studio space and And do that.

I mean so much of headspace is down to generosity and kindness of friends and people we knew along the way. And Rich had you know, whenever we needed something or had a problem, we'd be like, Oh I know a guy, or I know a girl. And and we phone him up and he had this friend, um, Dre, who's um not the doctor. Um who's a v who's a very who's a very dear friend of both of us now. And uh Dre was I mean He was amazing. I mean, the first version of the app, he basically gave us free access to his studio for the first couple of years, right? He had a recording studio.

Yeah, he had yeah, he had a recording studio as part of his business. And I mean, maybe we pay for the engineer, but other than that, I mean he did everything for free. He was Again, we just couldn't have done it with without him. You would just you would record ten minute meditations that you could Yeah, they're actually longer. So it was and at that time we you know, we just did them all real time and everything. And so it was um

Yeah, it was ten minutes for ten days, fifteen minutes for fifteen days, and then it was twenty minute meditations for the rest of the year. And it was just your voice. Speaking a little bit. Silence. Coming in.

Silence. Like in real time. Yeah, all in real time. Yeah. And yeah, we put together this year long course. Hm. But w when it came to the app itself, like the the coding part, did you like hire a tech team or or did you just like have some outside company put it together for you? Well, the my old agency at BBH helped us they gave us some kind of Helping kind of

pulling it together. And then we also had a lot of freelancers. So we had a freelancer in Bulgaria, we had someone in India, we had people in London. We just It was really as scrappy as we could make it just to get the thing up. And then we managed to convince This is a really big

thing for us. There were two things that happened that really helped. First thing is a woman called Kathy Waters at Virgin. agreed to put our content on every single Virgin Atlantic plane. And we pitched her in down at Gatwick. Yeah. And she came back a couple of weeks later and said, Yeah, we're gonna put it on we're gonna put it on all our weeks. Which was massive. We're gonna put Andy's recordings on our our planes. Yeah. And were they gonna pay for this or that you just not do it. It was a great exposure, right? Massive huge. It was massive. And then on the back of that we then managed to convince the Guardian newspaper in the UK to put a million Booklets on the front and we didn't pay for it. The booklets of of what?

So we we put together they they wanted content and we wanted exposure. So it was a it was a great it was a great deal. They they said could we come up with a a booklet on on how to meditate? But they they would actually kind of, you know, put the pay for the booklets. Yeah. So we we put together a a little a mini sort of manual for the start of the year on on how to meditate and how to have a mindful year. And did that immediately have an impact on on the downloads of the app? That's exactly right. Like in that first month that we launched, we took thirty-two thousand pounds in revenue in that first

January. And that was, you know. That was a really amazing moment for the for the team and and then it was like oh my god this thing's gonna fall down unless we we rebuild it. Alright, so you guys are um scrappy and and This thing starts to get a little bit of traction. And then you decide pretty early on, 2013.

Gonna relocate. You're gonna move Uproot your lives and move to Los Angeles. Yeah. Uh and why? we were coming over to to the US and we'd done an event in New York, which was covered by New York Times and and what we found was that every time we came over to the US we were making great connections great relationships, great friendships, but we would always be saying, Oh, we're

from the UK, we're going back to the UK. And very often those conversations would be well great. When you When you move out to US or when your company kinda moves out here, let's pick these conversations up. So he got us kinda chatting. And I think both of us I mean, we used to love coming to to California, especially.

it always felt like home for both of us, you know. I think we really connected with with the feeling here and there were a lot of A lot of really good business. kind of reasons for for coming here. Yeah, I think what is too thing, I think in the UK you speak to someone about an idea and They'll give you a thousand reasons why you can't do it.

And I think in America You say the same idea and they go There's a thousand reasons why it'll work, and have you thought about making it bigger? And can I introduce you to X, Y, and Z? Yeah. And it it's just the different it's built into the culture and the psyche here in a way that it's not extra. But you don't have to it's kind of just part of the way that this country's been built. And I think That

If you are positive and you dream big, like there is no better place I think in the world to build a project like Headspace. And I think we felt like that. I do want to ask you, um Andy, about um And shortly after you moved. to California.

Um you were diagnosed with cancer. I was, yeah. So All of a sudden you guys move the business there. And you're trying to grow it. And there's this huge

Set back. Um First of all, you are fully recovered today. I am, thank you. Oh yeah.

I am. Um Yeah, we're five. I guess five years on from it. No.

Did you I mean, this is a real test because you would work with people who were recovering From cancer treatment probably at the clinic in in London and and and it's different when it happens to you. It is and it's it's also different, you know, I'd spent many many years kind of doing practices specifically reflecting on one's own mortality and impermanence and

And death and it's very different doing that in an abstract way. But I did find I found meditation was kinda my rock throughout that period. It was it was something that I came back to not just once a day, but sort of many, many times a day. You know, it's not that I was free from fear, don't get me wrong, it was a scary time. But I think the temptation in those types of situations in life is to leap ahead to what might be, what could be, and to get kinda caught up in a lot of anxiety about that, or maybe to even get into a kind of a conversation in your mind of, you know, is it fair or am I, you know And

Thankfully like that training kind of allowed me to You know, as much as possible to stay fairly kind of present and not to get sort of too too caught up in that stuff. So were you kind of out of commission for For a while.

I was, you know, so I th you know, the the first week obviously, you know, we didn't I we didn't even have medical insurance, we were so new in America. Um And in the meantime, you know, we were having to establish ourselves in in the US and kinda get set up here and also manage the team back home as well,'cause there were sort of yeah, twelve, fifteen people in the office back in London. Yeah, it was I think it was a challenging time, like all round, really. It was a really I didn't really know anyone in we didn't know anyone. Like we we were really kind of out here on our own and so There was no other choice, and Andy had all these

things booked in, all these speaking engagements and the company needed money and so we couldn't turn them down and we'd signed contracts, so I had to learn how to kind of go out and do that and it was It was a really challenging time, but also just to see I think Andy and Lucinda and his wife go through

That And feel very helpless. It's tricky. Like it was just a really tricky mix of emotions I would say that I that I had and a lot of just uncertainty. I mean guy the the load that Rich took on like alongside just running the business the day to day of running a a fast kind of growing company. He basically took on all of the events and talking kind of, you know, engagements which were in Europe and in Asia and I mean

Which was I can't remember how many miles you flew in there was a space of like a month. I mean tens and tens of thousands. Just he was he was living living on planes. So it was it was really amazing to kinda watch actually just the the capacity that he had to do that. When you guys got to LA, was it already clear that to build this into something bigger You would have to

Raise outside money. Well We were all to be honest you, we were a bit Not a bit. We were very nervous about it. And it took us a little

Well, I think it took me a long time actually to get comfortable with it. Um It was kinda irrational fear about losing control of the The vision and the mission. It happens a lot. It does happen a lot. And we've probably heard a lot of bad stories and So when we got to California it was

The product was it really did take off in a different way and the business was really making serious kind of money. And so at that point when Like when people were coming to us saying we want to invest in your company, I do think we had a lot of leverage'cause the business was generating a lot of cash and we didn't have many people working at the company. So it enabled us

We probably to be honest, go, we probably went overboard, but we met over sixty different Investment Houses uh be the best way to describe it, until we found someone that we really felt aligned with and we could get the deal done that would work for us. I I'm trying to imagine like pitch meetings. I know that a lot of investors when you got to California were really interested in and you probably didn't have to sort of sell them on the idea too hard. But Andy, I mean

Just wondering given like your background and like You know, you studied to be a monk and you like gave up all your possessions and you had this epiphany as a you know, twenty four year old, twenty three year old to Live a simpler life. Now you are

We're going to be built into That these investors We're talking about scale and you know billion dollar company and Was a part of you uncomfortable with that? I have to imagine it was. Um I'm sure there were there were moments of discomfort. I think the bigger kind of thing look, when if they're talking about scale, well that's great, we were talking about the same thing. We wanted to get this out to as many people as possible. And we couldn't do that without the money.

I think the the temptation very often is to is to look at it in a very sort of black and white way in in just in society in general and say kind of like, you know, okay, money money's bad, you know. You guys are trying to do this, it's good, money's bad. I didn't really look at it in that way. I kind of I think money can be incredibly helpful. You know, I was really excited about getting meditation out there and getting it to to more people. So that was a a way of doing it. It seems like one of the ways you guys have also managed this process,'cause I think you've raised almost seventy five million dollars after a a few rounds. The first round was twenty fifteen, I think you raised about thirty million dollars. That Rich, you handle the business side really, and Andy, you kinda focus on

Just really the content. Yeah, they don't they don't let me near the books, and rightly so. Yeah, Richie Richie looks after the the business. Yeah, but we g I you know, like Andy said, like we We work more as a kind of creative right partnership on the things that you know, Andy's passionate about and I'm passionate about. And yeah, the day to day running is And he's not involved in

And a lot of that. Yeah. Um Yeah, once you guys Raised.

to these rounds. You had capital for marketing and to really push this out in in new ways and um It was an ad. I think it came out in twenty sixteen. It was a it was um the end of something like you know when I uh when I meditate I crush it. When I meditate, you know, focus. Um and so some people criticized this and said, Look, you know, medication is not about

performance. This is not the point of meditation is not to make you a better investment maker. It's not to make you uh you know a better football player. It's it's that is not what it's about. Um feel about that when people say that. It was interesting that that campaign'cause I think I think he actually did something really kinda helpful. We wanted to we wanted to show people that

Meditation isn't this Thing. You know, and we're gonna tell you how you're gonna benefit from it. We wanted to say look, there is this skill. Anybody can learn this skill and you can apply it with your own intention to any aspect of your life.

The reality is, as I've seen over kind of a lifetime. Is that Very often the reason people start meditating isn't the reason they necessarily continue meditating. And that they might begin it because they want to be better on the football pitch, but over time. they start to realise it's showing up in other areas of their life as well. And yes, they're performing better, but actually they're starting to have perhaps better relationships and um and we wanted to break the mould and kinda say it's not just about feeling calm and having relaxation. You know, that kind of traditional way of thinking about meditation, but it can also be

active, it can also be exciting, it can be joyful and it can be different. And and I mean I guess one of the reasons why you have to advertise your You know, your app, your product is because You have competitors, right? There are there are other meditation apps.

out there. Yeah. Which is which is like one of these kind of weird aspects about this whole world because you kind of expect the meditation space to be like peaceful and kind and gentle, but like this is a big business now, right? Like there are other people in the space. So do do you guys I don't know, I mean do you sort of If you got competitors, do are you kinda like looking over your shoulder to see what they're doing and and are you trying to beat them? No, I think there are different ways of

Of kinda looking at it. Personally I don't necessarily look at it as competition in the conventional kind of sense. I I feel like we have a job to do. And we'll sort of keep doing that and what other people do, other people will do. And I don't really like the idea of I think it's a very strange idea of competing for people's happiness. I mean that sounds like a it sounds kind of absurd in a way.

So I kinda feel like look, if our mission genuinely is to improve the health and happiness of the world Then if anyone's out there doing Things. that will genuinely improve the health and happiness of individuals, then that's something to celebrate. It's not something to you know, feel bad about from a competitive point of view.

So anyone listening to this interview, who's familiar with Head Space. will recognize Andy's voice right away. And I know Andy, you probably like people come up to you in cafes. Are you Andy from from Headspace? Sure. Um because it's so um distinct. And I wonder, I mean Is head space.

A company an idea. They can live without Andy's Image and brand and personality behind it can definitely live without my image. I mean this is a face for radio, trust me. But um this is probably a question for Rich and for rather than me. So if you think about it, we do have a English female voice in the product at the moment. Um so

that shows you that the essence and the quality and the authenticity of the content is still there, but it's just delivered by someone else. So We're in French were in German. We're gonna be in Spanish. We're gonna be like this. Other languages this year for the and the same the same kind of idea. So I definitely think it's not just about Andy's voice and so

As long as we always stay true to the way that we build products, I think there's a huge room to bring in other voices, other experts that aren't Andy. So Yeah, but you you almost have to. You have to think about what is right,'cause the value of a company can't be wrapped up around a single personality. And and I don't say that. I mean I I love you. I love listening to you uh you know, on the app, but if one day you both decide that you want to step out of this and your investors want to sell it or whatever, it can't be wrapped around. That's correct. Exactly and it's a lot it's a lot of pressure to have it in in just that. I think I think that um that cancer kind of scare actually was a really good you know a good wake up for for us to start thinking about that kind of you know it's too risky. to have it. You know, what if that person, you know, or if like in October by a bus or eaten by a shark or whatever happens in California but you know, like there is a risk, right? And so I I think it's not only part of improving

You know, it's de-risking things for the company, but it's also helping to improve the experience for our members as well. And Andy, when you think about All that you had wanted when you were twenty three, twenty four. And a life of simplicity. You've a very complex life now. You guys have what

two hundred plus employees. You know, you've got investors, you've got to have investor, you've got family Um Uh you're running a business people depend on you now? That's a Very different.

life. originally signed up for Um But do you prefer it this way? I honestly can't compare the two.

Um, I can't say kind of I can't look at one and say I prefer it to the other. Because For me they're not separate. obviously they are different experiences of life, different environments, but the mind's still the same, right? And I I didn't necessarily go into the monastery because that was necessarily how I would always want to live. It was more I thought it would take that long for me to understand my mind.

And I feel really lucky to have been in a position where I was able to go to that environment to experience the simplicity of that. And then have this incredible, almost what feels like a a second chapter. Where I get to kind of share that.

Um but it's a You know, it's something that All the kinda complications and stuff. Yeah, they're not easy, but you kind of You live with them'cause you care about it. How much of what happened with Headspace do you attribute to

Your hard work and your intelligence and your skill and how much to just luck. Ha ha. Did the laugh give it away. Yeah, I think

Just A lot of generosity, I'd say is one of the things that without that from a lot of people that really did just believe in us in the early days. Maybe Classify that as luck, I don't know, probably. Um But

I would also say we've worked We've worked really, really hard. As hard as you know I've never been more committed to anything in My whole life because Our hearts are in it.

Yeah, I think there's There's just a a set of ingredients that come together and we've contributed to that. But we've often said as well that sometimes it feels like there's just this Does this momentum? It's almost like a train that's just going. And it's like we grabbed on to the back of it. And to start with, we felt like we were kind of, you know, sort of just comfortably sort of travelling along and then it just sort picks up a load of speed. And now we're just hanging onto it at the back of the train. Because it's it's in it's been incredible to to be a we feel like we are part of something rather than Necessarily making something happen.

It's Andy Putticomb and Rich Pearson, co-founders of Headspace. Today, Headspace has millions of users in 190 countries, and a last reported valuation of$320 million. And even though Andy is no longer the only voice narrating on the Headspace app these days. Ian Rich joke that if anything ever happens to him At least they still have hours and hours of his meditation recordings. So I think I think they've worked it out. There's a couple of thousand kind of in total. So if you are eaten by a shark, there's a thousand hours that are still there on tape. Exactly. Exactly. I'm hoping this it's not gonna go down that way, but look if it does yes. Thanks for having us.

And please do stick around because in just a moment, we're gonna hear from you about the things you're building. Ball movies are about to heat up and Pop Culture Happy Hour from NVR has you covered. We'll tell you whether some of the big films on the way are as good as you're hoping they are, and we'll help build a list of gems you can uncover for yourself. Start your Oscar's prep early with Pop Culture Happy Air from NPR. Listen and subscribe now. Hey, thanks so much for sticking around, because it's time now for how you built that. And our story this week starts about nine years ago, on top

Of a camel. I was on a camel safari in the Thar Desert in Western India. This is Jensen Bram. And it was scorching hot. My Scandinavian skin was burnt to a crisp. And then snap. Someone

Sat on my sunglasses. His only pair of sunglasses in the middle of the desert. The arms were completely crushed, totally destroyed. But fortunately, the front part of the frame was still intact. So Jensen took a piece of twine and tied it around the hinges to secure what was left of the frames to his head. And it actually worked really well. They weren't falling down my nose, they didn't fall off as we were racing camels through these sand dunes. They didn't pinch his head or his ears. And when I didn't want them on, I could just drop them around my neck or put them in my pocket and not have to worry about breaking them. Jensen liked the sunglasses so much that when he got back to the US, he kept using them. He just took off the twine and replaced it with a leather cord. And I wore that McGyvered pair of sunglasses. for the next five years. And wherever he went, people noticed them.

Even strangers would come up to me on the street and be like, hey, where'd you get those? And Jensen started thinking, you know, maybe I should start selling these things like to bikers and backpackers and people like that. But I just didn't know where to begin, you know, sourcing the materials and and finding a manufacturer is such a daunting task. So Jensen partnered with a friend from college named Nikolai who knew a little about manufacturing, and the two of them started to call around. They found a company to make the lenses for the sunglasses. but they still needed a really important component, the cord, to take the place of the sidearms. You know, it had to be soft, around your head and over your ears, but it had to be rigid enough to kind of keep the sunglasses secure.

It also had to look nice and elegant, so it can just look like a shoelace. But the cord they started with was actually a shoelace from a high-end boot company. And it looked really great, but Jensen and Nikolai wanted to make it waterproof. We would melt cedar beeswax in a pot in my kitchen and dip all these cords in the wax and then bake the cord in the oven for two or three minutes. pull it out and dab it dry, and then repeat the process. But in the end, those first cotton cords kind of fell apart, and the guys had to keep looking. We must have gone through twelve to fifteen different cord manufacturers, and when they finally found the right cord, they still had to find just the right thread for stitching into a loop.

But the first iteration came out and it looked like someone had coughed up a hairball onto our cord. And by the way, at this point, Jensen and Nikolai were under a lot of pressure because they'd already done an Indiegogo campaign and had to assemble 3,000 pairs sunglasses. And they were doing all of that. By hand. Every pair has two cords, so we had to tie 6,000 cord ends, tie them and then clip it, and then fuse it with heat and then countersync it in the bead. After two months of working 12 to 17 hour days, and it was so stressful. Jensen and Nikolai were finally ready to ship out the glasses. They got some great reviews from outdoor magazines, they got into a few REI stores, and they're doing pretty well online. And they're gonna finish their first full year on the market with about a million dollars in sales.

Oh, and they call the shades? Umbrus. People always are like ombras, ombras, it's ombras, cause ombra means shade in Italian. That's Jensen Brem, his partner is Nikolai Poloni, and they run Umbras out of Seattle. And for every pair sold? They plant twenty trees.

If you want to find out more about Ombras, or hear previous episodes, head to our podcast page, how IbuiltThis.npr.org. Of course, if you want to tell us your story, go to build.npr.org. And thanks so much for listening to the show this week. You can subscribe at Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts and while you're there, please do give us a review. You can also write to us at hibtnpr.org. And if you want to send a tweet, it's at how I built this or at kyraz. Our show is produced this week by Casey Herman with music composed by Ramteen Arabli. Thanks also to Candace Lim, Julia Carney, Sanaz Meshkinpur, Neva Grant, and Jeff Rogers. Our intern is Sequoia Carillo. I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to How I Built This.

What you see above is a preview of the first minutes. One unlock costs 3 credits and covers this episode forever: full segment and word-level timestamps on this page, plus .txt, .srt, .vtt and word-level JSON downloads, as many times as you like.