Andy Dunn
Brian McConkey
Over the last decade, Bonobos pants have consumed a huge amount of space in my closet. I tried on some blazers at their Guideshop in San Francisco. With a movement of my credit card, I left without merchandise (because the store had no inventory) and they arrived at my house two days later. Bonobos was ahead of its time as one of the first digitally native brands that also reinvented the way retail was done.
In April 2019 I listened to a fascinating interview by Bonobos co-founding CEO Andy Dunn on the popular business podcast, How I built this with Guy Raz. They explained how he got the business off the ground, the trials and tribulations, and ultimately the acquisition by Walmart in 2017. It was a great interview, but after reading Andy’s new memoir: felt like only half the story.
The title of his memoirs was appropriate: Burn Rate: launch a startup and lose your mind. It’s a tour de force of entrepreneurship: It takes you behind the curtains of launching a business, raising capital, not raising capital, a series of leadership challenges and decisions that make a Faustian negotiation seem like an easy decision. Listening to Andy read his memoir felt like he was looking through a kaleidoscope that came into focus, overlaying his personal struggles that may have somehow fueled the success of his company.
Dunn’s memoir, Burn Rate: Launching a Startup and Losing Your Mind
Penguin Random House
“You are living the dream.”
Andy’s friend sent him this text shortly after his wedding and the sale of the company. Those four words couldn’t have been further from the truth. It is true that the Instagram-like exterior was not the reality, he told me during our interview.
The year before, Andy’s struggle to manage his bipolar I disorder unfortunately resulted in the worst manic episode of his life when he beat up his fiancée and her mother in their New York City apartment. They handcuffed him and finally the judge dismissed the charges after six months of observation. The wounds eventually healed and his fiancée, Manuela, and his mother supported him as he sought treatment.
Andy had originally been diagnosed 16 years earlier in college. One of the turning points he shares in his memoir was when one of his friends dismissed the subject of his manic episode when he surfaced.
“As if it was his burden to hear more than mine. As if he was more embarrassed by the memory than I am by my reality. By banishing the topic as taboo, after I finally found some strength to talk about it, it solidified my desire to never bring it up with anyone ever again.”, he stated in the book.
“He had no idea how important that moment was to me. We don’t know what people are up against. So the smallest thing, when someone opens up to you, it puts you in a high-risk situation that you may not be aware of. I had that vulnerable revelation, but he didn’t know that I didn’t mention it to anyone in two years,” he explained. On the receiving end, Andy suggests providing the person with an instant affirmation with an open reception.
“The first time I told someone and it went well, my friend was like, ‘Oh, it’s like you have a green sweater in your closet.’ He realized that it was a big deal for me, but he didn’t make it a big deal. He knew how to say two things at the same time. This doesn’t change anything about our relationship, and also this is just One thing about you, this is not all about you,” he explained.
What helped Andy get his mental health under control is a combination of finding the right medication and a healthy dose of therapy with his psychotherapist, Dr. Z. (a pseudonym Andy used for his therapist throughout the book). He said the book would not have been possible without the 1,200 therapy sessions between the catastrophic manic episode of 2016 and its writing.
“I would not have been able to process all the trauma and reconstruct my own psyche if I had hidden this for so long. An unwanted byproduct of all the work was the ability to write the book, with the benefit of having someone look at it in a mirror.”
A major turning point in the company was the tumultuous relationship with its co-founder, Brian Spaly, where he eventually asked if he would be willing to resign. In hindsight, could they have somehow worked it out to run the company together?
“I wasn’t ready at the time. The likelihood that two guys with really strong opinions were going to navigate that was slim. Would I have done it again? A hundred times a hundred. Go back to that saying: one day this pain will be useful to you. We needed each other to start this company and we learned a lot from each other, including from the disintegration of the business partnership. Only in hindsight do I imagine the scene in Hamilton where Aaron Burr’s reflection is that the world is wide enough for both of us. It really grabs me because it’s so true. The world felt so small and the conflict so intense at the time,” she explained.
Throughout our conversation we often draw wisdom from the parable of the lost horse that Manuela shared with him during a dark time. Is something apparently good that has actually happened to you something good?
“How do we reap the good of our suffering? Part of the good thing is sharing and somehow I got out of this maze. So the least I can do is share it.”
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