In Episode 164 of the Disruptors for Good podcast, we speak with Steven Izen, founder of Lokai, on building a $100M brand that gives back to causes around the world.
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Lokai bracelets were created with the intention of reminding people to stay balanced. The bracelet is composed of two elements: a white bead filled with water from Mt. Everest, the highest point on Earth, and a black bead containing mud from the Dead Sea, the lowest point on Earth.
These bracelets serve as a physical representation of life’s highs and lows—a reminder that it’s important to stay balanced amidst life’s challenges
The brand was founded by Steven Izen with the mission of inspiring people to “live with purpose and find balance in an ever-changing world.” Since then, they have grown wildly successful due to their commitment to helping others—10% of all proceeds go back to charity partners focused on helping those in need around the world.
Today, the brand offers dozens designs for both men and women, each conveying its own message or cause.
They also produce limited edition collections periodically throughout the year based on current events or meaningful occasions such as Pride Month, Earth Day, or Breast Cancer Awareness Month. The company also has major partnerships with the NFL, MLB, NBA, and College Teams.
“Life is a journey. Lokai exists to help you find balance between the highs and lows.” — Steven Izen, Founder & CEO
The bracelets are often worn by themselves but can also be stacked together with other bracelets for an even bolder look! People like wearing their Lokais because it serves as a constant reminder that life has its ups and downs, but no matter what comes our way we can remain grounded by staying balanced through it all.
Wearing a Lokai bracelet is a simple symbol of hope during hard times or encouragement during great times!
Wearing the bracelet is more than just an accessory; it is symbolic of remaining grounded in life’s highs and lows while making positive change in the world around us—an incredibly powerful message that resonates deeply with many people today!
Whether you opt for one color or stack multiple styles together for your own unique look, wearing your own Lokai bracelet can serve as a source of strength when you need it most!
The brand also offers a membership model to its customers, which offers multiple benefits and access to exclusive styles and colors.
With a Balance Club Membership, you can enjoy Lokai’s exclusive designs each month, discounted sitewide purchases and total freedom to pick up or skip any months that don’t fit your lifestyle -all while giving back to those in need.
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00:10
Host: Well, thank you so much, Steven, for joining me today. Super excited to chat about your journey, man. It’s a super impressive path that you’ve been on so far, building Lokai and infusing impact into a really powerful brand. I want to explore a lot of different paths with this, but let’s start with your journey. What was the aha moment? What was the reason for starting the company?
00:33
Steven Izen: Yeah, what’s up, Grant? Thanks for having me on the show. I actually came up with the idea for Lokai when I was 19. My grandfather was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, and that really brought me to a low in my life.
I was very close to him growing up, and it got me thinking about the highs and lows that I was going through and how everybody goes through highs and lows, regardless of age or demographic. So I said, “Okay, what are the highest and lowest points on Earth? Mount Everest and the Dead Sea.”
How could I take elements from those two places and incorporate them into a bracelet that people can wear every day as a reminder to find balance in life, staying humble when you’re on top of the world and hopeful when you’re at a low? I told my dad the idea for Lokai, and he said, “That’s a great idea, but everyone has great ideas. Now, the hard part is executing it.”
And I think the most important thing I ever did was add a giving back aspect to the brand. Giving back really helps you find balance as an individual, so we decided to pledge 10% of our profits to charity. Today, we’ve given almost $10 million to different nonprofit organizations.
01:39
Host: That’s pretty incredible. My first follow-up to that is about execution. What were the first steps you took to make this idea a reality?
01:55
Steven: Yeah, you know, for me, at 19, ignorance was bliss. I didn’t really understand all the different parts of what goes into building a business. I just wanted to get the product made. So, I started by Googling “how do you find a factory in China.” It was as simple as that. Day by day, I worked to make samples and get the product made.
When I did, I started the company by walking store to store in New York, cold-calling and asking to speak with the owner or manager to talk about selling Lokai. I got turned down almost every time, but the few wins I got kept me going. It started very organically like that.
02:45
Host: Did you have an e-commerce site spun up already in those early days, or was it just door-to-door trying to get into retail?
02:50
Steven: We did have e-commerce spun up. What really accelerated the growth of the brand was that as I walked door to door and handed out bracelets to friends and sold a few, I learned that people loved the story of Lokai because they were putting their own stories of highs and lows into the product.
I thought about how I could reach more people to tell their own stories of highs and lows. You got to get a little lucky in business, and it was about the time that Instagram was becoming a thing.
I started finding celebrities, athletes, and influencers who had family members with breast cancer or Alzheimer’s and reached out to them, saying, “Hey, we’re Lokai, a brand about inspiring people to find balance, staying humble and hopeful in life.
Can you tell your story? Here’s our product that gives back to breast cancer, Alzheimer’s, or whatever it might be.” It just created a wildfire from there.
03:55
Host: Wow. So, when you talk about the nonprofit partners and the give-back aspect, how did you go about that? Was it similar to the door-to-door sales with the physical product?
Was it just pinging nonprofits and saying, “Hey, we have this brand and we’d like to attach some donations to every sale”? What was the process for getting the nonprofits on board?
04:16
Steven: That’s exactly right. The first few were a lot more difficult than subsequent ones. Once you have a Rolodex of organizations you work with, others trust you more. It was really just telling my story and connecting with people at organizations who knew their client base wanted hope.
In the early days, we’d show up at Susan G. Komen breast cancer walks and sell the pink bracelets for Susan G. Komen. We also understood that the message of hope was powerful and needed within these organizations and their communities. We did some cross-marketing promotions as well.
05:06
Host: I want to go back to the high and low part with the Dead Sea and Mount Everest. How did that come to be, and how is that even possible? How do you find a way to get those elements into the product?
05:27
Steven: Surprisingly, they make a lot of beauty products out of mud from the Dead Sea, so I found a wholesaler who would sell me the Dead Sea mud. The water from Mount Everest took a while to find. I ended up connecting with a group of Sherpas, a climbing group, who would go up and get the water and bring it down.
05:56
Host: That’s interesting. The hardest part of any business is scale. How would you categorize the overall growth trajectory? Did it take a while to hit the point where you’re at now, selling millions? Was it a three-year process? Five-year process?
06:23
Steven: It was about five years. I worked on building the company for three years before I even launched it. I was still in college but worked on it every day for my sophomore, junior, and senior years. I launched the company right when I graduated, and it didn’t really take off until two years after that.
06:43
Host: Was that growth strictly due to Instagram and influencers?
06:50
Steven: Yes, I think any business takes twice as long as you think to really get the word out there and build an audience and community organically. Nothing happens overnight, even if it feels that way to the world or the audience.
07:08
Host: How does your dad feel about this now that you’ve executed your idea? Has he been along for the ride? Where is he now?
07:19
Steven: Both my parents are incredibly supportive. I’ve definitely made them both proud. My mom has always been very giving, so that aspect of giving back comes from her. They are happy and proud parents.
07:38
Host: When we talk about impact, sometimes tragedy can turn into a positive that affects others. You’ve donated almost $10 million to nonprofit partners. How far was it after your grandfather’s diagnosis that you came up with the idea and then took the first steps to make it happen?
08:14
Steven: I actually came up with the idea when he was diagnosed. Alzheimer’s is a long illness, so he had it for several years. There’s a picture on the website of both of us wearing Lokai bracelets. Those were some of the first samples before he passed. He didn’t know what was going on, but it was pretty cool to have that memory and picture.
08:42
Host: Was he your mom’s dad or your dad’s dad?
08:46
Steven: He was my dad’s dad.
08:49
Host: The biggest challenge for entrepreneurs in the impact space is scaling while maintaining the impact. What advice would you give to emerging social entrepreneurs looking to create a product with an impact model?
09:36
Steven: You have to be incredibly passionate about what you’re doing. If giving back is your driver, you can’t just take t-shirts and slap your logo on them. It all has to live together. You have to be just as passionate about the product you’re creating as the organizations you want to support.
What made Lokai successful is that it’s a unique product with a powerful message. Consumer products are not the easiest way to make money, so if the product isn’t your passion, there are other industries where you could raise more money for organizations.
10:56
Host: If you were starting out now, with Instagram being saturated, where would you look to market your product? TikTok is big now, but are there other platforms or strategies you’d recommend?
11:26
Steven: If it were as simple as the next Instagram, I’d be doing it. It’s more about having a deep understanding of your brand, your customer base, and where you can find those people. Being authentic to that message is crucial. Don’t be afraid to be vocal and grassroots, and really learn from people hand-to-hand.
I still go to local trade shows to hear how people talk about the brand. You don’t get that from running the company from behind the walls. You get that from being out with the customers.
12:24
Host: How was going through COVID when you couldn’t do that? Now events and trade shows are coming back, but what were those years like when you couldn’t have those interactions?
12:37
Steven: It was important that we were omni-channel. We have our own website, retail distribution, and Amazon. When COVID happened, our retail sales fell off a cliff, but our DTC and Amazon sales grew. I quickly realized how important being omni-channel is.
With iOS updates and privacy laws, advertising online got harder, but retail sales started to come back. The brands that have survived had different channels of distribution. If you just have one, something out of your control can affect your entire business.
13:34
Host: Retail still seems very important. How is retail performing for Lokai?
13:52
Steven: Retail is the fastest-growing part of our business.
13:57
Host: Did you expect that?
14:00
Steven: Maybe we should have focused on retail earlier, but our priority was DTC. Now that our brand is known, we sell through in retail. The game is selling into retail and getting reorders. We’ve seen a lot of success because of the brand and marketing we’ve done over the last 10 years.
14:56
Host: Where can people find Lokai products? Are they in every state? Any global retail?
15:03
Steven: Two of our largest retailers are Dick’s Sporting Goods and Kohl’s. We’re also in Ron Jon, surf shops, boutique stores around the country, and with licenses for all major sports leagues. We’re in all the stadiums, so if you go to a Yankees or Chiefs game, you’ll find them. We’re also on Amazon and Lokai.com.
15:39
Host: How difficult was it to get those partnerships with sports leagues?
16:15
Steven: They’re big partnerships, so you have to be able to sustain them. They have incredible audiences. What’s made it successful for us is that we bring a unique product to the table.
They get hundreds of t-shirt brands asking for partnerships. The hardest part with sports licensing is the number of SKUs. There are 32 teams, four sizes for each, so you’re talking about hundreds of products. It stacks up with factories and minimum order quantities. There are pros and cons, but overall, they’ve been amazing partnerships.
17:19
Host: Looking to the future, what are your goals for the next three to five years?
17:37
Steven: In the past, we lost our way a bit with licenses that didn’t fit our brand. We need to focus on our mission, which is to inspire people to find balance. We want to do a better job at that every day. If we can reach more people with that mission and message, that’s how we’ll grow our company. We’re focused on going a mile deep versus a mile wide.
18:21
Host: Amazing story. It’s inspiring to see brands like Lokai mature and maintain their impact models. Your model is beautiful because as you scale, the impact scales as well. Sometimes that can be difficult for brands.
19:22
Steven: I think a lot of the successful impact for-profit companies have products that would sell well even without the impact side. You can’t sell something only on the impact. It has to be a standalone product and company with a deeply intertwined impact mission.
Consumer products are not the easiest way to make money, so if the product isn’t your passion, there are other industries where you could raise more money for organizations.
20:00
Host: The products nowadays are tremendous. They can compete on any shelf. The challenge is consistently working on the backend of what happens after you buy a product and telling that story in a way that’s not overbearing. It’s a delicate balance.
20:28
Steven: Absolutely. You have to balance the product and the impact.
20:35
Host: Well, thanks so much, Steven. I know you’re busy. I really appreciate you taking the time. Best of luck for the next decade. Here’s to the next $20 million going back to nonprofits. It’s only going to be up from here. Congrats to you and the team, and best of luck.
Steven: Thank you, Grant.
