Lessons In Consumer Choice
COOL STUFF TO CHECK OUT:
Find Ricardo’s company: avalonrose.consulting
CONNECT WITH US:
Check out the official Avalon Rose Consulting Instagram page @avalonroseconsulting
Follow Ricardo Spicer on Instagram @ricspice
Find Max Gerson on LinkedIn
In this episode:
What do you need when you have a problem? You need a problem solver.
Marketing is about breaking the barrier, lifting your brand through the noise, and making that connection with your consumer.
Entrepreneur and marketing strategist Ricardo Spicer’s mission is to elevate you above the noise of competitors, target your exact eyes and ears, and find new and creative ways to care about whatever you are trying to deliver.
Being a good consultant is about your experience and your story, and Spicer can help you articulate that story and motivate your audience to be a part of it.
Do you have a desire to succeed?
“We teach best what we need to learn most.”
TOPICS DISCUSSED:
Avalon Rose (2:40)
Purpose of the Episode (3:00)
What Does Ricardo Do? (3:52)
Experience in Music (9:58)
Ricardo’s Career Start (16:13)
DeafJam and Professional Career (22:31)
Importance of Diversity (32:43)
Client Communication (54:01)
Ricardo’s Specialty (57:35)
A Special Offer! (59:33)
How to Support Host and Guest (60:32)
-
Max Gerson (00:00:00):
Welcome to the Brand Wolfe podcast, Branding For The Rest Of Us, where we promise to deliver big ideas to small businesses. We promise to introduce you to the most brilliant people that you've never heard of. And today we're about to light it up. It is my pleasure to introduce Ricardo spice. Ricardo represents his brand. Avalon Rose. Avalon Rose is a marketing agency that serves its entertainment industry clients in a unique and powerful way. Ricardo and the Avalon Rose team understand that the goal of good marketing is not about being known. It is about being desired. Now think about this for a second. As it relates to the music that you choose to listen to think about how much choice you have with your own music. Think about how easy it is to fast forward to find a new playlist. What does it take to listen to a whole song?
Max Gerson (00:00:57):
When was the last time you listened to an entire album? You have to want it. It's not about awareness. It's about desire. So how do you create desire for that other person as human beings? We can say whatever we want to another person, but we can't make up their mind for them. Can we, we have to leave room for that other person to step into the conversation. Now, Rick, you may or may not know this, but I believe you've been curating your superpower for as long as I've known you. As we've recently reconnected, I've really been meditating on what is your superpower. You're such an amazing communicator. Everyone knows this about you. Part of the reason why everyone knows this is that when you talk to Rick, oh my God, you're having fun. Katelyn had so much fun on the pre-production call. When I told Hauser that I was recording with you today, he felt jealous.
Max Gerson (00:02:08):
And for good reason, everyone wants to talk to Rick and it's not BS. You make everything delightful. You make everything wonderful. And here's why I think that you're so magnetic. You understand that good marketing, like everything else is not about managing sameness. It's about managing our differences and unlike anyone else I've ever met, I think this is really your singular talent. So today on branding for the rest of us, we have Ricardo Spicer of Avalon Rose. Avalon Rose is a marketing agency that serves entertainment industry clients. And if you don't care about that industry, that's okay. Here's what I hope that you're curious about for today's show. You're gonna learn how to create your personal brand. You're gonna learn what it takes to be able to successfully market with no budget. You're gonna learn some lessons about not how to make your brand known, but how to make it desirable. You might hear some stories about how to transition from being unemployed, to being a consultant. And most importantly, what I hope you take away is how to balance a virtuous life, a profitable life in a good life. So ladies and gentlemen buckle up, Ricardo's here, prepare to smile. I would like to introduce my guests today. Ricardo's wiser.
Ricardo Spicer (00:03:42):
Why? Thank you, brother. Appreciate it, man. That was an incredible introduction.
Max Gerson (00:03:46):
I felt very motivated there.
Ricardo Spicer (00:03:49):
I love it. I appreciate that. Seriously.
Max Gerson (00:03:52):
Rick, talk to me, talk to me about what you do.
Ricardo Spicer (00:03:55):
Okay. Well, I basically make people care about music or care about your product or care about your service through storytelling, through content creation, making people not only just aware cuz that's one step, but actually making you love the individual, the individual story, and then be enough to become a part of that story. I think that in and of itself is kind of a blanket description of what I do. I do that in a myriad of ways. I do it through, like I said, content creation. I do that through music production. I do that through consulting and guiding you through the very, very scary and nebulous world of entertainment. Because obviously there's a lot of noise out here, especially, you know, during these crazy times, even though, you know, a lot of people who have a lot of free time on their hand right now, we're all vying for eyes and ears. We're all vying for people's attention. We're all vying for engagement. And my role is to help kind of elevate my clients above the noise, allow them to target exactly who their eyes and ears are and find new and creative ways to make people engage and care about whatever you're trying to deliver.
Max Gerson (00:05:05):
Rick, we know you care about music. Talk to me about where that started and what music looked like in your life.
Ricardo Spicer (00:05:14):
It's so funny. You asked that because I tell this story so often I can almost do it without thinking about it, to be honest with you. My love for music came from my mom and my father. Let's be, let's be clear. My parents, both of my parents, were avid. When I say avid record collectors. I mean, as soon as you walked into either one of our living rooms, you would just see a stack of records. Now, obviously those records transitioned to CDs. My dad even had a reel to reel that he wouldn't let me touch until I was in my teenage years. So I was just an absolute theme because my parents were absolute themes for music every Saturday, my mom and I would make that Trek to the record store to show how old I am. But we would go to a record store every Saturday and she would buy every new release that came out.
Ricardo Spicer (00:06:00):
And then after she would say, what else is good? She would then say, Ricardo, you can get whatever you want. And so while she was getting the Patty Labelle’s, she was getting the Luther Vandross other world. She was getting, you know, all that good classic R and B. I was getting every rap or anything, influencing rap and hip hop culture that I can get. And not only would we then she would buy it for me, but then on our way home, you know, she would buy the vinyl and she'd buy the cassette tape. So we, she would play the cassette tape in our little, either Dotson at the time or our Maxima at the time. And then I would play my tapes. Like she'd play part of a, a, an album. Then I'd play part of an album. And we really got a chance to listen to the music that she loved.
Ricardo Spicer (00:06:42):
And she kind of got a chance to understand the music that I liked and loved as well. So that for a fantastic relationship between me and my mom, obviously, but then as soon as I would get home, we would get home. You know, I'd go out and, you know, go bowling with you jokes or I'd, you know, go play basketball or do something outside the house. And my mom would stay in the house and listen to all the music we purchased that day. By the time I'd come back into the house, I'd find my mother right in front of our stereo system and she'd be playing the music and also she'd have one of my keyboards out and she'd be replaying all the melodies, all the baselines of all that music. And so I would just kind of come up next to her and just check her out and say, I couldn't believe that she was already learning how to play songs that we just purchased.
Ricardo Spicer (00:07:28):
And then she would give me a lesson from there. She'd be like, okay, remember that song from that rap, from that rap song that you played me, that rap album, you played me. The origins of that song are from this song right here. And then she would play me the original. So she was playing me the original samples that all these hip hop guys. So it immediately made a connection between present day and the past and how important the past was to what we were able to create now. And especially being a hip hop theme. As I grew up, that was what hip hop was about. It was about remixing, repackaging, rearranging, chopping up the old to create a completely new composite. So that love for music started very young through my mom and, and, and my parents. And from there, my mom was always great about fostering my love for music instead of buying random Christmas presents, even though I was getting all the random stuff like, you know, Jordan's and Nintendos and, and basketballs or whatever that is, even though it sounded super superficial and stereotypical, but she would also buy musical instruments for me.
Ricardo Spicer (00:08:30):
I would get the newest keyboard. I would get the newest drum pad. I would get the newest pseudo mixer or karaoke machine, so I could figure out how to make my own compositions. She fueled that for me. So not only was I able to find a love within myself, but my mother was the guiding force to help me navigate and learn how music was created, how music was sold and how to actually consume music.
Max Gerson (00:08:55):
I love that. And I think really what I'm hearing is kind of a story about culture, not just about music or one type of music.
Ricardo Spicer (00:09:05):
You're right. She was teaching me not only lessons about what the music was, but how important that music was to our family, to the black experience.
Max Gerson (00:09:13):
Yeah. Right. It it's, it's not about being dogmatic about a genre,
Ricardo Spicer (00:09:18):
Right?
Max Gerson (00:09:19):
It's about understanding how music promotes culture and how it, how we connect through music. And you're not telling me a story about music. You're telling me a story about your mother. So I think you were surrounded with a lot of different types of music, right? I, I, I think the thing, I think the songs that you and I both love to listen to are not the ones we played on our trumpet in middle school.
Ricardo Spicer (00:09:49):
<Laugh> you're right.
Max Gerson (00:09:50):
Is hip hop. But talk to me about the different experiences that you've had in music,
Ricardo Spicer (00:09:57):
As you all alluded to earlier. I don't wanna say I was a band geek or band nerd by any stretch of the imagination. But our district that we grew up in was really forward thinking in making sure they pushed the arts on us, whether we loved it or not. I gotta give a shout out to my kindergarten, my kindergarten through fourth grade music teacher, her name was Mrs. Tule. Mrs. Tule realized at an early age, when I was at Loman that I loved music. Like I wasn't just a kid who wanted to hit the xylophone because I could hit it hard. I was literally trying to find the notes and she came to me after class one day and said, Hey, I see you really love this. Do, are you interested in learning how to play a musical instrument aside from what we're learning in this class?
Ricardo Spicer (00:10:40):
I was like, absolutely. So she gave me piano lessons and percussing lessons after school at Lomond starting, I believe, I believe that was like first, second grade. And I asked my mom if that was right. And she said, of course, it's right. I walked home from school anyway. And I was a latchkey kid. So I had time between what time I needed to be home for my mom and to take care of my homework. And she trusted me with being able to handle myself after school. And miss Tuto literally showed me how to play piano from start to finish at a very young age. And from there, you know, in fifth grade they introduced musical instruments for us to choose, to get involved with either band or if we wanted to sing, we could be in chorus. So it, the, the infrastructure that was set up from a school level and a curriculum level really fostered my love.
Ricardo Spicer (00:11:30):
Thank goodness. So I was getting teachings from home about culture and music that really impacted us as a family and impacted us as a, as a, as a community. And then I was learning the technical aspects in school, right. So fast forward to, you know, being in high school or being in middle school, not only was I learning musical theory and, and compounding all those teachings, but then on the flip side, whenever Mr. Patty or Mr. Bonner or any of our, our band teachers would stop us, me and, you know, my friends, Jeffrey Dietrich, and other guys who were sitting around me when we are during that pause, we would learn how to play hip hop songs or R&B songs or pop music or rock records on the trumpet. Right. Cause that was a music that was an instrument that I ended up choosing when I was in a band.
Ricardo Spicer (00:12:18):
So I was learning how to play the music I loved while learning musical theory and learning the classics. And, because of that, it allowed me to also fall in love with, like you said, the diversity in music genres. I was able to find pieces of classical music or from, you know, I remember playing fandom of the opera and I wasn't a show tunes or a Broadway dude at all, but there were certain melodies that really connected with me. And as a result that it allowed me to expand my mind beyond just black music, but to really understand what do I love about melody? What do I love about the connection between notes and how it makes you feel? And the feeling I would get from hearing a dope musical line or a sweet baseline or harmonies that just felt right, because it resolved at the right time with the right notes.
Ricardo Spicer (00:13:09):
That was the feeling that I tried to always get back to. And that is the kind of feeling that I always try to communicate whether, whether I'm producing music or whether I'm consulting a client, who's coming out with their own music, it's all about the feel of it. And I learned that at an early age because of my mother and also as a result of being in shaker schools. So that was kind of the beginnings of my musical journey. Obviously from there, you know, again, my mom allowed me to I told her you don't need to gimme a Christmas present, birthday present, Christmas present, birthday present. I think I did that for like four years and said, just give me two turntables, a mixer when I was 17 years old. And she said, okay. And then when I told her the price, she was like, excuse me, you're <laugh> how much is that? I said, it's gonna run about, I think at the time two technique, I didn't even get S because that was way out the budget. I got two horrible Gemini turntables and a Gemini mix. It was like a DJ starter package. And I believe it ran at the time was like 850 bucks. So something crazy for a 17 year old kid to be asking their mom for.
Max Gerson (00:14:12):
Yeah. But 500 side hustle, 500 bucks in 1982 though.
Ricardo Spicer (00:14:17):
Oh man. But no, we're talking about 1997, bro.
Max Gerson (00:14:19):
I'm kidding
Ricardo Spicer (00:14:22):
It. I wish it, if I'm that old, now we're talking about something different all
Max Gerson (00:14:26):
Together. Oh, just fine. Alright, so, so really I think what I'm, what I'm hearing and what I think it's important for other people to understand is that you're a DJ you've worked for years at Def jam. We both love hip hop, but part of the reason that you're great at what you do is that you're a creative problem solver. You're a consultant like so many of us. And what does it take to be a good consultant? It's not about ladders, it's about a web. And what I mean is that most of the people that I meet that are great consultants, whose job it is to be in service of their client, they need to have all of these different threads of experience because the concept is that each thread makes the web stronger. And how does marching band relate to hip hop? Well, first of all, it's performance. Second of all, it's about getting people excited and pumping them up and it's about culture and it, and it blends in classical melody. It blends in pop music, it blends rock, right. It it's a great catalyst mm-hmm <affirmative>. And so I just believe that you you've had all these different experiences and I think that's really great opportunity that we had growing up.
Ricardo Spicer (00:15:49):
Oh yeah.
Max Gerson (00:15:50):
Now let's, let's transition to 98, 99, 2000. What I consider to be the golden era of hip hop.
Ricardo Spicer (00:16:00):
Oh yeah.
Max Gerson (00:16:01):
Right.
Ricardo Spicer (00:16:02):
Yeah. For sure.
Max Gerson (00:16:03):
Where were you during that time?
Ricardo Spicer (00:16:06):
98. I was graduating from high school. And let's, let's, let's talk about, let's talk about 98 specifically that summer we were transitioning from graduating high school to going to college. And back to that summer, instead of, you know, taking some random job at a pool or at the mall or someplace, I knew early on, I wanted to get into the music industry. So that summer I worked at a record store back to my mom, right. Worked at a record store cause I wanted to not only number one, get free music <laugh> because if I worked there, they're giving way CDs. But I also was, I wanted to figure out and do more exploration on why people chose the music that they liked and why they chose to buy it. So I was doing market research without really understanding I was doing market research, really figuring out what made people tick enough to go from, oh, I heard that song to, oh, let me go and purchase it to pulling out my wallet and actually buying it because there are a lot of steps in between that will stop you from actually discovering your favorite song and also thus purchasing your favorite song.
Ricardo Spicer (00:17:21):
And the great thing about when I was working at that record store, the amount of music that came out that summer that was so impactful in my life, even it, it cemented my, my, my journey into trying to get into the music industry and my love for music in totality. Let's talk about the miseducation of Lauren Hill. Let's talk about big puns capital punishment. Let's talk about why clefs John's classic album, the carnival. So, so many fantastic albums came out in 98 and it was also a Renaissance in the music business. Now we were starting to see before 98, 97, your favorite groups might have gone gold by 98. Your favorite hip hop groups were going platinum, meaning they were selling 1 million copies of their CDs. Min some of them were going double platinum. Obviously Lauren hell went diamond. Can't forget about the outcasts of the world, but point being hip hop music got onto the main stage, and now it was beginning to take over commerce in the music industry.
Ricardo Spicer (00:18:28):
So I was able to recognize the impact of the cultural aspect of it and to see how it was actually making dollars from working at that record store from then on, throughout my, my college years from 98 to 2002, again, I wasn't just taking regular jobs. I wanted to make sure I was taking steps toward getting into the music industry. So the following summer I was working at w Z a K, which at the time was the only urban music radio station in Cleveland. Cuz I wanted to learn about radio. How does the music get onto the radio? And like most of us think, you know, we think that music just gets on the radio cuz it's good. It's like, ah, yeah, right. That's not even the case. It wasn't the case then. And it definitely isn't the case now, but I want to learn about each aspect of the music music industry.
Ricardo Spicer (00:19:15):
So I can get a well rounded understanding of how to create it, how to monetize it, how to get it to, you know, a label and also how to get it to end consumers. And that, again, not only hip hop music, I'm talking about some great rock albums, some great, you know, R and B albums, some great pop albums came out during that time. That it's so funny. Now if you play those records as a DJ, now people go crazy. It's insane. How you can, I could play a record from 98 to 2002 at a, you know, at a corporate event. When most of these, you know, most of the, the people there are the guests, there are still in their twenties and they go as crazy as I did when the music initially dropped. We, I, I was fortunate enough to grow up in that time because I could understand analog because I mean, let's be clear by 98.
Ricardo Spicer (00:20:03):
The only email address I knew of was AOL chat rooms, right? By the time I got outta school, we're talking about iPods, apple music and downloading, right? So I was, we were in that perfect time period to understand the old guard and then understand the new digital frontier that we're on, which was obviously the future of music industry and music consumption and entertainment consumption for that matter. So like you said, the tho not only was it a golden era for hiphop music, it was a golden era for the music business and, and being able to discover music.
Max Gerson (00:20:36):
So I, I think, I think here's the lesson for everyone else about understanding what it takes to be a good consultant. Ricardo's demonstrating a tremendous curiosity for his passion At a very early age. He was just wondering, what does it take for a song to be bought
Ricardo Spicer (00:20:55):
Mm-Hmm <affirmative>
Max Gerson (00:20:56):
Right. The other thing you need to understand, if you care about getting where you're going, you need to be ready, you need to be prepared. It doesn't mean you, you have to know exactly what that end destination is,
Max Gerson (00:21:12):
But you, you have to be thinking about how you are taking the next step to get you to the next place. So, so here's my example for that. My fantasy was that I wanted to be an automotive journalist. I wanted to write for road and track or motor trend or current driver. So after graduating university of Colorado with a philosophy degree after leaving the business school, oh, the irony there, right? What did I do? I went to a technical school. I went to universal technical Institute. You've probably seen the commercials if you watched car shows past midnight in Chicago. And it wasn't because I wanted to be a technician. It, it wasn't because I wanted to, to make a career out of working on cars. But I just knew that if I had that body of knowledge, that technical knowledge, and I could combine that with my analytical skill set, I would have a pretty unique advantage in my industry. And I think Ricardo has that same unique advantage. Right. He understands how to market, how to sell, how to communicate, but he under, also really understands what it takes to be an artist and what it takes to succeed in the craft. Rick, I wanna hear a little bit more about your professional career.
Ricardo Spicer (00:22:35):
Yeah.
Max Gerson (00:22:35):
Because you worked at Def jam for a long time. And I think there are some really valuable stories there worries there.
Ricardo Spicer (00:22:42):
Absolutely. when I, again, back to the origin when me and my, or my mother and I would go to a record store, I always had talk about a fantasy. I always fantasized about that maroon album cover with the DJ tone arm on it. The, the, the burgundy album cover was the brand of Def jam, right? Def jam was always known to be ground zero for hip hop music from a record label standpoint. You had to have skills on the mic. You had to have some of the best beats. It was, it was like the, it was the Chicago bulls. Let's put it like that in, let's go back to 97, 98, you know, the Chicago bulls, especially with the, the last, the last dance documentaries going on, ESPN dev jam was the Chicago bulls in terms of the hip hop brand that everyone respected and wanted to be a part of from LL KU J to method, man, to Redman, even though run DMC wasn't on Def jam records, they were synonymous with it because of Russell Simmons all the way through JayZ.
Ricardo Spicer (00:23:56):
And, and the like so again, in terms of my trajectory and my journey, I knew that that was my destination. I wanted to be a part of the fabric of Def jam because they were the label that put hip hop on the main stage. I was fortunate enough the last night of my of my internship at w G a K I met radio rep. His name is drew RS, who was working at Def jam at the time. He still works for Def jam. As a matter of fact, and I, I met him because Kim sellers, who is the radio was one of the radio hosts on the station said, Hey, Ricardo, do you know drew? I was like, I have no idea who that guy is. She was like, I need to introduce you to drew. I was the guy kind of driving the hummer around for w Z a K and all the random radio remotes.
Ricardo Spicer (00:24:41):
And so she introduced me to drew. And when I saw him, I saw Def jam. He had baggy jeans on, he had a fat farm polo shirt on, he had crispy air force ones and a baseball cap. And he was on, on, on his job. He was at work wearing exactly what I was wearing as a student. And I was like, that's what I need to be doing my life. So after being introduced you know, of course with it being my last night, I told him it's my last night as an intern. Hey, you know, do you have any opportunities? Cause I'm looking for my next internship. He said, as a matter of fact, I'm, I'm moving from Cleveland to Detroit. So unfortunately I don't have any opportunities for you here. And I said, fancy that I go to university, I'm gonna uni.
Ricardo Spicer (00:25:25):
I go to university of Michigan. So I can easily make my way to Detroit. It's not that far. I have a car I'll make my way there. From there, as soon as I get back to Ann Arbor, some time passed, you know, the summer in Cleveland passed, I got back to school. The first thing on my agenda was to call that rep from Def jam and to, I don't wanna say annoy him, but let's just say, make him very aware that I'm in an existence. When I say I called him nearly every week, just to touch base, just to communicate that I still was very interested. Tell him about new songs that I had heard that happened to be on the radio from his roster. And ultimately he brought me into the office and immediately made me his intern. As B and internships are so important.
Ricardo Spicer (00:26:07):
I can't say that enough if I didn't go the internship route, I would not be in the situation that I was, that I am in now. And to think about it back in the day you didn't get paid for internships. Now, if you are an intern, you have to pay most people depending on what state you live in, but back then you had to work for free. So there were a lot of jobs I took for flat out free just to gain the experience as a result of that not getting paid. It was my passion, my hustle, my awareness and my, I mean dedication. When I say dedication, I read every CD booklet known to man to find out who the writers were, who the producers were, who did the sales, who did the marketing, who did the legal, like every aspect of the music industry was used to be in the CD booklet.
Ricardo Spicer (00:26:52):
So now that I'm in a building like Def jam, because it's actually who it was wholly owned and still wholly owned by universal music. So I was in a universal music building that was in Detroit, actually it was in Troy, Michigan. I was reading all this information and then learning about it firsthand from being in that building from there, unfortunately, drew got into a horrible car accident and as a result of that car accident I had to take over his job for the most part because he was in a body cast. So I started to learn about even more about radio. And I was learning how to take a record from a, from the label to market it to the radio station so that they ultimately play it because I made such an impact while he was down for the count in recovering from his, his, his injury.
Ricardo Spicer (00:27:36):
As soon as he came back, he introduced me to Kevin Lowes. Kevin Lowes at the time was the chairman and president of Def jam records. And he introduced me as, Hey, Kevin, this is Ricardo Spicer, super intern. You talk about an intro. Your intro did pales in comparison to what he ended. I'm joking. Your, your intro was great, but Kevin's intro allowed for me to be or drew, excuse me, Drew's intro to Kevin allowed for me to, to have visibility with the biggest executive in the music industry. From there, I kept showing my hustle by becoming an intern, actually moving up to New York city. I showed my hustle, my merit, my acumen, my skillset to the point that by the time I graduated college and I had done all these internships, they moved me to Atlanta to work directly for Def jam and to worked through universal music.
Ricardo Spicer (00:28:29):
I started out doing marketing. It was kind of a sales function. It was called an artist development rep where I was basically helping get music into retail both independent retail chain and mass merchants like target Walmart. And like and after kind of going through that after a few years and learning more about sales, learning about marketing, I went to dev jam proper as a marketing manager. And that was kind of my career path through Def jam. Through that career path, I was able to actually work with all the artists that I grew up listening to from method man, to Jay-Z to Foxy brown, to DMX. And then not only on the urban side, on the black music side, I worked with the likes of Rihanna with Bon Jovie. Even though Bob Marley's dead, but his catalog Bob Marley's, Bob Marley's catalog.
Ricardo Spicer (00:29:19):
So because back in the day, Def jam had a joint venture with island. So it was island Def jam. So I worked not only the, the, the hip hop side and the R and B side, but I worked all the rock acts as well. That includes fallout, boy saliva and, and, and artists like that. So I got baptized by fire learning how to market for some of the biggest artists in the game at the, again at the height of the music industry, and then at the beginning of the fall of the music industry. So my career started out as an intern then kind of segueing into learning about sales with a, with a, a strong emphasis on distribution, then transitioning directly to direct consumer as being a marketing manager for Def jam
Max Gerson (00:30:03):
Today on Branding For The Rest Of Us, we have Ricardo Spicer of Avalon Rose. Ricardo is a tremendously talented marketer communicator consultant for the entertainment industry. And even if you don't care about music, you have to understand that the stories that Ricardo's talking about relate to anyone that works in complex sales and anyone that cares about advancing their careers. Rick, you just talked a lot about selling to next steps about positioning, about being ready and about proving it. You knew what your passion was. You. I identified that and where you put your energy into was connecting to the person that can open the door and really understanding that your responsibility to that person, your responsibility to drew Was to make him look good when he couldn't work. And by doing that, you were proving to Kevin Lyles. You were proving to Def jam that you can do what drew said you can do. Is that right?
Ricardo Spicer (00:31:18):
That's absolutely correct.
Max Gerson (00:31:21):
So wherever you are, if you're a sales rep and you work in complex sales, if you are trying to figure out how to transition out of being a worker, and you want to create your own consultancy, you want to create your own brand. You have to think about this as a complex sales process. You have to think about How do you eat an elephant one bite at a time. You can't just get to the sale. You have to move to the next step. And I think you really learned an important lesson there, but honestly, I think we've skipped over a pretty big part of your narrative in a pretty big facet of how I interpret your superpowers. So I'm gonna go back in the time machine. I'm gonna go back to Woodbury.
Ricardo Spicer (00:32:21):
<Laugh>
Max Gerson (00:32:22):
I wanna go back to 1992.
Ricardo Spicer (00:32:25):
Okay.
Max Gerson (00:32:25):
I wanna go back to an opportunity that was presented to us from the shaker Heights school system, which was the student groups on race relations.
Ricardo Spicer (00:32:38):
Oh, wow. That's right. So tell me about that experience. Rick, I'm very passionate about diversity because of shake Heights and the neighborhood we grew up in. So student group born race relations is, well let's even back it up even further. Let's talk about shaker Heights. So people kind of understand what this neighborhood is, and that'll give you a little bit more of a backdrop of why student group of race relations which is called score was so important. Shaker Heights initially is a, was created as a suburb for working class white English, sex, sex, and Protestants to travel to downtown Cleveland, but to have a place to work that was away from downtown. Their goal was to make sure that these workers were secure and had a neighborhood for themselves by themselves before FUBU was even a, a, a clothing line so much.
Ricardo Spicer (00:33:40):
So they literally built up barricades that still stand to this day to separate the enclave that is shaker and the rest of Cleveland. If you try to drive through Cleveland right now, you have to do some various roadblocks to actually get through the city streets. That was to protect people from ever having to interact with anyone from Cleveland, which was a little bit, I don't wanna say a little bit, but was seen as unsightly and not the kind of people they wanted to be around fast forward after the deconstruction of that kind of bubble. They want Shaker Heights want to make sure that integration was now taught as a result. And this is many, many moons later as a result. They indoctrinated the school systems with curriculum to speak to race relations, including prejudice discrimination racism stereotyping. These phrases concepts were taught to us at a very early age, so we could embrace and understand that the person sitting next to me may not look like me.
Ricardo Spicer (00:34:51):
They may not have the exact same experiences in terms of their families struggle through whatever they have going on or, or how they were raised or how they grew up. But we have more commonalities once we recognize and respect one another's differences. The great thing about score is that it took high school kids from high school, for like a period or two, actually it was probably like three periods. Cause it ended up being outta class for maybe like three or four hours. And then those high schoolers would go to Woodbury, which is our fifth and sixth grade school to teach kids about what I was saying earlier, racism, prejudice discrimination and understanding about differences and being either minority or part of the majority. And so we were teach, so they would teach kids or we would teach kids about these really complex concepts that I think a lot of us still struggle with just so we can demystify what it's like to be different.
Ricardo Spicer (00:35:42):
And to, to understand that that is important. You know, when people say, oh, I'm colorblind, we learned early on, like, that's not a good thing being colorblind. Isn't good. You need to recognize that someone is different. So you then can, I don't say learn how to, to relate to them, but learn how to find commonalities that then we can figure out how to relate with right. Or relate to, excuse me. So score allowed us to get into these small groups to talk about these complex concepts, whether it be just discussions or we'd have activities to learn about trusting one another, that may not look like you like trust, fall, that we've all done in every corporate retreat since which is crazy. But the other thing about it is it gave us workbooks and gave us a glossary and gave us con ways to problem solve with these complex concepts.
Ricardo Spicer (00:36:31):
From there, I was so enamored with it because my household was diverse. I was raised by a man. My biological father is black. My biological mother is black as well. My parents got divorced before. I can remember. That's why, when I was telling you about the music lover in me and how my dad had music. And then I went directly to my mother. Most of my time was spent with my mom when I was four years old. She had just come back from a work trip and she sat me and my sister down and said, listen I met a gentleman and I want you to meet him. He's coming to Cleveland in a few days and I wanted to have dinner with him just so you can get to know him again. I'm four years old. And I remember this, like it was yesterday.
Ricardo Spicer (00:37:09):
And as we pulled up to this restaurant, I noticed a gray haired white man looking into the backseat of my mom's Maxima. And I re I, I remember vividly thinking to myself, who is this white man looking in this window? <Laugh> I was, I was the man of the house at four years old. Right. I get out the car and that white man looking in the window was the man and the gentleman that my mother met in Dallas throughout the time that he was in Cleveland through the short stay him and my mother fell in love and he ended up becoming my step-dad. His name is John. His name was John Lombardi. John Lombardi is a hundred percent Italian man from New York city back to those stereotypes. If you listed the stereotypes of an Italian man from New York city, John checked off all the boxes, every single one of them.
Ricardo Spicer (00:37:59):
Right. but this man was able, was willing, able, and, and, and, and love my family so much that he adopted without the legal terms and all that adopted my sister and I. So I was for all intents and purposes, I was raised by a white man and my mother's black while she was the, the, the captain of the ship. John was just as important to that household. He taught me a hard work ethic. He taught me how to defy the stereotypes of, of how people might perceive me as a black man, because he knew how the other side spoke about us. Sometimes, you know, people would say nasty things to him thinking that, you know, he was just a quote, unquote, regular white guy, little did they know he was raising two black kids in his household. So he was able to give me glimpses of what the other side looked like now back to score and would bury in that experience because my household was diverse because my neighborhood was diverse because my group of friends were also diverse when it came to going to school and learning these concepts.
Ricardo Spicer (00:39:04):
It made me love the enrichment that my neighborhood provided me with because my world looked differently than the other things that I would see on TV that was either all black or all white, or have a token, you know, person of color or a token Asian person. We lived among so many different kinds of people, not only racially, but in terms of religion. And also in terms of thought that it really put, I felt it put a lot of us at an advantage and somewhat of a disadvantage, because at an early age, we realized how to navigate this world when you have a unique experience. And it's our job to accept people with unique experiences and learn how we can all work through that and become better people, better professionals, better teachers, better parents, and all the above. So the student group on race relations was pit and parcel to my growing up and propelled me to be a champion for diversity throughout the rest of my life.
Max Gerson (00:40:00):
I love that story so much. And it's so important to understand what it takes to be a great consultant, what it takes to be a great problem solver, what it takes to be a great communicator is having a diversity of experience because when we fail to communicate, it's us talking about us in a language only we can understand, right? I'm so passionate about this idea. That to be a great communicator, to be a great consultant, to be a great marketer, right? It's all about the other person. It can't, it's not about you. It's actually not about your product. It's like showing up on a first date talking me, me, me talking about the things you only you care about in a language only you can understand, you're not getting a second date. They're not gonna swipe, right. You have to communicate to that other person and you have to be empathetic. You have to understand their position. You have to speak to them where they're at in the language that they understand. And I think that's really what was catalyzed for you by working in score. You were given this opportunity to find out what's on the other side
Ricardo Spicer (00:41:26):
Mm-Hmm
Max Gerson (00:41:27):
And once you can find out what's on the other side, you know, think about this as a vendiagram. There's a thousand things that you could talk about, but you need to find the intersection of the 10 things that, that other person cares about and can understand,
Ricardo Spicer (00:41:44):
Especially when you talk about something that on the outside, on the outside seems complex, right? When you're talking about race, or you're talking about marketing, or you're talking about a product, or you're talking about a service, or you're talking about a relationship, right? I'm talking about a romantic relationship. And if you step away from that, there are a lot of moving parts in all of those things, right? The right product makes the right, you know, meeting someone at the right time. You know what position you are in your life when you meet someone on a romantic side, but being able to kind of break down complex things into something that's very simple and very tangible or something that we can articulate. Always goes back to being able to just understand somebody, right. And back to what you said, which was so important, talking to somebody about something that we can relate to where they're at, not where I'm at, right? As soon as I start talking as if I'm the foremost authority, instead of really trying to figure out how I can be the best of service to that individual is something that I think is very imperative.
Max Gerson (00:42:51):
Simplicity really is the ultimate sophistication. I work with so many B2B brands. They use HubSpot as their CRM. Hubspot's got a lot of fun tools. And a lot of times what they tell me is our sales reps are trying to do an email outreach campaign. And HubSpot keeps telling them that they're communicating in a 12th grade level.
Ricardo Spicer (00:43:16):
<Laugh>,
Max Gerson (00:43:17):
But that's not so great. It's actually a critique. They need to be communicating at a fourth grade level.
Ricardo Spicer (00:43:24):
Mm
Max Gerson (00:43:25):
Right. People have problems. People need what we sell. We solve problems. Right? A lot of times when people reach out to a consultant of any type, it's not because things are great. It's because there's tension. There's a problem to be solved. If there wasn't a problem to be solved, they wouldn't be interested in spending money outside of their brand. Mm-Hmm, <affirmative>, don't make it more difficult for them to find the answer. Don't make it more difficult for them to understand what you do and how you can help them. Don't talk to them about the features of what you do. Talk to them about the benefits. And it's really hard to do, but Ricardo, I think you've just been practicing this since, you know, 1992 you've you were taught at a very early age, how to understand someone else's situation from their perspective. And when you can do that. And when you actually care about doing that, You can communicate with them. Right. But Growing up in shaker Heights, when we grew up in shaker Heights, we graduated in 98, shout out to
Ricardo Spicer (00:44:42):
98, 98.
Max Gerson (00:44:43):
That's an unfair advantage that is not ever going to happen. <Laugh> first of all, there might not ever be school again.
Ricardo Spicer (00:44:51):
Yeah. How about that? <Laugh>
Max Gerson (00:44:53):
Second of all, when we were at shaker, there was this level of diversity That objectively, I don't think exists anywhere else in the world.
Ricardo Spicer (00:45:06):
No, it doesn't.
Max Gerson (00:45:06):
It was, you know, our school was like 40% white, 30% black, 10% Asian, you know, I'm sure I got those numbers wrong, but you can just understand what a blended diversity we had. You can understand how well the school system promoted diversity and they pushed the arts. They pushed score. They pushed these relationships on race relations. And I know that it's not just me, you know, waxing philosophical about how I grew up, but we know that time magazine did a story on this when we were in high school. So mm-hmm,
Ricardo Spicer (00:45:46):
<Affirmative>,
Max Gerson (00:45:47):
It's 20, 20 Your daughter, my kids might not have that same opportunity,
Ricardo Spicer (00:45:55):
Not at all.
Max Gerson (00:45:57):
How do, how do we help them do that?
Ricardo Spicer (00:46:02):
That's a great question. I mean, the one, I mean, obviously we teach from the lessons that we learn. I mean, we teach from the lessons that we learn from it's, it's funny, Mr. Mcintyre, who was one of the founding members of score and also one of the founding members of minority achievement committee, which was another quote unquote extracurricular activity that shaker offered basically minority achievement committee was a program where high achieving black males and black females would help mentor young, we called potential scholars. So students who weren't achieving great grades, so to speak we would speak to them about life skills, study habits and being able to be a part of the school community while still being authentically black, right? Understanding those challenges and learning how to still be successful and achieve at a level that would help you one get getting to college two help become a pupil of society.
Ricardo Spicer (00:47:07):
And then three also learn to relate, right? Minority achievement committee in tandem would score, really spoke to bridging the gap between achievement through race and through certain gaps out there that you really can't find answers for in just con conversations alone. Right. Or just ignoring the problem. So Mr. Mcintyre, I say all that to say, Mr. Mcintyre, who founded that minority, excuse me, committee said to us one time in my class, he was a health teacher at the time. He said, we teach best what we need to learn most that stuck with me so heavily, because back to your original question, how do we teach our children? You know, second shake, you know, the second generation of shaker folks who may not be living in shaker, how to navigate this crazy world, especially with all the trappings that's out there for race relations, right?
Ricardo Spicer (00:48:10):
Now more than ever, I feel there is a chasm in terms of how we relate to one another, some of it's politics, some of it is economics, right. But the good thing is it creates an opportunity for us to have teachable moments with our children. Currently, I'm living on the westside of Atlanta. The westside of Atlanta used to be known as one of the roughest spots in Atlanta. It is now becoming gentrified much like many other cities, towns, and properties throughout the United States like Brooklyn, you know, back in the day, certain elements of Brooklyn used to be the most dangerous places to go to. Now there's a Starbucks in the corner. And there's a a food co-op to be shopped at here on the westside of Atlanta. It used to be, although it's very historic, we have Clark Atlanta around the corner, Morehouse Spellman Georgia tech Georgia tech around the corners, Georgia state is around the corner, but it was predominantly black and has been predominantly black for probably the past 70 years, 80 years.
Ricardo Spicer (00:49:20):
And it was also one of the poorest locations in Atlanta now because of gentrification. Now it's becoming one of the more desirable places to live because inside the perimeter of 2 85 in Atlanta, it's very hard to find affordable housing while still finding quality schools and fighting, you know, like really quality homes. We decided to move over here because we wanted to make sure we stayed in city proper, but also we wanted to make sure we connected to the historical nature of what this community represents. When I say more houses down the street, it is literally a stone throw for my home and Morehouse produced more black intellectuals and more on the male side, Spelman on the female side and Clark Atlanta, the AUC center has produced some of the brightest stars in the black community. So while that dichotomy is there between, you know, low income housing and then college kids and, and academia in the same neighborhood, it presents a nice opportunity to showcase high achieving and successful black folks, middle class black folks under service communities.
Ricardo Spicer (00:50:33):
And then the influx of people who never grew up in this neighborhood or who are now starting to show the diversity that Atlanta has to offer showing that all in one microcosm. So it's almost like resetting what was, if was set up in the infrastructure here in Atlanta prior to that, because of that, it makes for a great bed to teach my daughter about race relations, cuz she can walk outside of her home and see why is this black person poor while this white person over here has a, you know, six-figure house, right? So the, the key is because I constantly have to remind myself about, because I'm a gentrifier now, right? It's crazy. I, even though I'm black, most people don't say that, but I'm gentrifying this neighborhood. Because I didn't grow up here. I, I I'm technologically savvy.
Ricardo Spicer (00:51:25):
You know, my lady who I'm with is a white woman from I don't wanna say middle of nowhere, but a very small town in Michigan. So we are leading by example and showing how diversity works inside the household, but then also making sure that she can see outside of her window, what diversity looks like, what it feels like, what it, what it means to have the push and pool of different economical, economic, and political factors that make up the diversity in her neighborhood. So how to get our kids to learn what we learn is to continue to teach, continue to show, but also be able to deconstruct what is presented by media. What is presented by the powers that be, and also learning by example and showing our kids like, you know, you don't have to just be within your comfort spot, being able to push yourself and learning from people who aren't like you is the best of what America has to offer. I think you talk about superpower that's America's superpower. When we get our together is being able to articulate that diversity, inclusion and being, having a unique story is important. And we should always champion those causes. So I hope I answered your question, but we teach best by what we need to learn. Most
Max Gerson (00:52:42):
We teach best what we need to learn. Most. I love that. What identifies that message is context benchmarking and intentionality mm-hmm <affirmative>. So today more than ever, there's a tremendous gap between awareness and experience on our phones beamed into our mind. We have this tremendous amount of awareness about all these things that are happening all over the globe. We know what Kim Kardashian had for breakfast. <Laugh> we learned about the latest earthquakes from the Indian subcontinent mm-hmm <affirmative> right. We know what's happening in China. We have all this awareness, but we actually don't have any connection to, to those as experiences. And during the great lockdown during lock down during this whole bag of nails, mm-hmm <affirmative>, our experiences are limited. Now think about how this relates to business and sales. So for me, I get into big fights with my clients, usually about their visual identity.
Max Gerson (00:54:04):
Mm. I'll be working with a successful brand. It will have been in business for 40 years with this existing visual identity. And I tell them that you guys want to sell, you want to grow. That's why I'm here. Right? You want to have a new destination in mind? And I'm trying to tell you that your visual identity is an anchor. It's a ball and chain, and it's gonna slow us down, but that's not their experience with their brand, their logo, their visual identity. They don't have any other context, right? I'm a consumer of good branding, good design, good marketing of good communication. I have all this awareness and experience of what the, the other possibilities could be, but my clients don't, they don't care about any of that. They haven't seen that they don't have that as a cultural resource, so they don't have the ability to dream.
Max Gerson (00:55:14):
They don't, they don't have the ability to think about where to go next. And I think that's just really important for parents, for sales reps, for consultants, it's really our job to provide that context for whoever we're trying to communicate with, to show them the same thing that we can see to stand shoulder, to shoulder in pursuit of a common goal. But when people are talking to us about their problems, we have to understand that maybe they haven't solved this problem before maybe they haven't solved it in this way. So that the places that they are looking to try and solve that problem are probably not the right places. Seth Godin talks about, look in the obvious place. First, if you lose your keys, chances are they're on the dresser. They're not in New Mexico. <Laugh>. And the reason why, you know, that's true is because you've solved that problem before. But if you're trying to grow your business in a unique way, if you're trying to sell during COVID in a unique way, if you're trying to push a new album, push a new product in a different way, and you're talking to Ricardo, you're talking to myself, you need to understand that you might not have solved this problem significantly or ever before.
Max Gerson (00:56:44):
So you need to look in a different place. And if you've tried other things and as time has gone by that obvious place is most likely, further and further away from where you thought it was. So when you talk to Ricardo, what you need to understand is that he's here to help you solve that problem. What Ricardo's going to do is to look in that obvious place. What you need to understand is that the obvious place is obviously not where you've been looking otherwise. Why would you be paying him? Why would you be paying Avalon Rose mm-hmm <affirmative> So, Rick I thought that perhaps you'd like to offer something to anyone that might be listening that might need what you do.
Ricardo Spicer (00:57:35):
Mm-Hmm
Max Gerson (00:57:35):
<Affirmative>. So talk to me about the clients that you serve.
Ricardo Spicer (00:57:39):
So I service I service brands, artists, labels and companies in the entertainment space, as well as in the direct to consumer space. I've been able to luckily because of my music industry experience, that I've worked with a number of labels as a consultant but also working with, especially nowadays that a lot of music is DIY, whether it be recording, whether it be marketing, distribution but even as it's DIY the same thing applies. You still ultimately wanna make people care about your, either your music, your product, your service, or your brand in totality. So it's my job to help demystify the steps and the avenues to get to your end goal and help you get your music out there to people, help you get your product out there to people, but also allow also come up with creative ways to engage your consumers, to actually make them care.
Ricardo Spicer (00:58:38):
It's one thing to put out products. It's one thing to have a service, but if people don't care about it, you know, you're, you're, there's too much noise out here for people, especially when you have so many options due to technology, right? So my job is to help you get from, you know, like I said, when I, when I first started in the music industry and working for at a record store, take it from, oh, I like that product brand artist song to, I want to consume that to, I want to share it to, into, I want this to be a part of my lifestyle connected to dots between what your lifestyle and what you're in product or in service is that's my job is to create a special strategic ways for you to be a make become aware of it, to engage in it and share it and to retrofit it to whatever part of your lifestyle that you want to be a part of.
Ricardo Spicer (00:59:32):
Right? So as a, as a result to anyone who's listening, I'm offering a free hour consultation about whatever your business is or your artistry looks like, or the music you're trying to put out to the marketplace because not only have I worked with brands like Def jam, like 300 entertainment, but I've also worked with Coca-Cola, I've worked with Foundry 45, which is a VR and AR company of which I'm very, very into the tech space. I, I do VR and AR engagements as well through Avalon Rose. So our, my job is to not only just do in the entertainment field or take care of the entertainment field, but consumer engagement at large. So I'm offering up one hour consultation to anyone who is listening to this wonderful, wonderful Brand Wolfe podcast.
Max Gerson (01:00:22):
For anyone that's listening, they will offer a free consultation and oftentimes the consultation can be worth millions of dollars. Rick, where can people find you? Where can people find Avalon Rose today?
Ricardo Spicer (01:00:35):
So you can find avalonRose@avalonrose.consulting on the web. You can also find this on Instagram at Avalon Rose consulting, or you can also check me out on my personal Instagram, which gives you all kind of information, even though it's it's, you know, it's my personal one, but it's a lot of business taking place. You can check me out on Instagram at R I C S P I C E at Rick spice,
Max Gerson (01:01:03):
Ricardo Spicer of Avalon Rose. Thank you so much for being on the show. This was provocative. This was helpful. I hope it was helpful to you. I hope you learned some lessons and if your brand needs desirability and not awareness, and if your audience are direct consumers, you need to get in touch with Rick. Thanks so much for being here, Ricardo.
Ricardo Spicer (01:01:30):
Thank you, Max. I really appreciate it man.