How to Run Your Business and Not Let It Run You: A Conversation with Joanna and Chip Gaines

Michael Rivo: Welcome back to Blazing Trails, I'm Michael Rivo from Salesforce Studios. Joanna and Chip Gaines, the stars of the hit series, Fixer Upper, are practically household names. How'd they turn their family business, Magnolia, into a home lifestyle empire is the stuff of legends. Building an empire doesn't happen overnight. Like all small business owners, they faced challenge after challenge on their path to success. On today's episode, they talk about that entrepreneurial journey, plus they share how they're navigating their businesses today during these turbulent times. A quick word about work. com before we get to our interview. Reopening our communities and businesses will take careful planning, but it can be as seamless as possible with work. com. Work. com is an all new suite of apps and resources that businesses and community leaders around the world can use to reopen, reskill employees, and respond efficiently to the COVID- 19 pandemic. Reopening will be a journey, but work. com is your guide. To learn more, go to work. com. Now, I'll hand it over to our host, Marie Rosecrans, Senior Vice- President of SMB Marketing at Salesforce.

Marie Rosecrans: I am thrilled to introduce to all of you the co- founders, business partners, life partners, Chip and Joanna Gaines. Welcome to the Stories of Resilience.

Chip Gaines: What?

Marie Rosecrans: We're honored to have you here. First and foremost, how are the two of you doing today?

Joanna Gaines: We're doing good.

Chip Gaines: Well, it's the three of us. It's the three of us, in fact.

Marie Rosecrans: I heard you brought an extra guest today.

Chip Gaines: We're having lots and lots of spring chickens here on the farm, or maybe it's early summer now because ...

Joanna Gaines: It feels like spring. I think we're all still kind of stuck in spring.

Chip Gaines: We have got some farm activities going on, and I wanted to include some of them to all...

Joanna Gaines: Show you... It was that or a goat, y'all. I said no goats inside.

Marie Rosecrans: What can I say? We're going to have a goat sighting. We're going to get right to it with some questions that I prepared, but again, we really encourage everybody to post their questions to that Q & A box. I just finished your book, The Magnolia Story.

Chip Gaines: Thank you.

Marie Rosecrans: I came away so touched by your entrepreneurial journey. You had some really tough early days. You took some great risks to expand. In fact, I was getting some heart palpitations myself when I was reading about your journey, but you both have been so incredibly resilient through it all, through really difficult times. I wanted to ask you, how did you persevere through that time?

Joanna Gaines: I'll start.

Chip Gaines: You start.

Joanna Gaines: I know you've got stuff. You're all about perseverance.

Chip Gaines: Usually it's a long- winded one, so she's got to get her two cents in...

Joanna Gaines: Let me talk first.

Chip Gaines: ...edge wise or else we're going to be in big trouble.

Joanna Gaines: One of the things that we, I remember when I think back... Can y'all take that chicken outside?

Marie Rosecrans: This is what we love about live.

Joanna Gaines: Yes. It's going to be Crew and the baby chicken. Crew will run in here at some point, I promise. When I think back to those days, I remember, I mean moments when Chip and I would look at each other and just think...

Chip Gaines: "We're in trouble."

Joanna Gaines: ... "Are we going to make it?" Not seeing the end. Not understanding you could actually get through it. We would look at each other and say, " Do we just bail and get out of Dodge?" That seemed so much easier than having to actually figure out how do we make it through this? Chip and his family have always had this thing that Gaines never quit, and so he'd say, " Jo, we're not going to quit. We're going to make it through this."

Chip Gaines: The Stevens were kind of opposite.

Joanna Gaines: No, don't say that.

Chip Gaines: They were always going, "When it doubt, quit."

Joanna Gaines: No, it just seemed easier sometimes.

Chip Gaines: If there's only a 60/ 40 chance we can succeed...

Joanna Gaines: Run. Run for the hills. For me, it really was... I did the books. I saw the numbers, and I could not see a way out, and I just remember thinking, " Okay." We would look at each other every day and say, " We're not quitting. We're going to do this." Something about that level of commitment, even when it felt hard, I think helped me just know, quitting isn't an option. If that's not an option, we're going to make it through this.

Chip Gaines: crosstalk to be a plan B. It's sort of like the old history lesson about the sailor or the explorer that literally decided to burn their boat so that they understood that there was no plan B.

Joanna Gaines: Yeah. There's no ...

Chip Gaines: crosstalk that first- hand I would say.

Marie Rosecrans: Sounds like the two of you also really, really encouraged each other as well through those times.

Joanna Gaines: I think we leaned on each other's strengths in those moments of weakness where I would typically only see the glass half full, and Chip would see the glass half full, like just that kind of thinking really helped me go, " Okay, I can do this." One thing we've always told people is even with that mentality shift, there's a lot of power in that. When you decide, " I'm not quitting. There isn't a plan B. We're going to make it through that," that that shift, it changes the momentum of things. It doesn't change it overnight. For us it was four or five more years of hard, so even though we were like we were in it, it didn't mean that all of a sudden everything was going to be easy, and now we're going to make it. I think what we really try to encourage people with is it could be a decade before you actually see the other side of this, but there's something about the momentum and that thinking of, " We're going to make it through this, and who knows what it's going to look like on the other side," but the one thing I can say is when I look back, I'm so thankful. We would have missed this moment. We would have missed a lot if we would have just pivoted and gone another direction because it was easier.

Marie Rosecrans: I love that. Thank you so much for sharing that. That is truly a story of resilience. You two are stories of resilience, so thank you. I'm going to switch gears a little bit. I know that you're familiar with Salesforce. You're customers at Salesforce, in fact. We at Salesforce really believe that business is a platform for change, and with everything happening in the world right now, I think you would agree this is more important than ever. We'd really love to hear from you, why is it... Two questions. Why is it important for companies to use their platforms to advocate for equality and justice, and then maybe you can tell us a little bit about how Magnolia is inspiring others to do that as well, be a platform for change?

Chip Gaines: Yeah, for us as really small business owners and as founders of what used to be a very small business, and it's evolved into really a medium- sized business, I mean I think some people looking in would assume it's this mega conglomerate or an empire of sorts. It's a small family business, even though it has definitely grown exponentially over the last few years. Bottom line for Jo and I is that we're people on planet Earth. We're human beings, and I don't feel entitled to hide behind our company with our personal perspective or our personal views and so when issues arise, I'll say it that way, and we've had plenty of them over the last five to ten years. I would say 10 years, we'd just gotten into the" public eye," but in a very small level, and then in the last five years, it's sort of expounded. Even early on when mass shootings would occur, Jo and I's hearts would leap for the people in those communities, and what we could do to be involved. That was really, I would argue, our first taste of this. We're not going to stand idly by while tragedies occur in our ecosystem. If we're aware of it, I believe God chose us to be aware of those issues, and then therefore, there's something we can do about those issues that I'm implying. Recently, obviously we were in the middle of the COVID crisis, and I would say that it was... I just want to be a bit personal here, transparent and hopefully all of this kind of works itself out, but I would say that as a family, and as a couple, and then the way Jo and I relate to that experience is that as a couple, if we're feeling this level of rawness due to this COVID- 19 pandemic, then we assume the whole world's feeling that same feeling. As that pandemic was sort of unfolding before our very eyes, and our company was having to evolve towards it, and to combat it, and to be wise about it, Jo and I made a very tough decision to close our shop down weeks if not nearly a month before it was a mandate that we were required to do that. I don't say that because I'm trying to pat myself on the back. We're just saying that as a community we realized that there were some things that were out of our control, and to be a part of the problem, as opposed to part of the solution, was just not an option for us. Then, fast forward just a few weeks from that rawness that we felt due to the COVID experience, we had a real racial uprising in our country, and obviously was due to incredibly unfortunate circumstance that happened in Minneapolis. We're tied to Minneapolis because Jo has a a really strong relationship with Target, and Target's headquartered out of Minneapolis, so we just got on the phone, and started calling people. " What's going on? What can we do to help?" As that started unfolding, we realized, Jo and I felt like there was a very tangible binder or blinding that was removed from Jo and I's eyes, and I would say when then blinding binder had removed itself, and we had talked to those people on the ground there in Minneapolis, we just realized we have to do better. I guess the very bottom line is that I had this almost epiphany. I remember... I'm 45 now, so I was in my 20s. I forget the exact date, but a few decades ago, I was on the couch in some place in Texas, and I was watching the LA riots unfold after the incident that occurred there. My heartfelt explosion, for lack of a better term, was that my family was not going to sit idly by and do nothing. Then, we find my children, as grown adults, 30 years from now, 25 years from now, whatever the exact date from A to B was, then they're grown, dealing with the same ramifications of this injustice and this systemic racism that has been a part of our ecosystem for obviously a very, very long time, and Jo and I basically made a decision. We are going to start implementing things at Magnolia. The things that we can control are family. My wife and I, Jo and I talked about it like endlessly, endless hours of conversation about what do we do? What are we unaware of? What have we been blind to? What can we do in our family first, and then our local community, and then that community affects our state, and that state affects the country, and that country affects the world. That's the only way Jo and I know how to do it because if you look at it from the epidemic, the crisis, the overwhelming nature that it represents, it makes even powerful people pull back because what can I do about it? I don't know what Jo and I can do about racism. I don't know what we can do about gun violence. I don't know what we can do about things that we've seen in our life, but I know that Jo and I can start with us, and I know we can impact our family, and I know our family can impact our community, so I just want to encourage everybody that's listening, the argument I've got is when somebody needs a cup of water, you don't have to solve the water crisis. You don't have to go and create a system that turns ocean water into fresh water. That's a big, tall objective, but can I take a cup of water to this person that I know is in need of a cup of water? In that one moment, you've changed the world, and Jo and I have made a very clear pact with our family and our community, and our business, and then all that that represents, that we're not going to be guilty of standing idly by as all of these things have occurred under our noses.

Marie Rosecrans: First and foremost, if you couldn't tell, I have the deepest admiration for the two of you. My admiration is even deeper now, based on everything that you've done. We had a speaker here at Salesforce on a Leading Through Change, Mellody Hobson, who said, " It starts in our house," and it's very, very clear that you really feel the same way. We really do need to start in our house, so thank you so much for sharing your perspectives on that. One last question before I head over to the overwhelming number of questions inaudible. I'm telling you it's going crazy over here. We're happy to call Magnolia a trail blazer. You're a Salesforce Marketing Cloud customer, a Social Studio customer for Magnolia Market, specifically. One of the things that I've noticed about you, you've kept the customer at the center of everything that you do. You can tell that in the products that you have, your engagement with the folks that you... Even the small businesses that you work with. Help us understand how technology has helped you to do that, and how technology has played a role in your growth.

Joanna Gaines: Yeah. Earlier on when all this was starting, I would say our main energy, our resources, just our creative thought, all of it went into the experience that people were going to get here physically here in Waco, Texas here at the silos. That was where we just kind of exhausted our energy to make sure that what they saw here, what they smelled, what they heard, everything we were so intentional about. Then, at some point, we realized, " Oh my goodness, there's this whole other universe." What do you call it, the world wide...

Chip Gaines: I know. The internet. We didn't know. We didn't know.

Joanna Gaines: inaudible. We are horrible at that kind of stuff, but beyond the physical silos, there's this whole other world that the sky is the limit, and then we started thinking, for people who haven't come to the silos, or who can't, or haven't made the trek yet, what are we going to do for them that is equally as intentional? Obviously, it's going to be different because it's different in person versus this, but how can we change our focus to make sure the people that are experiencing this on this other platform feel that intention, feel just that we value their time, so if they come over to us, if they read an email, or a text, or something on social that they feel heard. One thing that we, especially with the COVID thing, we realized is that now more than ever, that's how people are interacting, and I would say we've loved about Salesforce, the idea that all of our marketing tools are in this one bucket. We used to have it all, I mean it was really piece mailed, where now we just feel this kind of energy, this powerful force that we've got now that we can tap into that, and now we know that we can customize things. I think that's been huge for us. One example is the texting. For us locals, what they think of Magnolia, they know tourists are coming to town, longer lines. They want to experience it, but they don't want to experience it like a tourist. They want to come in and just walk down the street and come to the shop. Even just being able to customize how we talk to the locals via text has been huge. Using email, all of these things that feel really personal were in people's inboxes, were in their phones now. We want to make sure they feel heard, known, seen, not just marketed to in this blanket, " Hey, come see us," but that it feels customized and like we're really talking to them. That's what's important to us. We're not marketers in the sense that we want it to just be a thing. We want the sales. We really want to engage and interact with our customers in a really authentic way, and I think that's what we're super grateful for with technology. Obviously, with Salesforce, is that it's allowed that so that we're really talking to the customer, and hopefully they're feeling heard and valued in that experience.

Marie Rosecrans: Absolutely love that. I am letting you know that we have literally overwhelmed with inaudible. We have thousands of entrepreneurs and small businesses from pretty basically everywhere, including Japan, believe it or not.

Joanna Gaines: Wow.

Chip Gaines: What?

Marie Rosecrans: Yes, and so before I head over to the questions, I just want to remind you, if you have not already posted a question, and you really want to see if Chip and Joanna can provide you with the practical and actionable advice that you want and need, please go ahead and submit your questions in the Q A box. I am going to, this question is for either of you. It's from Hans and Breena Julianus. As entrepreneurs starting your business, did you have a defined vision for where you wanted to take the company, or just a general and pivot as you go type outlook?

Chip Gaines: Yeah, let me jump into this. The Gaines', we talked about how the Gaines' and that's me, and the Stevens, that's Jo's maiden name family, could not have been polar opposite entities on planet Earth. How this all happened is proof for us that God exists and there are miracles and things of this nature, but our personal opinions aside, my family came from a rule of thought that you started things as the ideas entered your brain. They hadn't even been fully flushed out. They haven't been fully vetted, and you had already started that idea, and let's say it was a business or a lemonade stand, or in my case, a fireworks stand, a laundry service, a lawn business. I mean etc, etc. They invented accidentally a habitual and very chronic entrepreneurs in my sister and I. We would start businesses, and then once they failed, we would evaluate the failed business, and then we would know what to do better the next time that we had one of these bright ideas. My wife, on the other hand, would write down pages and pages of...

Marie Rosecrans: Well, Stevens believed in a business plan, and moving forward slowly, and some may say wisely.

Chip Gaines: Oh boo, boring.

Marie Rosecrans: That's the difference. I will say though, with Magnolia, when I think about... There's two sides of this because Chip was doing construction when we first got married, and so that was his thing. He was renovating homes. I had this dream to start a boutique for whatever reason. I never did design. I'd never done retail. I worked at my dad's tire shop for 10 years.

Chip Gaines: That's retail.

Marie Rosecrans: Well, I knew how to sell a set of tires. I didn't know how to sell candles and fake florals. I think for me, the business plan I had was I added up all my expenses. There was no payroll. Couldn't afford that.

Chip Gaines: Tell her about the three different folders. That's what I was getting at. You had folders and folders of...

Marie Rosecrans: As I worked for my dad, I had these side dreams, like on my lunch break. Don't tell them. It was actually in the afternoons when I was bored, and I would dream up these other businesses, and there were three businesses that I knew one day I wanted to start. One was a spa, one was a bakery, and one was just a random retail boutique. I don't know. I kind of just literally did eenie, meenie, miny, moe, and the retail boutique is what I picked. The first year we got married, I told Chip, " I want to do this." We bought this tiny little building. We renovated it. I started learning about buying and selling goods. When I did the math, I had to do$ 248 a day to stay open. That's about as far as we got. I never had dreams and visions of being a big retailer, having a network, having a show, nothing. It was, " Chip, if we can make$ 248 a day, we can stay open." To answer the question, the way we have rolled is we've rolled more on the Gaines side in that sometimes...

Chip Gaines: 60/40. 60/40.

Marie Rosecrans: Yeah. You've got this instinct and you've got this intuition. I think that's where we make a good balance. Chips has these amazing instincts and intuition that I come in and kind of do the fine tuning and do the details, and that's, I think, why we're a great team, but we didn't have a big vision for Magnolia. We just thought, Chip was more, " Jo, I want you to follow your dreams, and if we only do$ 248 a day, then great. I'm excited that you love what you're doing, and you're finding value in your work." To answer the question, we didn't have big dreams. We didn't have a big vision. It's just this is how we stay open, and from there, every day something new evolved. It was about staying nimble. It was about pivoting when you needed to. It was really understanding gut instinct versus just going on a whim, and having to really trust that. The more you hone in on that, the stronger, I think, you become because you know, you've got to rely on your instincts as a business person.

Chip Gaines: It's like this idea that, I think people think of entrepreneurs and sometimes small business men and women that they get kind of a lumped into this thought of like riverboat gamblers or something like that. I would encourage, to your question, the reality that Jo and I found very quickly is there's a huge difference between literally rolling the dice, between making just an illogical or an unadvised gamble towards something, and hoping you with the" lottery," as opposed to strategically, and logically, and very thoughtfully adjusting as things present themselves to you. I would say people get lost on both sides of those extremes. You see that people like Jo and her family, and I'm just being facetious here, but sometimes get paralyzed in the thought process. It's like I have to know all the answers before I act and make a decision because that's wise, or that's prudent, and then you've got the Gaines' who need no information, and we're going to roll the dice, and we're always adjusting after the fact once we realize that our plan was flawed to begin with. There needs to be some place in the middle, and I want to encourage people that are entrepreneurs and small businesses, the objective is to become an expert at whatever your craft is, and then figure out how to scale that expertise. I think when people master that, a little bit of gut, and a little bit of intuition, and a little bit of business planning, and you mix those things into the pot, I think that's where the Elon Musks of the universe come from. I think that's where the Bill Gates of the universe come from. It's not always in these calculated, precise things. I'll say one more thing, and then I promise I'll shut up. I've been infatuated in the last couple of years with business leaders. How much information do you need to have, and obtain, and fully be able to trust before you make a decision to act? I've honestly gone on a personal soul- searching mission to answer that question. I've talked to dozens of some of the highest powered CEOs and top E executives on the planet, sorry C executives on the planet, and my conclusion, it was very surprising. I think Jo would think, if I asked you that, how much information, like if you had a percentage from zero percent of the information to 100%, so you knew for a fact that something was going to happen or not, how much of the information do you need to have before you make a decision to act towards that final objective? From zero to 100?

Marie Rosecrans: 51%.

Chip Gaines: What do you think? That's not your vent, that's my vent. What do you think you should know, if you pulled out of a farm...

Marie Rosecrans: Me personally, exactly.

Chip Gaines: ...How much information about where you're going to end up do you need to know before you take the crosstalk.

Marie Rosecrans: 110%.

Chip Gaines: Oh my gosh. All right, so 110%. I was hoping she was going to say 85 or 90.

Marie Rosecrans: I was trying to speak for most people, like yay, that'll push them.

Chip Gaines: I will tell you, you will be very surprised to find out that the answer to that question if between, in this very unscientific experiment that I've done for myself, but they gave me a lot of peace about it, somewhere between 40 and 60% of the information. When COVID hit, I'll say it this way, you didn't know any information. You didn't know if it was just the" flu." You didn't know if it was some other thing. Nobody knew all the details, so you were having to piece together little pieces of information to then determine what's our best next course of action? When you hear big time executives that are making billion- dollar decisions knowing 40 to 60% of the information, if I were a young entrepreneur, that would give me a lot of confidence like, " I thought I was an idiot. I thought I was ridiculous if I made a decision with only 40 or 60% of the information," but I want to say to the contrary. If you're starting a lawn business, or a very small literally local business, I'd say sure, push more at the 40 to 60% of the information. Get to 80. Get to 90. Get all the facts. Get the business plan air tight, but if you're trying to be Elon Musk, if you think that he knows more than 60% of the information before he pushes go on one of those rockets to try to figure out how do we create an engine that can take us to Mars, you're crazy. That's not the way it works. He starts off with a fraction of that, and then he builds to 40 to 60%, and it evolves to 90 or 100, but that's after years, and years of the process.

Joanna Gaines: Okay, Marie, inaudible after that rate, you have about two questions left.

Chip Gaines: Oh my gosh. I won't be this long- winded every time, I promise.

Marie Rosecrans: inaudible that is a powerful instrument. I'm just going to put that up. Okay, so Suzanne from Michigan, from Green Parrot Super Store, " What process do you go through when deciding whether or not to partner with a certain company or person in business?" She wants to do a shout- out to you, Chip. " My husband is really enjoying the book, Capital Gains."

Chip Gaines: Oh wow.

Joanna Gaines: Sweet.

Chip Gaines: Thank you.

Marie Rosecrans: You've had some incredible partnerships, and so she's asking you, what's the process you went through to decide when it was right or not.

Chip Gaines: I try to be consistent. Let me jump in here. I'll be brief, I promise. I try to be consistent so that there's reoccurring thoughts and ideas that people can then take away from an hour together because obviously you're not going to be able to retain 80% of this. The 20% part that I want people to remember is back to my point about that Jo and I are people. We have heartbeats. We have real emotions. We have real desires, and goals, and hopes for our family and our future, etc. We don't hide behind our business because of that reality. We want to highlight those emotions through our business, and I would say the same hold true with business to business partnerships. If I don't feel connected to the people on the other side of that brand or that business that we're trying to create a partnership with, for us, these things are heartbeat real live human interactions, and so if my business, and their business fit like a glove, but me and Jo, and the people behind their curtain don't, unfortunately those deals don't happen for us. When they do feel great, and then the two brands feel great, then you start realizing we've got something we can build off of here, and we can work together and build something that's really beautiful. Did you have a thought?

Joanna Gaines: No, just authenticity is such a buzz word these days, but I really, for us it is this idea...

Chip Gaines: It's not a buzz word when it's true.

Joanna Gaines: Okay, it is this idea of A, do I see this happening? We've had lots of opportunities where they were great opportunities, but for us to endorse, or partner with it, it felt like a stretch. To us, we've always kind of known, I mean I'll give you Target as an example. I said from the beginning, I was like, " That would be a dream because Target's my favorite store." Right now, during COVID, that's the shop I want to go to. I miss going out and shopping at Target. Some of these partnerships and these relationships, I just feel like, like Chip said, because is is a personal thing, this isn't a brand to us. When we think of Magnolia, we don't think of a brand. We think it's a...

Chip Gaines: Child.

Joanna Gaines: ...business with a heartbeat. It's an actual thing, and so for us it's saying no to a lot of the things short- term, but thinking long- term for the authenticity of the brand, for the voice of the brand to be kind of more rounded and sure, it's kind of saying no a lot more than saying yes. When you say yes, it's because it truly feels like this is a natural partnership. I'm not having to say, " Well, it's good because of this dollar amount, but shoot this is going to be role. It's like pulling teeth." We've always just had to say no to those, even in times where we're like, " We could actually take that check right now." We've had to say no, and I think in time, hopefully what will be resonating with a lot of people is this authentic thing, and so that's something that I think is a big indicator for us.

Marie Rosecrans: That's wonderful, the values alignment you speak to right there. It's just so powerful. You're absolutely right. Sharon Kaliel, and I apologize to all of you if I'm not saying your first and last names correctly, but I'm trying, I promise. Sharon Kaliel from Valor Compounding Pharmacy in Berkeley, California, just across the bridge from here right now. " I love that you have diversified your business portfolio. Did those opportunities present themselves to you, or did you seek them out? What advice do you have for small businesses to create new revenue sources?"

Joanna Gaines: inaudible.

Chip Gaines: Yeah, I'd say that's bottom line great question. For me, I'm a natural born hustler. I mean that's all I know to do is hustle and work, and work again, and work smarter, and then fail, and figure it out. That's just sort of in my DNA, so it's hard for me to communicate to somebody like Jo honestly, who's on the opposite end of that spectrum, but I will say, there's no supplement. There's no... I joke about this with people and platforms in that I wished I could say there's a magic pill and I could give you that said magic pill, and all of your issues would be resolved, but the magic pill is hard work. The magic pill is determination, and the magic pill, for me, is I use the term hustle, or to be wiley, or to be scrappy. We've got these phrases in our company that everybody refers to because when I walk by a piece of trash at our company headquarters, I can't walk past it. I have to go address it, so I pick up the piece of trash and I throw it away, and then when you have those sort of fundamental realities, that when you're aware of things, you address them. Let me say this real quick. I thought this was fascinating. There's a sort of a saying in the Army that if you see something that is below standard, and don't do anything about it, you have now set a new lower standard. When you process that thought, if I see something as a Magnolia employee, that I know beyond a shadow of a doubt is substandard, and I don't do anything to address it, I've now set a new substandard reality. I think to answer that question as simply as I can, opportunities are endless. There's infinite opportunities, so when I use the term hustle, it's not to sell anything to anybody, it's I'm constantly hustling to find the right opportunities at the right moment for us, for right now. I would encourage you to look very broadly at lots and lots of opportunities, but I would hustle as you work through those opportunities to narrow down your selection so that then she and that pharmacy can say, " I think this is a great opportunity for me to increase my revenue stream if I were to bring this product into the mix, or partner with this outside firm."

Joanna Gaines: I think it's the idea of evolving, and I think a lot of businesses get stuck because they're not open to the evolution of it. They're like, " This is what I started as, and this is what I'm going to..." It's being open, like Chip said, and looking around, and seeing what's the full story I'm trying to say? Is it wellness? Within the pharmacy, I'm trying to think, what's bigger? What's the bigger story? Then, every avenue you look at, does that tell that story more? With us, with retail it started off I was selling candles, and then we do home décor, and design, and then well lifestyle is home, it's eating, it's the coffee. All these moments, and so...

Chip Gaines: It's to do with the family.

Joanna Gaines: As we started looking outside, as Chip was hustling, because I was like, " We've got enough. I'm tired," but as he was hustling, the way we say yes to it is, " Does it feel... Does it help tell that story even more? Does that seem like that can really articulate what we're trying to say? How do we evolve into that?" A lot of the times it's saying no because it's like that actually tells a different story, and how do we wrangle that in? I think it's being willing to evolve, and tell a really strong story, and continue to take risks.

Marie Rosecrans: I love that. Thank you so much, and I know Sharon appreciates it as well. Jo, this is for you. Sarah Shepherd asks, " Can you talk about how you're able to have your hand in so many projects, Magnolia, Magnolia Journal, cookbooks, the Magnolia Network, and balance each project so well, and you're also a dynamic duo, but you're also great parents as well, so maybe let us in on some secret sauce because we could all use some.

Joanna Gaines: You know, for me, I have, when you talk about all those entities, it's really one team, and it's about a team of eight that as I move from whether it's a meeting, or an idea, the way we've looked at Magnolia, and the way we try to streamline it, now even with the network, is we want to tell the same message, and the same story, so it starts with the magazine, and then it goes into product curation, it goes into what we want to tell on the network. It's this nice line, and I think when you have that consistency through the brand, it makes things easier because you're having those same conversations, just with different forms. It could be network here. It could be magazine, so it's really simplifying how we work. Chip has always said, " Work smarter, not harder." I used to work really hard, but not smart, and it was just like I was so busy. I was not spending enough time with the kids. I was spending... Everything was off balance.

Chip Gaines: It wasn't that you weren't spending enough time with the kids, but you just felt like you were failing the business when you were with family, and then you felt like you were failing the family when you were with the business.

Joanna Gaines: Yeah, it was this idea that I couldn't win. Then, something shifted, and I really feel like it was like, " This business isn't going to run me. I've got to run this business, and so for me it was making really key shifts. It was taking half the week to be home, meaning I have to kill it when I'm at the office on Monday and Fridays. Monday and Wednesday, whatever it is." In that, knowing that I have space for home to create, and to cook, and do all the things that really bring me life, then when I would leave home, I'd go to work feeling full, and energized. It was really trying to figure out, because I feel really grateful in this opportunity to be self- employed, but you also have to carve out these intentional moments so that you're not just filling up, and then your tank is dry really quick. I would say in the last year or two because I want my cake, and I want to eat it too, I've had to figure out ways to really kind of carve out things, be super intentional, work really hard, but I'm also home now more than ever, which is really kind of crazy. I'm busier. I have more on my plate, but for whatever reason, I've dictated what I'm doing and not what business is going to do for me. When you kind of get that kind of, I think, passion and mindset, then you start really saying yes to what you need to say yes to, and let others do what I used to control, and micromanage. Now, I'm like, " You know what, I'm going to let the team do it because they're going to crush it." I don't know if that answers the question. I just think you've got to own it, and not let it run you because it was running me for a while, and I was extremely tired and feeling like I wasn't winning.

Chip Gaines: I will say on Jo's behalf, because it's harder for her to say something of this nature, but it's like she's built like a Cyborg. Her and her father are just built to work, and they'll show up to the work, and they'll do it until they keel over.

Joanna Gaines: I'm more of a robot than a human.

Chip Gaines: Yeah, but what I want to encourage her about, and what I want to say to everybody that's listening here, it's the idea that Jo needs some of her time. It's like things that inspire her, and refresh her, and I would say it's drivers. It's type A personalities drivers that we both are, sometimes when you take down time, you actually feel like you're failing, or you feel like you're a loser, or you feel like you're lazy. Even though you're anything but lazy, but in that moment, you've got these insecurities that pop into your brain like, " You should be working. This isn't done. Don't forget about this, your kids need you for this reason or that reason." I just want to encourage everybody that it's like when you have a full, fresh tank of gas, you're infinitely more efficient than when you burn completely out of gas, and you're operating, even though you're still there, and you're still doing the best you can. I want to encourage you to what Jo has learned over the last couple of years, is that she can actually do more with less if she'll give herself, her body, her mind, her spirit, all the things that make us human, if you'll give those things what it needs, she has much more to give at the house, with the family, at the business, and I think that's a piece of the equation. Everybody thinks work 100 hours a week, and work harder. I saw a mug the other day that said, " Nobody cares. Work harder." It's like I agree to that, with that, to some extent, but then there's also the part that's like nobody cares. Go take a nap. Nobody cares, go watch a movie, go paint, go play some golf, whatever it is that's going to fill your tank because I can assure you, when you get back to the house, and back to the office with a full tank of gas, you're going to be infinitely more competent and more capable than you were running on fumes.

Joanna Gaines: I think just being self- aware of I didn't know what that felt like. I just felt like hard work is hard work, whether you're tired or you've got energy, and now I'm so in tune with my mind, and kind of my emotional state, that I know, " Oh, I'm running low. I've got to pull back. I've got to get in the garden. I've got to get with the kids." It's understanding kind of your DNA, and how you're wired, and making sure that you're really feeding, like Chip said, your soul so that you don't feel depleted.

Marie Rosecrans: Yeah, our last speaker was Brene Brown, and she said, " New muscles require rest to develop."

Chip Gaines: Wow.

Joanna Gaines: I love that.

Marie Rosecrans: Thank you for reminding all of us about that really important message. Believe it or not, we're running out of time.

Chip Gaines: What?

Marie Rosecrans: I know, right? We're having so much fun. I have this rapid fire part of the show that I like to ask you a few questions, so that I feel people already feel like they know you personally, but maybe another way in which to get to know you on a more personal level. We have three questions for you, and maybe you can determine who wants to answer it. What is one thing you've let go this year?

Joanna Gaines: That's so good. Control.

Chip Gaines: Ohh inaudible.

Joanna Gaines: That's been hard. My whole life I've controlled, and I feel like, back to Chip's point, this is rapid fire?

Chip Gaines: We're just as long ...

Joanna Gaines: I turned into Chip.

Chip Gaines: We're just as long-winded ...

Joanna Gaines: I'll just say control, but for someone like me ...

Chip Gaines: That's a good, quick answer.

Joanna Gaines: For someone like me, that's like giving up like your identity, but it's been the most freeing things, and I'm like, " It's going to be great. It's going to be better because I'm not controlling it." That's been a hard thing to let go of.

Marie Rosecrans: Love that. Okay, we're going to move onto the next one. Name one small business you've supported. Maybe it's this month, but today's July 1st, so we're going to say maybe over the course of this pandemic, a small business that you've supported?

Joanna Gaines: Small business. I can say locally, yeah.

Chip Gaines: We've got local, lots of local small businesses.

Marie Rosecrans: Name some local small businesses.

Joanna Gaines: Yeah, well the other day, we put our masks on, and we knew no one was in the store, so we went, but there's this beautiful store called Gather, and that's the last thing we're all doing right not is gathering, so I assumed, " Hey, let's go in there." I wanted a little home refresh. There's a store called January Letterpress, a small business here in town that's got stationary, and again, just wanting to feel inspired, but also wanting them to know we support them, and then Fabled Bookstore. I know that's hard because these are all local, but there's something about local businesses that we love so much. When we think of Magnolia, when she was 1, 200 square feet...

Chip Gaines: Where she started. She was a part of this small business ecosystem, and we just love...

Joanna Gaines: Every customers that walked in, I felt loved and supported, so if there's any way we can do that, even during a pandemic with masks and gloves on, we're up for that.

Chip Gaines: Yeah, I've got a local barbecue joint called Vitek's that man the kids go to as often as we can, and I love that. I want to give a quick shout- out to a company that anybody could get to that's a national group, but it's a very small business, and it's called, of all things, justbats.com and my boys both play select baseball, so if anybody's into sports or specifically select athletics and they range from gymnastics all the way to soccer and anything in between, my boys are baseball players, so you can go online, and have these bats delivered to your door, and I know they would love the fact that they got a little shout out today, and they've been great to us.

Marie Rosecrans: Well, I hope all of those small businesses have eCommerce sites because I'm sure there are people trying to find them right now.

Joanna Gaines: Exactly.

Marie Rosecrans: One last question, who inspires you?

Chip Gaines: You mentioned Brene Brown. Jo and I have both been incredibly inspired by her over the last few years as she came online with just talking about how, just in the general sense of mental wellness. It's something that's so...

Joanna Gaines: Just in courage and bravery.

Chip Gaines: Yeah.

Joanna Gaines: inaudible.

Chip Gaines: It's one of those things that again, you've always been taught that that's a sign of weakness, but in fact, it's a sign that needs attention. It's just like part of this entire thing that is the human experience. We love and adore her. Is there crosstalk

Joanna Gaines: I always, I always, and this is super personal, but my mom is just fire. She's a 4'11" Korean woman who moved from Korea, sold Korea to...

Chip Gaines: As a teenager.

Joanna Gaines: At 19 years old, didn't know English, married my dad. My dad was actually stationed there.

Chip Gaines: She could get on this bike, and try to ride this bike back to Korea.

Joanna Gaines: She wanted to go home.

Chip Gaines: When things were tough early, early on.

Joanna Gaines: I think when I think about her upbringing and how hard life was for her, and now I get why she wanted to get away. She was trying to escape something just for her own whatever. Just the grit, and I think the strength that that woman, who is the tiniest woman you'll meet, there's something about that that's just so... Her story is so strong. It's so brave, for me that I have big shoes to fill, even though she has size 4 1/ 2 shoes, I think it's just she inspires me because I'm like, " If mom can do it, she's one of those examples of making it out alive, and being an amazing example." My mother is definitely one of my heroes for sure.

Marie Rosecrans: I love that so much. As a mom, I love that, and as someone who has an amazing mother, just so appreciative of your comments. In the final pages of your book, you wrote, " And in the end, what it's all about is thankfulness and contentment." We are so thankful for the two of you, the contentment, the inspiration, that you shared with all of us who joined today, and the support that you've been able to give the small business community. I'm so looking forward to and I'm sure so many people joining today, counting the days until you launch the Magnolia Network, so thank you so much you two for being here. To all of you who are listening in today, thank you so much for taking the time to join us. We hope you enjoyed listening and learning from this incredible duo. We hope you'll continue to support one another because it is all about supporting one another right now, and continuing the conversation on Twitter with# stories of resilience, and if you have feedback, and you listen to the feedback, we posted a link in the Q& A feed as well as in the chat window. We would love to hear from you. Lastly, I'm happy to announce that we already have our next Stories of Resilience scheduled. It's on July 29th. We're going to be featuring Angela Duckworth, Best selling author of Grit, and CEO of Character Labs, and she's going to be joined with Kobie fuller, co- founder of Valence and partner at Upfront Ventures for another engaging conversation. Register right now by clicking the link right there on the screen. Until then, stay happy, stay healthy, stay well, and thank you again for joining us today on Stories of Resilience.

Michael Rivo: That was Joanna and Chip Gaines talking about why now is the time to personalize customer relationships, the importance of balancing gut instinct with thoughtful planning, and how to run your business and not let it run you. For insights into this topic and others, head over to salesforce. com for resources to help guide you through today's economic and social environments. I'm Micheal Rivo from Salesforce Studios. Thanks for joining today.