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When Samyr Lain\u00e9 walked into his freshman dorm room at Harvard University in 2002, he found his new roommate tucked away in the corner of their room, typing away on his computer.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A year and a half later, that roommate sent him a project he was working on called TheFacebook.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou could tell where his skill set was as a coder and as a thinker, and he was just supremely advanced,\u201d Lain\u00e9 said of Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. \u201cHe was taking senior-level courses as a freshman and showing up to a three-hour final exam, two hours late, and getting the highest grade in class.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
While living in that dorm room, Lain\u00e9 began to hone his skills as a triple jumper on Harvard\u2019s track and field team. After college, he competed as a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin. He then went on to study law at Georgetown, graduating in 2010.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A decade after sharing a bunk bed with Zuckerberg, Lain\u00e9 represented Haiti in the triple jump at the 2012 Olympic Games in London. Ten years after that, he co-founded Freedom Trail Capital, a venture capitalist firm that invests in celebrity brands like Issa Rae\u2019s haircare line Sienna Naturals, Kaley Cuoco\u2019s dog supplement company Oh Norman!, and Ten to One Rum, co-owned by the singer Ciara.\u00a0<\/p>\n
From his time as an Olympian, Lain\u00e9 understands what it is like to be the talent fronting a product. After his athletic career ended, he went on to work with Jay-Z at Roc Nation and with Will and Jada Pinkett Smith on their media company, Westbrook. Those experiences were pivotal in teaching Laine how to make a celebrity brand successful.<\/p>\n
From the Olympics to Roc Nation\u00a0<\/p>\n
After placing tenth in the triple jump at the London Olympics, Lain\u00e9 continued to work in sport, first as a lawyer at Monumental Sports, which owns several Washington, D.C. sports teams including the Capitals, Wizards and Mystics, and later directing player relations at Major League Soccer.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He joined Jay-Z\u2019s entertainment company Roc Nation in 2018 as senior director of operations, using both his legal background and operations skills to manage artists like Alicia Keys, Meek Mill, Lil Uzi Vert. He also worked on Jay-Z\u2019s alcohol brands, music streaming platform Tidal, and launched projects like the company\u2019s book publishing division, Roc Lit 101.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy role at Roc Nation is really what laid the foundation for what I\u2019m doing today,\u201d he said. \u201cFor me, [it] was just having a front row seat and understanding how Jay leverages his cultural cachet to build some really valuable, really tremendous businesses,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lain\u00e9 left Roc Nation in 2019 to then join the Smiths at their media and production company, Westbrook, as vice president of operations. He was then promoted to senior vice president, working with the entire Smith family to launch apparel, personal care, and coffee brands.<\/p>\n
\u201cI came on as a very early employee, maybe employee number six or seven. We built that to almost 200 employees across six different verticals,\u201d he said. \u201cA lot of [the job] was taking what I learned\u2014a baptism by fire Roc Nation\u2014translating that to Westbrook.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Friday before the 2022 Oscars (the one when Smith slapped comedian Chris Rock), Lain\u00e9 left Westbrook to consult for brands and address what he saw as a gap in the market between celebrity-led brands and venture capital.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A year later, he co-founded Freedom Trail Capital with his wife and fellow triple jump Olympian Ayanna Alexander-Lain\u00e9. Together, the two have amassed a portfolio of celebrity-led brands trusted by consumers and celebrities alike.<\/p>\n
Investing in authentic brands\u00a0<\/p>\n
What will make or break a celebrity brand is authenticity, not just a famous name attached to a company, Lain\u00e9 said, before pointing to the many mediocre celebrity tequila brands out there as an example. Sometimes, Lain\u00e9 warned the product doesn\u2019t even match the name behind it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Take for example Jay-Z\u2019s successful cognac and champagne brands\u2014most people don\u2019t remember his vodka venture Armadale.<\/p>\n
\u201cVodka was probably the wrong category for the wrong demographic that Jay-Z appeals to,\u201d Lain\u00e9 explained. \u201cWhat doesn\u2019t work, and people know this, is inauthentic pairings between talent and business.\u201d<\/p>\n
Companies fail when they don\u2019t need to think critically about their product and how it will serve customers, he said. Freedom Trail takes a different approach.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe look for businesses that either have or can benefit from having a person of influence involved. Person of influence, we say deliberately, because we\u2019re not exclusively looking for celebrities, but we\u2019re looking for folks who have a platform and an audience where they can add their audience to authentically supercharge an already great business,\u201d Lain\u00e9 explained.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lain\u00e9\u2019s goal is that a company survives with or without a big name\u2019s backing. But when an influential person becomes involved, they tend to bring their audience with them.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
He points to his client and Harry Potter actress Emma Watson. Her family\u2019s gin brand, Renais, is the quintessential example of an influential person backing a brand. The gin comes from recycled grape skins from Watson\u2019s family\u2019s vineyard in Burgundy, France, where her father has been growing grapes for more than three decades. Her brother, Alex, is the company\u2019s CEO, and Watson designed the product\u2019s bottle and packaging, Lain\u00e9 said. And that authenticity translates to other well-known and beloved brands.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe reason that Nike is a talent-led brand, and Revlon and Gatorade [is that] they all leverage talent successfully, Lain\u00e9 said. \u201cThe right person with the right audience and the right messaging through the right medium speaking to the direct demographic at the right time can supercharge a business. That business that it\u2019s supercharging has to be a great product that\u2019s innovative and a quality business and a strong brand.\u201d<\/p>\n
#Meet #Mark #Zuckerbergs #college #roommate #OlympianturnedVC #exec #invests #celeb #businesses<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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