Persistence Pays Part 4: From Homeless to Billionaire

"I have said many times that the difference between successful people and unsuccessful people is that successful people do a lot of the things that unsuccessful people don't want to do. Like when the door is slammed in your face ten times, you go on to door number eleven with just as much enthusiasm.” - John Paul Dejoria.

Storyline:

If this were just another rags to riches story, I would probably not cover it here. However, the story of John Paul Dejoria was particularly exceptional and fascinating to me: because of his values, his "out of the box thinking", and what he did with his phenomenal success.

John Paul grew up with a single parent, amongst the gangs of East Los Angeles, living in near poverty. At the age of nine, he would deliver newspapers at 3 O'clock in the morning with his brother, dreaming that he might earn $150 week someday so that he could afford a used car.

As fate would have it, while still in his early 20s, he himself became a single parent with a young son to support.  To get by, he took various jobs such as being a janitor, a gas station attendant, repairing bicycles, and selling encyclopedias. During this time, he also became homeless twice.  Too proud to ask for help, he collected coke bottles and cans and cashed them in for small meals. By any standards, he was in deepest of valleys, but managed to keep his hopes high to climb the greatest of mountains.

In 1980, he finally got his break.  He was able to borrow $700 with his friend, Paul Mitchell, to start a new company. This company would introduce a new line of hair care products under the brand name "Paul Mitchell".

At the time, this company was one post office box and an answering machine.  Their voice message was recorded by a female friend with an English accent in the back seat of their car (the office).   Not being able to afford colored ink, they went with black and white packaging - which today is the instantly recognizable Paul Mitchell brand.

Instead of following the convention of chasing after supermarkets and chain stores, the partners knocked on the doors of hair salons across the United States. They used an innovative sales strategy that had never been tried in that industry before. They offered to do free demonstrations for customers and guaranteed that if the product didn't sell, the salons could return it without any conditions.

Suffice to say, the salons loved it, and their customers did too. As the company grew, John Paul continued to innovate; running it with a management philosophy to hire, train and retain the best people, and reward them handsomely.  As a result, his company operates with three to four times less resources than his competitors, or in his words, with “fewer moving parts ... fewer people doing more.”

With this combination of innovation and persistence in everything; ranging from design and sales to operations, his dream of earning $150/Week turned quickly into billions of dollars in assets.  Today, John Paul Dejoria is still innovating.  He is involved in many other ventures ranging from tequila and pet care products to solar cars and environmental projects. He donates $100s of millions to various charitable causes around the world. His motto is “Success unshared is failure.”

Reflection:

There are a few common themes that come out of the lives of successful people.

1. They have dreams and know what they want to achieve.

2. They are willing to pay the price (whatever it may be) to achieve them.

3. They go for them with passion and never look back.

Hint: you can see other stories in our 'persistence pays' series by clicking here

Comments

[Anita]

Truly inspiring.

[Micro-CEO in training]

Very interesting story, and it also reminds me of Will Smith's portrayal of the main character in the movie "Pursuit of Happiness". What a triumph, even with huge practical burden ...homeless with children to feed!. Success is the value that is so deeply engrained in all Americans, and we love to read about the underdog who makes it big and then give some back.

On persistence, there is a memorable scene in another movie called "Gattaca" where the weaker of 2 brothers challenges his physically superior sibling to a swimming distance match into the open seas. Amazingly the weaker brother outlasts the other and even has to pull him back to shore. The defeated brother gasps, "How did you do that?" and the tired but victorious one replies, "Here's how I did it: I never saved anything for the way back."

[Nisha]

I have seen John Paul DeJoria several times on Donny Deutsch show. He is truly a role model of what a successful person is. Very humble, unassuming, honest, creative and at no point one even gets a feeling that he is a multi Bilionaire. He makes you feel that he is just one of us, cares deeply about every individual around him and willing to impart his experiences to help others.

One just feels so much connection with him. That is the sign of a truly a great human being.

Thanks for bringing such inspiring stories every Friday. My family looks forward to Friday mornings.

[Sandeep Balaji]

It was very insightful reading about Paul Dejoria.One often reads about the rages to riches story of people who are very passionate about something they care about...And it helps them get there at a far quicker clip than their peers...The American Dream is an inspiration of all global citizens....

Sandeep
www.Qiu-inc.com