Upstarts by Donna Fenn
Discusses the rise and success stories of businesses founded and run by young punk kids like Matt and I. Includes interviews and coverage of all the usuals, including:
Josh Spear - A kid from New York who started blogging in the back of a college classroom a few years ago and now runs his own mini new-media empire. Today his site has a slew of contributing writers, he's endorsed by Yahoo! and he travels the world blogging about all sorts of stuff from art and design to Global Economic Summits. I ran into Josh a few months ago outside this year's TED conference - nice guy.
The Hundreds - Two former USC Law School students, Bobby Kim and Ben Shenassafar, who started a streetwear brand in 2003 inspired by Southern California skateboarding lifestyle. They started a daily blog - back before anyone knew what a blog was - which served to connect with their customers and define what their brand was all about. Now they have 2 flagship stores, did nearly $5 million in sales last year and refuse to distribute through national department stores out of fear of alienating their core audience. Matt and I see these guys out in LA all the time, especially at Lakers' games.
I've yet to find the chapter in Upstarts about 0484CREATIVE and our rise to global supremacy but I'm sure we must be in here somewhere.
Tribes by Seth Godin
World's most popular marketing blogger discusses the idea of brand building and cultivating 'tribes' of devout fans who embrace whatever it is that you do and help spread your message. Besides ours, Seth's is the other blog you should be reading every day.
