In this episode, Leticia Viedma shares how she transitioned from being a lawyer to the founder of KAMI, a women’s footwear company with an emphasis on Spanish craftsmanship. She discusses what inspired her to enter the fashion industry, the challenges she faced developing a DTC brand, and why she believes delivering a high-quality product that serves customers is essential. Tune in for insights on shifting from corporate life to fashion entrepreneurship, developing effective growth marketing strategies, and building an authentic brand that resonates with an audience.
About Leticia Viedma (LV)
Leticia Viedma is the founder of KAMI, a modern women’s footwear company rooted in traditional Spanish craftsmanship. Before starting KAMI, Leticia was a successful M&A attorney. After leaving her practice, Leticia went on to earn her MBA at Wharton School and transitioned into marketing. By 2020, she had joined Rent the Runway as the head of growth where she helped scale one of the leading fashion tech brands in the world. Leticia’s most recent career pivot has led her to build KAMI, a footwear brand whose mission is to create designer-quality shoes that balance style and comfort for everyday wear.
Contact Info
Website: shopkami.co
Instagram: @shopkami.official
Takeaways
- Focus on your brand’s “why” to anchor you through challenges.
- Long-term success requires dedication and time investment.
- Products should solve real customer problems as they are the foundation of brands.
- Develop customer trust by maintaining an authentic online presence.
- Networking is key to establishing a presence in the entrepreneurial space.
Interview Themes
Why is it important for ecommerce brands to have a clear “why”?
A “why” is the purpose or vision for your brand that acts as your company’s guiding principle. Leticia shared that her entrepreneurial journey has been filled with moments of fear and uncertainty, but reminding herself of her “why” helps her stay grounded. For Leticia, KAMI’s purpose is to craft accessible, designer-quality shoes that empower women. When entrepreneurs lead with their purpose in mind, it is easier to make aligned decisions and stay motivated.
How does long-term thinking shape the way entrepreneurs should approach building their businesses?
Building a brand isn’t a sprint—it’s a marathon. Developing a loyal customer base doesn’t happen overnight. Instead, relationships with customers are built through a development of trust, emotional connection, and meaningful interactions. Leticia advises that in order to achieve long-term success, entrepreneurs should be willing to invest time into processes that will compound over time.
Why should product quality and customer satisfaction be the foundation of a brand?
According to Leticia, it’s nearly impossible to “market your way out of a bad product.” Customers buy solutions to solve their problems. For instance, KAMI started as a direct response to a real problem that Leticia had identified: women lacked high-quality shoes that were stylish, comfortable and affordable. With this in mind, KAMI set out to craft women’s footwear that solved these issues. For brands to grow sustainably and organically, a product that addresses customer needs is more important than any marketing tactic.
What role does authenticity play in connecting with customers in the ecommerce space?
Authenticity builds emotional connection and emotional connection builds trust. Leticia believes that for a brand to create genuine connections with its customers, social media platforms can be used as tools. Gradually, brands are drifting away from polished corporate branding, favouring relatable and transparent content instead. By showing the behind-the-scenes, sharing imperfect moments, and revealing the humans behind the company, brands can strengthen customer loyalty and cultivate community.
Chapters
00:00 Building a Women's Footwear Brand Rooted in Spanish Craftsmanship with Leticia Viedma
03:16 Transitioning from Corporate Life to Fashion Entrepreneurship
06:06 The Beginnings of KAMI: Premium Women’s Footwear Brand
21:30 Building Customer Trust Through Authentic Content
23:29 The Importance of Creating Solutions with Products
29:29 Networking and Finding Community as an Entrepreneur
30:51 Managing Uncertainty as a New Founder
35:04 Long-Term Growth for KAMI
Transcript
Leticia Viedma
Just my friends and family have been super supportive. I call my mom, my chief psychologist officer, like I call her almost every day. She knows more about footwear than she ever cared to know at this point, I think. So I think having a community is really important. And then the other part of it is really connecting with your why. Why did you start this in the first place? And really feeling solid, profound conviction around your why, since the start, and then reminding you of that whenever you have moments of doubt or moments of, I guess not much inspiration. So I think going back to your why and trying to connect and project with that vision of where you think this can go, those two things have been important.
And then one last thing is I think when you're an entrepreneur, there's a big tendency to just work, work, work. There's always something to do. You're always sending an email or talking to someone. The limit is the sky in terms of work. What I found is that you actually sometimes need a moment for yourself and you need to create spaces for inspiration, spaces to connect with other sides of you that are not just this and spaces to get in a flow and enjoy life, so you can come back to your work with more energy, more inspiration.
Glynis Tao
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams, a podcast for fashion entrepreneurs who want to build a purposeful and profitable clothing business so they can make a living doing what they love. I'm your host, Glynis Tao, an apparel business consultant and SEO specialist with 20 years apparel industry experience. I'm also a mom to a wonderfully energetic little boy named Chase.
Glynis Tao
My guest today is Leticia Viedma, founder of KAMI, a women's footwear brand that blends Spanish traditional craftsmanship with modern design. Every pair is handcrafted in her hometown in Spain from premium leather, offering designer-level quality without the designer markup. Before starting KAMI, Leticia led the growth team at Rent the Runway, where she helped scale one of the most iconic fashion tech brands in the world.
She's also a graduate of the Wharton School and began her career as an M&A attorney before transitioning into marketing and entrepreneurship. In this episode, Letitia shares her incredible journey from corporate law to fashion founder and the lessons she's learned about growth, storytelling, and building emotional connections with customers. We also dive into what it takes to grow a DTC brand from the ground up, how to bridge heritage and innovation, and why trusting your intuition is key to building something authentic.
So whether you're a founder navigating a pivot or someone dreaming of starting your own brand, this episode is full of inspiring insights you won't want to miss. Welcome, LV. It's so nice to have you here today. Thanks for joining me on the podcast.
Leticia Viedma
It's so nice to be here. I'm so excited. Thank you for having me.
Glynis Tao
My pleasure. So you started your career as an M&A attorney before transitioning into marketing and entrepreneurship. Can you walk us through that journey and what inspired you to make such a big career pivot?
Leticia Viedma
Yes, so I'm Spanish. I'm originally from a small city in the southeast of Spain called Alicante. And in Spain, law is an undergrad degree. So I did that as an undergrad and started my career working in M&A doing advisory on transactions, buy side, sell side, a lot of private equity deals. And I did that for about three years, but I quickly realized that I was missing something very important or something that I've learned that is very important to me over time, which is the sense of ownership. And, you know, when you're a lawyer, ultimately you're always advising. You're on the sidelines, but you're not really owning the decision making. I just noticed most of the time I was so much more interested in learning about the business and not so much the legal work around it. That's kind of what moved me to slowly change over and make a transition to the operating side. I'm really happy I took the plunge and made the pivot.
Glynis Tao
Okay, and so did you have any background in fashion up until then?
Leticia Viedma
No, not at all. Just to continue on my trajectory, I left law, I transitioned, I wanted to go abroad. I moved to Luxembourg to join the European Investment Fund. That was my next step in my career. For those who are not familiar with the European Investment Fund, it's essentially a public-private institution with a mandate of investing in the European startup environment to really reinvigorate that layer of small and medium-sized businesses. I believe the European Investment Fund is an LP in 75% of European venture capital funds. That was kind of my segue after law and got me closer to the startup world and really solidified my wish to operate. I really think the US is the best place to start a company and learn. I wanted to come here. That's when I applied to Wharton and I got in and just came for a business school. Right after business school, I joined Rent the Runway and I had no prior experience either in fashion or as an operator. I learned a lot on the job.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, I think we'll go back to your experience at Runway, but before I get to that, what was the aha moment that led you to create KAMI?
Leticia Viedma
It started really as a passion project and then not so long ago this summer, honestly, I had this aha moment where I thought, no, this is kind of what I really want to do with my life. I want to give this a lot of energy. I think there's a couple of things that inspire me. First of all, I love fashion and I love shoes in particular and whenever I had to buy shoes here in the U.S., I always found myself having to trade off on either price or style or quality. So I really felt that there was a need to deliver a product that nailed the value equation between quality and price. Part of it was just like my personal journey and observations and then on the other hand, I started to get really energized with the idea of building my own company. Fundamentally, I'm really like a builder—that's what I enjoy doing. So I just put all of my passions together and that's how KAMI was born.
Glynis Tao
So how did growing up in Spain and your connection to traditional craftsmanship influence the vision behind the brand?
Leticia Viedma
This is honestly a not so well-known fact about me, but my great-grandfather actually made shoes. He had a factory, he made espadrilles. So I never met him—that was like three generations ago—but maybe there's a genetic component to it. No, jokes aside, as I mentioned, I come from Alicante, which is a city in the Southeast. It's very well known for its craftsmanship and shoe making and traditional leatherworks. So growing up, I was always super exposed to the shoe making industry, in indirect ways. I went to school with girls whose parents owned factories and I was very exposed to that through my personal connections. And so having worked in fashion here in the U.S., I really thought about how can I connect all of my worlds and create something that is special and unique to me and somewhere where maybe I can do this better than average. I brought together easy access to manufacturing in my city, which I knew was gonna help me deliver a really good product and then all of my inside work in marketing and fashion in New York, I kind of put everything together.
Glynis Tao
Okay, so that makes a lot of sense now because I was going to ask you why it was important for you to manufacture your footwear in your hometown. Specifically, it's being manufactured right in your hometown, right?
Leticia Viedma
Yeah, correct. The city is Alicante and it's in one of the little villages in that region. The reason that I wanted to do it there is because product is so important for consumer businesses. You cannot really market your way out of a bad product and I would never want to create a company around a product that isn't top notch, right? And so I really had very high trust that the product was going to be amazing based on my experience growing up there and having been exposed to Spanish shoe craftsmanship. That's the reason why. And then obviously I'm so proud that in my own way I can contribute to my hometown.
Glynis Tao
So what does the design and production process look like from concept to a finished pair of shoes?
Leticia Viedma
So shoes actually have a pretty long lead time as I've come to learn because they are actually handmade. I was talking to my manufacturer a couple of months ago and I think he mentioned that every single shoe that is made is touched by at least 30 pairs of hands. And so it's heavily manual, heavily operational. From start to finish, a shoe takes at least 48 full hours to complete. So that means that you need to really think ahead. I'm starting to think about 2026 Summer Collection now and I think I'm already kind of late in the game. We're just getting started and nimble, so we can move a little bit more quickly. But there's a lot of lead time and a lot of thinking ahead that happens. And that's the first part.
The second part is that shoes are very technical because you actually need to be able to walk in them. It's not like ready to wear. I mean, not all ready to wear. Some ready to wear are really structured. Let's say more mainstream ready to wear. It's easier to design without specific expertise. And so in my case, I know what I'm good at. I'm definitely not a shoe designer, so I partnered with a design partner. His name is Alvaro. He lives in my hometown. He has decades of experience, both designing and producing shoes. I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted the collection to look like, and so I put mood boards in a deck together and just sent them to him. We had conversations about my feel and my vision for the brand and then he sent me sketches. I gave feedback, but you know, I think we're pretty in sync in terms of taste. So that process of aligning on the look and feel of the shoe was actually pretty seamless. And then after that, you have to kick off sample development, sourcing the different components. So like one thing you'll notice, KAMI’s heels have a very specific iconic shape—they are a bit slanted. So we had to source that specific heel from a specific component and provider, also in my region. That process is lengthy and just figuring out the different components, the different parts, like where are going to get the leather from? What kinds of leather are we talking about? I knew I didn't want to do hardware—I just wanted to keep things as simple as possible. Once you have the samples locked in, then that's when you decide to go into production. Yeah, it’s definitely a few months.
Glynis Tao
I'm just curious to know how long that whole process took from the time you had the idea for the brand to when you had your first sample to when you actually had your products ready.
Leticia Viedma
I guess this is one of my character traits. I have an extreme bias for action, so I started this honestly as a passion project at the beginning of the year. I wanted to explore whether I could have a side hustle. It was just more out of passion. Let's say probably overall, it took like six or seven months to get everything and then launch the site. So I guess around nine or 10 months all in. Yes, I moved pretty quickly.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, and you recently just launched your brand, is that correct?
Leticia Viedma
Yeah, honestly, the site has been live for three or four weeks. It's four weeks.
Glynis Tao
It's a baby. You had led the growth team at Rent the Runway. What were some of the biggest takeaways about scaling a DTC brand?
Leticia Viedma
I think I touched on one of them, which is that product is super important. You really need to build a company around the product that solves consumer needs. So I think that's number one for consumer businesses.
And number two is really being customer-obsessed. What I mean by that is people have limited bandwidth and limited head space and so I really believe that the way to grow your brand is if you're able to tap into people's needs and problems and position yourself as a solution to those needs and problems. Yeah, so those two things like product and customer first are really important. And then what I will also say is that I feel like 10 maybe years ago, growth marketing lived on its own orbit and brand marketing also lived on its own orbit and growth was super focused on demand capture and essentially customer acquisition costs and it was very heavily driven by how you were doing the media buys. And then the brand on the other hand was very focused on more upper funnel, demand generation tactics and not as analytical. And I think those days are kind of over. I really believe that brand is growth and growth is brand and you cannot really separate the two. I actually think that the only way to build sustainable long-term growth is if you're able to solidify an emotional connection with your customer. You have to do that in every touch point because from a user perspective, they don't care if it's a paid ad on Instagram or they're seeing your organic post.
So something that I have a strong conviction on is that there needs to be really strong brand alignment across all of your marketing touch points. You'll be successful if you really touch on that emotional connection and not only build a brand on the back of paid performance, but also organic and community and their traditional brand channels.
Glynis Tao
And so are you able to apply some of the lessons that you learned from working at Rent the Runway to KAMI's early stage growth?
Leticia Viedma
Yeah, I definitely am trying to, on the one hand, really nail and scale a performance marketing engine. By that, I mean optimizing the site, delivering on a solid email program, kicking off paid advertising across paid social and paid search channels. So that is table stakes and you need that. But then I'm also really focused on growing that authentic organic community of people that gravitate toward the brand and that are going to become your advocates and that are excited to hear about the brand. And so I'm doing two things. I'm starting to really spend some time on organic social content and I had to get over myself. I don't like social media. I didn't have TikTok before and now I'm just trying to get out there and film some content and really put a face behind the brand and create that personal connection. So that's on the one hand.
And then on the other hand, I've started to build connections with creators and influencers who I feel are brand aligned and are also passionate about the brand and the story resonates with them. I'm starting to build that community of future brand ambassadors, hopefully. So really moving on the two tracks at the same time.
Glynis Tao
What has been the biggest challenge in moving from a corporate leadership role to now starting your own business from scratch?
Leticia Viedma
Right now I'm pretty much alone. I am having to do everything myself. In my prior life, I had access to resources and obviously Rent the Runway was an established company that had a team. Now I'm literally on Canva, doing ads myself—like creating the ad—having to DIY everything. And so I think that's been a challenge because, in many ways, I know what good looks like or what really good looks like and what execution excellence can look like. I'm a marketer. I'm not a graphic designer and so I think the hardest thing for me has been just wrapping my head around the fact that this is where we're at today and I'm just trying to do things as best as I can in the most cost efficient way and just trying to be very resourceful. I'm also tapping some freelance help just to add more leverage to my time, but with the understanding that we'll improve and get better over time as we scale. Kind of detaching from perfectionism and really embracing the fact that done is better than perfect. And also that I'd rather move quickly versus being paralyzed and not get the word out there. Honestly, people are quite understanding. I know that the content in my site could be a hundred times better, but I'm just getting started and I think good enough sometimes has to be good enough. Those are my ongoing qualms as I move from team support to on my own.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, oftentimes it's a really big change for someone coming from corporate who had a team behind them to do those things. Like you said, you're not necessarily good at doing graphic design. You had a graphic designer there to do that, but now it's up to you to do many of the things, right?
Leticia Viedma
Totally, yeah. I think one of the things I'll say is that I think one of the themes of my nonlinear career path is that I think everything you can figure out. I really think that the difference between people that are able to do it versus people that not is just a matter of how passionate they are about the problem. How many hours are you willing to invest in trying to solve this, in trying to figure this out, in trying to find the resources, the network? How obsessed are you with this problem? And then you figure it out. So I think it's a combination of passion and hard work.
Glynis Tao
And are you sharing that process with your audience as well? Like sort of the journey that you're going through right now and showing those behind the scenes and maybe not so perfect moments?
Leticia Viedma
I think I need to do a better job of that. And so yes, my plan is to. I'm actually just working on this—a much more granular content plan. So I actually capture that and offer vulnerability and hopefully inspire other people to do the same, because guess what? If you wait until it's perfect, you'll never do it.
Glynis Tao
That's very true. And I think it probably what makes you authentic as opposed to showing such polished everything, looking so perfect, but showing the reality of what is really going on. I think it also builds more of that emotional connection between you and your audience and not just making yourself look like you're a super polished big brand or something, right? So I think that whole storytelling aspect is a very important part of the journey.
Leticia Viedma
Yeah, no, you're totally right. I have to say at the very beginning, a couple of months ago, I was a bit daunted at this idea of, oh my God, having to produce content is actually a lot of work too. I mean, I've never in my personal life been a big social media person and now I've had this moment of realizing, oh my God, this is so much work.
You have to be strategic. I'm really good at executing, but then guess what? Volume and frequency really matter a lot as well. I'm in the phase of acknowledging that it's a really important part and a really important piece of the marketing puzzle. So now I'm just working to build a system of scale to be able to actually weave this with my everyday and operationalize it in a way that is approachable, right? So that's where I'm at. I mean, I've definitely started to post more. I'm starting to use some AI, like apps to make some fun content and that's easy. I think for anyone who cares that is listening, more will come over the next couple of weeks. I'm kicking like a robust plan off. Yeah, for sure.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, wow. I look forward to following you along your journey as well. And so just kind of like you had mentioned, it's important to be solving a problem, right? Just curious to know what was that gap that you had identified in the market and what was that that KAMI was hoping to fill.
Leticia Viedma
Yeah, I mean, guess two things. Having worked in fashion for… I was at art here for like five and almost half years. I think I always knew this, but I had a realization. Women are really smart and they really care about value and what I mean by value is getting good quality at a reasonable price point and my insight is that people are actually willing to pay a little bit more to get higher quality. Right. So I think that's part of what informed the KAMI strategy. KAMI is really all about that. I want to deliver value. I want people to feel this is a good investment because I'm getting a hundred percent leather. It's handcrafted. It's versatile styles. I'm going to be able to wear them everywhere. And you know, it's not like a crazy expensive product. Our products range from 270 to like 350, but you're getting designer level quality. That was rooted in that insight of I don't want women to have to compromise anymore because I don't want to compromise. So that's part of it.
And then on the other hand, I mentioned this at the top of our conversation. When I wanted to buy shoes here, I mean, in Spain, there's a lot of really good shoes. When I was here, oftentimes I didn't know where to buy. There's a lot of options where you're getting maybe not so good quality shoes for like, you're already paying like a hundred plus by the way, or you know, you just have to go and make a commitment and invest in designer for 600 plus. I think the other part of the insight that I had was I think there's an opportunity here mid-market, if you want to call it that, or like entry, like contemporary. So yeah, I think those were the two sort of user problems or it's the same user problem really that I identified and like built the opportunity around.
Glynis Tao
And you have some really nice shoes too. I saw the pump with the signature heel on it. I think that looked great as, I mean, it's a classic shoe, right? But just with a little twist to it. But I feel like that's worth the investment to pay for high quality shoes that will last for years, right? I don't just buy shoes once, wear them and throw them away. I keep my shoes for years. I've had some from 10 years ago and they still have lasted and maintained their quality. So if you think about that longevity of the time, that's really important.
Leticia Viedma
Totally. I think the other thing that I didn't touch on is the pump is the name of the shoe or the name of the style is ‘No Regrets’ because, I don't know if this happened to you, but in my opinion, there's nothing worse than leaving your house in the morning and less than a one hour into your day, you're already regretting the shoes that you're wearing. And I was like, I'm done with this. I am shoe obsessed—I'm like a shoeaholic. I have so many shoes, but I have so many shoes that I've only worn like once or twice. And so all of the KAMI shoes are actually designed with a woman in mind who is going places. We got things to do and all of the women in my life, I'm so lucky to be inspired by women who are professionals, they're moms, they are creators, they travel, they need to go places. And so can we please deliver some shoes that are stylish and comfortable at the same time? That's what I had in mind too. The heels, for example, they are like two inch heels. I walk around with those shoes in New York and I don't want to have regrets. I take the subway stairs up and down, I go dancing. And you know, that was part of it too. It's shoes that you can actually use and you'll get value out of everywhere. And they're really made for versatility and a wide range of use cases.
Another example is the Chelsea boot. That one is called the ‘Nine to Five to Nine’ because I really think it's a style that you can wear to work and then go to dinner with. You don't even have to think twice, right? The shoes are designed with usability in mind and hopefully people are able to wear them everywhere all the time.
Glynis Tao
You're originally from Spain, but now you're based in New York. How has living in New York City influenced your entrepreneurial mindset approach to building a brand?
Leticia Viedma
I love New York. I feel so grateful that I live in the city. I think New York is just the city of opportunity and what I mean by that is you leave your house on a random Tuesday morning and you don't even know who you're going to meet. So many things can happen to you. This city just has such a special energy. There's an incredible drive. Obviously there's a lot of ambitious people, but there's also a lot of art, a lot of beauty, a lot of restaurants. So I think it's a big city of inspiration for me and a big city of exposure where I really connect with that feeling of believing that anything is possible because it's just such a magical place. I don't think I could have ever done this if I weren't here.
Glynis Tao
Do you find it easy to make connections within the New York design or business community?
Leticia Viedma
Yes, honestly, that's been an amazing sort of part of this process. I met you through the female founder collective, for example. So I've joined a couple of entrepreneurial or female founder related organizations that really create a lot of space and opportunity. I've also had the chance to meet other founders through my personal life and then they introduce you to people. I mean, today I just had an amazing opportunity working with Chase. That's the bank where I have the bank account for KAMI and they organized these super cool events. They invited me, so I just went and what I really noticed is everyone is very generous with their time. So yes. You have to put yourself out there, but if you make the effort and you attend events and are just fundamentally a nice person, it's not that hard.
Glynis Tao
That's so great. You mentioned Chase and you're on the Chase Your Dreams podcast. I just wanted to mention that tie in. So as a solo founder, how do you stay motivated and manage uncertainty during these early stages?
Leticia Viedma
Yes, I’m generally a positive person, but obviously, during this process, you have moments of self-doubt or you’re thinking, I'm completely reckless and crazy to have changed my life so much in such a short time span or you also get scared, was this a bad idea, you know? So those moments definitely happen. I think first of all, community has been really important for me. I joke around with my friends saying that I become their neediest friend because I'm always texting them with questions. My friends and family have been super supportive. I call my mom, my chief psychologist officer. I call her almost every day. She knows more about footwear than she ever cared to know at this point. So I think having a community is really important.
And then the other part of it is really connecting to your why. Why did you start this in the first place? And really feeling solid, profound conviction around your why since the start and then reminding you of that whenever you have moments of doubt or moments of not as much inspiration. I think going back to your why and like trying to connect and project with that vision of where you think this can go. Those two things have been important.
And then one last thing is I think when you're an entrepreneur, there's a big tendency to just work, work, work. There's always something to do. You're always sending an email or talking to someone or the limit is this sky in terms of work. And what I found is that you actually sometimes need a moment for yourself and you need to create spaces for inspiration—spaces to connect with other sides of you that are not just this and spaces to get in the flow and enjoy life so you can come back to your work with more energy, more inspiration. So that's been hard for me because now I just want to work every day, but I'm really trying to carve out and give myself Saturdays or Saturday mornings for no work time—absolutely nothing and just do my thing.
Glynis Tao
It's important to set those boundaries and make time for the self-care aspect. As entrepreneurs, yeah, we could just keep going forever, and if you don't have those limits or boundaries, you could easily burn yourself out, I find.
Leticia Viedma
Totally. Yes. It's not a sprint, it's a marathon.
Glynis Tao
It is a marathon, yes, because we want to be in this for the long term, right? It's a long game. It's not a sprint. You're right. It's a marathon. And I'm really happy to hear that you have the support of your friends and family and the community behind you as well, because it's so important as founders through this podcast. Having spoken and done many interviews, I find this common thread that's among all the founders and CEOs from early stage startups to brands that have been around for decades and they're all saying, yeah, your values are important. Always stick to your values and also your community is also important as people who will be there to support you through all the ups and downs that you will be experiencing throughout this whole process and this journey.
Leticia Viedma
Yeah, I feel very blessed to be honest and I've been surprised at how supportive my friends and family have been. So yeah, that's been an amazing added bonus.
Glynis Tao
And do you have any friends in the industry?
Leticia Viedma
I do have a couple of friends who are founders, just in very different kinds of business. KAMI is fundamentally bootstrapped. I did raise friends and family around, but we're not VC funded or anything. I do have friends who have their own more tech or SaaS type companies. And yeah, I definitely go to them with questions when I have them. One of the best pieces of advice I got from one of my friends who started his own business was, don't overthink. He's like, 90% of the decisions are reversible, so just go for it.
Glynis Tao
What's your long-term vision for KAMI?
Leticia Viedma
Oh my God. Yes. Part of me is like, don't know, I haven't even thought that far, but honestly, I'm just excited to grow the business and have fun in the meantime. I think I really just want to scale it. I want to become a sort of staple or staple brand in the footwear space. Hopefully globally at some point. Right now, we only market in the U.S. and in the process, building a team that I love working with and we just like to have fun and try out different things. That's my vision. Hopefully, we empower women to go places, to believe in themselves, to take the plunge and to feel proud to walk in their shoes.
Glynis Tao
Yeah. How do you see the DTC footwear space evolving in the next few years?
Leticia Viedma
I think honestly, footwear online purchases were always lagging a little bit behind in fashion because there's more barriers to purchase, when you're thinking about the sizing and the fit and all of that. And so over the last few years, it's starting to accelerate. I was just reading a report recently. I believe it's like a 9% estimate for shoes e-comm growth. I think it's definitely gonna become more ubiquitous in terms of buying it online and not going to the store. I do think that footwear will always remain somewhat of an experiential purchase. Also because the leather and the feeling and you having to try it because you have to walk in it. I think there's always gonna be an in-person aspect to it, but the e-comm like aspect will continue to grow.
And I do think that we're gonna see more brands, more independent or not heritage brands rising. I mean, we're starting to see some of that. I think this will continue. I think there was a huge indie trend in beauty then came ready to wear and I think we'll probably see that too in footwear. I think it's been harder traditionally because I mentioned shoes are harder to make, but I do think that we'll see a little bit more of that—more new independent brands emerging.
Glynis Tao
What's next for you and your brand? Are there any upcoming launches or projects that you're excited about?
Leticia Viedma
We just launched our first collection, as I mentioned, literally a couple of weeks ago. So right now, we're really focused on building the marketing channels behind it and starting to grow that community and the performance. Getting our marketing to a decent place and building those systems of scale. But I'm already thinking about the spring summer collection. That won't go live until 2026 in the spring, but I’m already starting to work through that. So I'm excited about that.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, sounds great. What's a piece of advice that you would give to aspiring entrepreneurs based on your own experiences and lessons learned?
Leticia Viedma
There were a few things that were important to me. I think one thing is you have to really know your why and really want it and really connect with your energy behind starting something because once you're in it, you're in it and you're going to have to love the reason why you're there and continue to find that to be a source of inspiration. So I would really encourage everyone to kind of think hard and deep about that before they start a business.
I would also say, and look, this is something I'm trying to practice by myself. As I mentioned, I'm someone who has an extreme bias for action, which I guess is a polite way of saying that I'm really impatient and I always like to move really fast. But like we said, you're in your business for the long run and so something that I've learned is sometimes you need to take a beat and you need to, instead of trying to go, go, go and deliver on everything super fast, it's more about slow cooking and taking some perspective and moving with a little bit more so that you can execute better. That's something that I'm navigating now. I think you don't build a brand in two days, you need to get to people. Really build those emotional connections and that takes time. Just as with anything in life, any deeper relationship, people need to get to know you and who you are and what you stand for and try you and then come back hopefully. And so that's not gonna happen overnight. So I think not losing the plot and knowing that you have to be consistent and show up every day and eventually things will compound and you'll have a brand trajectory, but that takes some time.
Glynis Tao
Where can people find you if they want to get in touch with you?
Leticia Viedma
Yes, of course. Well, I think first of all, we're growing our Instagram so you can follow us at shopkami.official. So that's our Instagram channel. And as I said, we're really committed to starting to post more and hopefully deliver entertainment and fun content. So that's our channel. then
I mean, yeah, if you want to reach out to me personally, I'm also really happy to share my email. It's lv@shopkami.co
Glynis Tao
Thank you so much, Letitia. And I'm so happy that you reached out to me. Thank you so much.
Leticia Viedma
Thank you for having me. I mean, that's another piece of advice that I didn't mention: things happen for yourself. I'm shameless and many times people say yes and like they take you up. So thank you.
Glynis Tao
I really think that's great and I'm so happy that you did and you're putting yourself out there and telling your story and now more people will get to hear about it and learn about you.
Leticia Viedma
This is amazing. I love your podcast. You have an incredible roster of guests. So I'm just honored to be part of it. Thank you.
Glynis Tao
Thank you so much for tuning in. You can find me on Instagram, @glynistao, and my website, glynistao.com. Please subscribe to Chase Your Dreams podcast if you haven't already. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with others who you think this may help. Lastly, it would be great if you left a rating and review for our podcast. See you next time!