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The Cobbler: How I Disrupted an Industry, Fell From Grace, and Came Back Stronger Than Ever
Everyone knows Steve Madden’s name and his shoes, but few are familiar with his story. Over the past thirty years Steve Madden has taken his eponymous shoe company from the fledgling start up he founded with a mere $1,100 to a global, multi-billion dollar brand. But Madden’s mistakes, from his battle with addiction to the financial shortcuts that landed him in prison, are as important to his story as his most iconic shoes. In this raw, intimate, and ultimately inspiring book, Madden holds nothing back as he shares what it took to get here and the lessons he’s learned along the way. From his unconventional hiring strategies to his slavish devotion to product, Madden offers a business perspective that is as unique as his styles. In The Cobbler, readers are treated to the wild ride though his rise, fall, and comeback. But they will also walk away uplifted by a man who has owned up to his mistakes and come back determined to give back and use his hard-won platform to create positive change.
256 pages, Hardcover
First published October 13, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 51 reviews
August 7, 2021
As a teenage boy in the 1990s, I was dimly aware of Steve Madden's shoes and their funky, chunky, affordable, stylish aesthetic. I didn't have any idea of Madden's involvement in insider trading (and since I still haven't seen the Wolf of Wall Street, I had no idea of his involvement there either). And I rarely give a business book more than a star or two. All that to say, I am probably not the target market for this memoir. But even so, I enjoyed it because Madden gives interesting insight into what makes him tick, what drives him, what he's done wrong, and what he had to do to be successful. For example, it is both unsurprising that an entrepreneur who battled addiction and built a shoe empire soon controlled the underground economy when he was in prison, and it was fascinating to hear him tell the tale. Madden made for a gruff, expressive, and committed narrator, and I enjoyed hearing him tell his tale.
**Thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.
**Thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.
November 15, 2020
4.5 rounded up to 5
Thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to listen to this audiobook. Read by Steve himself. Interesting story of an incredible man, both in business and humanity.
Thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to listen to this audiobook. Read by Steve himself. Interesting story of an incredible man, both in business and humanity.
May 12, 2023
This was such an amazing memoir, I am a huge fan of Steve Madden’s shoes but had no idea of the man behind them and what he has been through. I read this and listened along via audio, which Steve narrates himself and it is quite an experience that way. To say it is an inspiring story is putting it mildly, did he have his flaws? Yes. Does he acknowledge them? Yes absolutely. He is driven, he took care of his employees no matter what, and when starting out with his business he definitely made some mistakes along the way, some even costing him time in prison.
What a fascinating story of the rise, fall, and even stronger rise of someone that would do anything to put his shoes on the feet of everyone. I honestly cannot recommend this one enough, it was a one sitting read as it was that riveting to read.
This is a new paperback edition with new updated content, you definitely want to check it out! And how great is this cover??!!
Thank you to Bajek Publisher Services for the free copy to review.
What a fascinating story of the rise, fall, and even stronger rise of someone that would do anything to put his shoes on the feet of everyone. I honestly cannot recommend this one enough, it was a one sitting read as it was that riveting to read.
This is a new paperback edition with new updated content, you definitely want to check it out! And how great is this cover??!!
Thank you to Bajek Publisher Services for the free copy to review.
Read
March 28, 2022In The Cobbler: How I Disrupted an Industry, Fell From Grace, and Came Back Stronger Than Ever, American fashion designer and entrepreneur Steve Madden reminiscences how he took his eponymous shoe company from a startup selling shoes out of the trunk of his car with $1,100 startup capital to a multi-billion dollar global brand. Along the way, Madden made some mistakes that landed him in prison, he speaks at great length about his battle with alcoholism and drug addiction, family trauma, lessons learned, and his path to personal re-invention.
Madden writes about his Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), his losses (Grief, Divorce), and his wins (Grass to Grace to the bottom and getting back up). As of March 2022, Steve Madden has a market cap of $3.13 Billion. From selling shoes from his car trunk in the 90s to a billion-dollar company. Very Inspiring.
Growing Up
Growing up, I always felt like an outsider. The kids I went to school with were almost all from the same type of upper-middle-class Jewish families, but I was different. My dad was Irish Catholic and from the “other side of the tracks,” while my mother was a local Jewish girl. I was the only mixed, half-Jewish kid to be found.
His parents gave birth to him late
My dad was already forty-four and my mom was thirty-six when I was born, the youngest of three boys. My parents had grown up during the Depression and were in their twenties dur-ing World War II. They knew what it was like to lose everything,including family members who went off to war and never cameback.
Exposure to a range of generation
Being exposed to such a wide range of generations affected me in ways I wouldn’t fully understand until I was much older. When it came to my business, I’ve always had an old-school, blue-collar mentality. From day one, my team and I were scrappy and worked on a shoestring, pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps, if you will.
Labeled Troublemaker – Drive to succeed – Prove them wrong
As I absorbed the disappointment of my mother and my teachers, I made a caricature out of myself. It wasn’t a conscious decision, but I had been written the role of trouble-maker, and I played right into it. I broke the rules and acted obnoxiously just to prove them right. There was a moment that this flipped, but that came much later, around the time I started the business. At that point, the same urge to act out mutated into an intense work ethic and obsessive drive to succeed at all costs in order to prove them wrong.
Avid Reader – Biographies
Despite everything, I was still an avid reader. Books and drugs were my favorite escapes. I was thrashing around the room doing God knows what when the cinder blocks collapsed, and the books came tumbling down.
Generational Trauma
Growing up, alcohol was ever-present in our home. It was never really a problem, but it can’t be a coincidence that my father’s three sons all turned out to be addicts. He definitely liked to drink, probably too much. Like many men of his generation, he enjoyed his martini lunches. But he always functioned, worked hard, and never made a public scene. No matter what, he was on that same train every night.
Eat your own dog food
At Steve Madden, salespeople are not allowed on the floor if they are not wearing our shoes. Period. I spend a lot of time in our retail stores, and whenever I see sales- people in another brand of shoes, I walk right over and tell them, “Get off the floor.” It may sound harsh, but it all comes down to pride.
Money is not everything
I could say I wish I hadn’t done it, but that’s an empty thing to say. More than that, I wish I hadn’t been compelled to do it. I wish I didn’t have the feeling back then that money was everything. I can tell you now that it’s not everything. Not even close. But that was my core belief back then, and once I was hooked, I would have done anything.
Taking shortcut: Patience is the key
Meanwhile, I was scraping together every nickel I could find just to stay in business. So, when they asked, I was happy to flip stocks by buying and selling shares on the day of a company’s IPO and make a quick twenty to forty grand that I could invest in the business.
Today, I liken those deals to taking a shortcut. They helped me solve my cash flow issues at the time, but, like most shortcuts, they weren’t actually the best way to get to my destination. If I could go back and tell myself one thing, I would say to be more patient. I have no doubt that with the right team and the right products, we could have made it without taking a shortcut. But I’ll never know for sure.
For the most part, the hardest thing about life in prison wasn’t actually life in prison. It was the heartbreak of the world moving on without me while I was stuck in there, trapped in this strange limbo On some days, I thought, This must be what it feels like to be dead.
Teaching Business Class in Prison
My work assignment at Coleman had been stacking books in the prison library, but I was messing around too much and got fired. I waited for my new assignment, and when it came, it was a nontraditional re-quest. The guards asked if I would teach a business class to the other guys and offer them some tools to help them get work when they were eventually released. I was more than happy to do this, though I wasn’t sure if the guys would be interested in what I had to say.
To me, being an entrepreneur doesn’t have to mean starting a business. It can be anyone who breaks the rulebook and has a creative way of doing things.
Madden writes about his Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), his losses (Grief, Divorce), and his wins (Grass to Grace to the bottom and getting back up). As of March 2022, Steve Madden has a market cap of $3.13 Billion. From selling shoes from his car trunk in the 90s to a billion-dollar company. Very Inspiring.
Growing Up
Growing up, I always felt like an outsider. The kids I went to school with were almost all from the same type of upper-middle-class Jewish families, but I was different. My dad was Irish Catholic and from the “other side of the tracks,” while my mother was a local Jewish girl. I was the only mixed, half-Jewish kid to be found.
His parents gave birth to him late
My dad was already forty-four and my mom was thirty-six when I was born, the youngest of three boys. My parents had grown up during the Depression and were in their twenties dur-ing World War II. They knew what it was like to lose everything,including family members who went off to war and never cameback.
Exposure to a range of generation
Being exposed to such a wide range of generations affected me in ways I wouldn’t fully understand until I was much older. When it came to my business, I’ve always had an old-school, blue-collar mentality. From day one, my team and I were scrappy and worked on a shoestring, pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps, if you will.
Labeled Troublemaker – Drive to succeed – Prove them wrong
As I absorbed the disappointment of my mother and my teachers, I made a caricature out of myself. It wasn’t a conscious decision, but I had been written the role of trouble-maker, and I played right into it. I broke the rules and acted obnoxiously just to prove them right. There was a moment that this flipped, but that came much later, around the time I started the business. At that point, the same urge to act out mutated into an intense work ethic and obsessive drive to succeed at all costs in order to prove them wrong.
Avid Reader – Biographies
Despite everything, I was still an avid reader. Books and drugs were my favorite escapes. I was thrashing around the room doing God knows what when the cinder blocks collapsed, and the books came tumbling down.
Generational Trauma
Growing up, alcohol was ever-present in our home. It was never really a problem, but it can’t be a coincidence that my father’s three sons all turned out to be addicts. He definitely liked to drink, probably too much. Like many men of his generation, he enjoyed his martini lunches. But he always functioned, worked hard, and never made a public scene. No matter what, he was on that same train every night.
Eat your own dog food
At Steve Madden, salespeople are not allowed on the floor if they are not wearing our shoes. Period. I spend a lot of time in our retail stores, and whenever I see sales- people in another brand of shoes, I walk right over and tell them, “Get off the floor.” It may sound harsh, but it all comes down to pride.
Money is not everything
I could say I wish I hadn’t done it, but that’s an empty thing to say. More than that, I wish I hadn’t been compelled to do it. I wish I didn’t have the feeling back then that money was everything. I can tell you now that it’s not everything. Not even close. But that was my core belief back then, and once I was hooked, I would have done anything.
Taking shortcut: Patience is the key
Meanwhile, I was scraping together every nickel I could find just to stay in business. So, when they asked, I was happy to flip stocks by buying and selling shares on the day of a company’s IPO and make a quick twenty to forty grand that I could invest in the business.
Today, I liken those deals to taking a shortcut. They helped me solve my cash flow issues at the time, but, like most shortcuts, they weren’t actually the best way to get to my destination. If I could go back and tell myself one thing, I would say to be more patient. I have no doubt that with the right team and the right products, we could have made it without taking a shortcut. But I’ll never know for sure.
For the most part, the hardest thing about life in prison wasn’t actually life in prison. It was the heartbreak of the world moving on without me while I was stuck in there, trapped in this strange limbo On some days, I thought, This must be what it feels like to be dead.
Teaching Business Class in Prison
My work assignment at Coleman had been stacking books in the prison library, but I was messing around too much and got fired. I waited for my new assignment, and when it came, it was a nontraditional re-quest. The guards asked if I would teach a business class to the other guys and offer them some tools to help them get work when they were eventually released. I was more than happy to do this, though I wasn’t sure if the guys would be interested in what I had to say.
To me, being an entrepreneur doesn’t have to mean starting a business. It can be anyone who breaks the rulebook and has a creative way of doing things.
January 23, 2023
Growing up, I was deeply in love with the brand Steve Madden. I loved basically everything about it. Even when people would side eye me and judge me for wanting pair after pair, outside of the most simple of platforms.
I never really took the time to look into the history of the company, or the person. This 2nd edition of The Cobbler was full of details and a journey I had no idea existed. It left me stunned, but also appreciative of someone who took the time to write down everything: the good, the bad, the in-between, and unfortunately, the ugly.
I’ve always been someone who has flitted from job to job, hobby to hobby, moment in life to moment in life, but as I’m in my mid-thirties, I wondered if I had lost my opportunity to truly live and get back on track.
I honestly wasn’t expecting this memoir by my favourite shoe designer/company owner to remind me that even when you’ve hit rock bottom, you still have a chance to move forward.
I’d give this more than 5 stars if I could. Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and Steve Madden for the opportunity to read this.
I never really took the time to look into the history of the company, or the person. This 2nd edition of The Cobbler was full of details and a journey I had no idea existed. It left me stunned, but also appreciative of someone who took the time to write down everything: the good, the bad, the in-between, and unfortunately, the ugly.
I’ve always been someone who has flitted from job to job, hobby to hobby, moment in life to moment in life, but as I’m in my mid-thirties, I wondered if I had lost my opportunity to truly live and get back on track.
I honestly wasn’t expecting this memoir by my favourite shoe designer/company owner to remind me that even when you’ve hit rock bottom, you still have a chance to move forward.
I’d give this more than 5 stars if I could. Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and Steve Madden for the opportunity to read this.
October 13, 2020
Highly Entertaining...and surprisingly SWEET.
I had been looking forward to this memoir because shopping Steve Madden's stores in the late-90s was such a big part of my own coming-of-age. Steve's story is incredible on its own but the telling of it is really special in THE COBBLER. It reads like I am talking to Steve himself. Like, palling around with you know, a hugely successful, massively flawed, extremely lovable dude. I really valued how honestly the book looks at his struggle with addiction. I have some friends who struggle with addiction and am always hoping to get a better understanding of what they go through. Also interesting is the insight into how Steve ran a huge company. A fascinating, warm, and highly entertaining read. Once I'm finished I'll pass it along to a fellow shoe-loving college buddy!
I had been looking forward to this memoir because shopping Steve Madden's stores in the late-90s was such a big part of my own coming-of-age. Steve's story is incredible on its own but the telling of it is really special in THE COBBLER. It reads like I am talking to Steve himself. Like, palling around with you know, a hugely successful, massively flawed, extremely lovable dude. I really valued how honestly the book looks at his struggle with addiction. I have some friends who struggle with addiction and am always hoping to get a better understanding of what they go through. Also interesting is the insight into how Steve ran a huge company. A fascinating, warm, and highly entertaining read. Once I'm finished I'll pass it along to a fellow shoe-loving college buddy!
November 15, 2020
THERE'S NO BUSINESS LIKE SHOE BUSINESS!
Steve Madden's candid account of his rise, fall, and rise was compelling and deeply inspirational - and is a "must-read" memoir.
STEVE MADDEN HAS SOUL. Steve "tells all" in this memoir. Readers learn that he was the youngest of three boys and his mother's least favorite son (ouch!), did poorly in high school and never graduated from college, battled drug and alcohol addiction, suffered from severe ADHD, and made bad decisions early in his career that landed him in federal prison. And while serving time in a "Club Fed" prison, another bad choice resulted in him being transferred to a more "prisony" prison and losing his earned 8-day furlough/reduced sentence.
AN UNLIKELY SUCCESS STORY??? No way!!!! Yes, this emotionally vulnerable college dropout entrepreneur with a chronic substance abuse problem made plenty of mistakes. But Steve Madden's strong work ethic, passion for shoes, keen fashion/trend instincts, and his willingness and ability to hire an astute team to keep his company up afloat during his prison term....are only a few reasons why Steve's story is a VERY LIKELY (AND LIKEABLE!) SUCCESS STORY. Longevity in the fashion industry is a rare feat (no pun intended!)and Steve Madden has accomplished this with flying colors.
Before reading this book, I owned many pairs of Steve Madden shoes so I knew who Steve Madden was and I had also known about his prison sentence. I had also watched a portrayal of him in the "Wolf of Wall Street" movie. This book did a superb job of sharing interesting and relevant information about Steve Madden's journey and his successful shoe/fashion empire -- as well as his love/passion for shoes. In addition to being a visionary, Steve is a gifted storyteller and this book was impossible to put down.
I listened to the book's audio version that was narrated by Steve Madden. I always love it when an author reads his/her memoir and this was no exception. Steve Madden's narration was superb and throughout the entire book, I felt like I was in the same room as Steve Madden listening to his "truth is stranger than fiction" story.
I was given an ARC of this book by NetGalley in exchange for an honest and accurate review. I highly recommend this book and want to personally thank Steve Madden for sharing his story with us.
Steve Madden's candid account of his rise, fall, and rise was compelling and deeply inspirational - and is a "must-read" memoir.
STEVE MADDEN HAS SOUL. Steve "tells all" in this memoir. Readers learn that he was the youngest of three boys and his mother's least favorite son (ouch!), did poorly in high school and never graduated from college, battled drug and alcohol addiction, suffered from severe ADHD, and made bad decisions early in his career that landed him in federal prison. And while serving time in a "Club Fed" prison, another bad choice resulted in him being transferred to a more "prisony" prison and losing his earned 8-day furlough/reduced sentence.
AN UNLIKELY SUCCESS STORY??? No way!!!! Yes, this emotionally vulnerable college dropout entrepreneur with a chronic substance abuse problem made plenty of mistakes. But Steve Madden's strong work ethic, passion for shoes, keen fashion/trend instincts, and his willingness and ability to hire an astute team to keep his company up afloat during his prison term....are only a few reasons why Steve's story is a VERY LIKELY (AND LIKEABLE!) SUCCESS STORY. Longevity in the fashion industry is a rare feat (no pun intended!)and Steve Madden has accomplished this with flying colors.
Before reading this book, I owned many pairs of Steve Madden shoes so I knew who Steve Madden was and I had also known about his prison sentence. I had also watched a portrayal of him in the "Wolf of Wall Street" movie. This book did a superb job of sharing interesting and relevant information about Steve Madden's journey and his successful shoe/fashion empire -- as well as his love/passion for shoes. In addition to being a visionary, Steve is a gifted storyteller and this book was impossible to put down.
I listened to the book's audio version that was narrated by Steve Madden. I always love it when an author reads his/her memoir and this was no exception. Steve Madden's narration was superb and throughout the entire book, I felt like I was in the same room as Steve Madden listening to his "truth is stranger than fiction" story.
I was given an ARC of this book by NetGalley in exchange for an honest and accurate review. I highly recommend this book and want to personally thank Steve Madden for sharing his story with us.
December 17, 2022
Omg from the Mary Lou, to the Jill, to the Slinky....Steve Madden shoes were my obsession in the 90s!!! So when I saw this book I had to read it! And boy did I have no clue about who Steve Madden was.
As mentioned in his story, the absence of his face in relation to the brand really eliminates the idea from your head that Steve Madden is a real man behind that brand.
He does a great job discussing his struggle with ADHD, relationship/business drama with Jordan Belfort, drug addiction, and jail stint, remaining extremely likeable.
It was a quick and easy read with a happy ending! I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it not only to those who like the shoes, but those who like The Wolf of Wall Street.
Thank you, Netgalley, publisher, and author for the ARC.
As mentioned in his story, the absence of his face in relation to the brand really eliminates the idea from your head that Steve Madden is a real man behind that brand.
He does a great job discussing his struggle with ADHD, relationship/business drama with Jordan Belfort, drug addiction, and jail stint, remaining extremely likeable.
It was a quick and easy read with a happy ending! I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it not only to those who like the shoes, but those who like The Wolf of Wall Street.
Thank you, Netgalley, publisher, and author for the ARC.
July 28, 2024
I have had a number of Steve Madden shoes but really knew nothing about him. I came across this book as part of the list of daily books on sale emails and took a chance. The memoir was a decently good story of how he built a company and overcame addiction. I appreciated Madden’s humility and remorse. 3 stars. Recommended for memoir aficionados.
June 26, 2023
I really enjoyed this book. I picked it up mostly because I wanted more details on his relation with the wolf of Wall Street and was pleasantly surprised on how much he went into it. I really liked the casual writing, it felt very down to earth.
Read
May 14, 2023SO interesting. Loved understanding how Steve Madden (the brand) has grown into such a successful brand over the years. Steve Madden’s (the man) story and his development is also super interesting.
Definitely recommend!
Definitely recommend!
May 27, 2023
Madden’s iconic designs, such as the Marilyn, the Mary Lou, and the Slinky, established him as the preeminent designer of shoes for young women.
acquired and successfully stewarded brands such as Betsey Johnson, Dolce Vita, Big Buddha, Blondo, BB Dakota, Greats
my two great loves: shoes and golf
forty-one months in prison
You have to take care of the fundamentals—putting food on the table, paying your bills—before anything else. He lived by that rule, and from the moment I started my business, I have too.
I never did well in school, but I was an avid reader, and I especially loved biographies of movie moguls like Louis B. Mayer and Samuel Goldwyn.
I started working as a caddy at the golf course. For five hours a day, I carried two huge bags that each felt like they were bigger than me, and for that I earned fourteen dollars.
One of my strongest beliefs, especially when it comes to business, is that it’s better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission.
At Toulouse, I started to learn the rhythm of retail: how a woman tries on a shoe, what she’s telling you she wants when she twists this way and that in the mirror, whether her mind is made up when she asks to see a certain shoe or you should bring her another color too. It was sort of like dancing or kissing, an intuitive give-and-take.
ADHD is funny. Later on, it helped me drive my business forward in a fanatical, singleminded fashion. But in my home and personal life, it’s been much more of a burden.
In Miami, drugs were everywhere, and this is where I first fell in love with quaaludes, which we called 714s.
John had started a company selling home alarm systems called Madden Securities, and he gave me a job as a salesman. I traveled door-to-door selling alarm systems, went to stores all over Miami, put up flyers and stickers, and generally canvassed the whole area.
I learned from Jack the importance of making sure that everyone who works in a store is wearing items that are sold there. give shoes and accessories to staff members for free or at a huge discount so they are out there wearing and representing the brand.
If a woman asked to see one shoe in her size, Jack taught us to bring her another, similar style as well.
I crashed more cars than I could remember. I had to rent a car. Many times, I crashed those cars too. One of the cars I borrowed belonged to my old friend Danny Porush. A truck drove into the door and tore it right off. Danny and I didn’t speak again for several years.
I’ve always brought people in and given them a stake in the company. It helps them feel ownership and begets loyalty from talented people who would otherwise move on and eventually get another job.
At our first shoe show in June 1988, Nordstrom placed a huge order
I learned the valuable lesson then that, no matter how well things are going in business, you can never let yourself coast. You’ve got to keep moving and pushing forward, always looking ahead and around corners for potential problems and opportunities.
Unless there’s outside funding, cash flow is the biggest issue for any entrepreneur. Our early shoes were doing well, but I was still living hand to mouth.
Within the first few months of our arrangement, Sal and Nick started being late with my payments, and I needed those commissions to pay David and Miranda, not to mention my own rent. I lived with the knowledge that I was one late payment away from losing everything, and I carried this fear with me long after it was no longer true.
The amazing thing was that once their clients inevitably lost money on these shitty stocks, the Strattonites, as Jordan called them, somehow convinced them to invest in a “new, hot company” to earn back that money instead of calling it quits. It didn’t matter that this new company was just as lousy a bet as the first one. Steve Madden fit that profile. It was hardly even a company at that point, but that wasn’t a problem at all for the guys at Stratton. If anything, it’s probably why they were so interested in working with me.
In the meantime, though, I knew these guys could help me make money in another way: by bringing me in on their other deals as what’s called a flipper. In this role, I would buy shares of a company they were taking public before the IPO, and then sell those shares on the opening as soon as the stock prices were nice and inflated. In other words, I was pumping and dumping right alongside them
When I first became involved with Stratton, I didn’t know that what they were doing was illegal. Bear Stearns cleared all of Stratton’s trades
It was the spring of 1990, and I started producing the majority of my shoes at a little factory in Queens, which has now been the Steve Madden headquarters for thirty years.
David went from being my doorman to my driver to being in charge of shipping and receiving to managing multiple warehouses for us.
The magic of clogs is that they’re versatile. Women can wear clogs with dresses, skirts, or pants.
I named that shoe the Marilyn after Marilyn Monroe, even though it wasn’t remotely the kind of shoe she would have worn. I just thought it was a sexy shoe, and it deserved to be named after the ultimate fantasy girl.
Early on, part of my luck was that I had so little competition within the shoe business from my peers. It seemed like all the sharp, young people my age were working on Wall Street, so my competition was pretty much all coming from companies that had been in business for decades and still did things the same old ways. It was an older industry creating products for an older clientele. This enabled me to step in and be disruptive, though that term didn’t exist back then. I wasn’t a kid. I was in my thirties, but as far as the shoe business was concerned, I might as well have been wearing a diaper.
Say, for instance, we received a huge order from a department store for a thousand pairs of the Marilyn. That was great, but we wouldn’t get paid until after those shoes were shipped and received. This meant we had to have cash in the bank to fund the entire production of those shoes without relying on stores to pay their invoices. But it got worse. Then there was the fact that many retailers were late with their payments. So, how was I supposed to make more shoes for the next order and pay my staff? Finally, when a store bought too many pairs of a shoe and they didn’t sell, they could return them and get their money back.
Meeting our customers directly at the store gave me great insight into the type of young women who were actually buying our shoes. I wanted to know everything about them: what movies they liked, what music they listened to, where they bought their clothes, and, most important, what they wanted in a shoe. Styles were changing fast, and I had to keep up.
Jordan decided that they would keep 85 percent of those shares. They ended up selling about half of them, or roughly 40 percent of the company.
This was an unfair deal, and I knew it. A founder should retain far more than 15 percent of his or her own company at the IPO—30 percent would have been more appropriate.
I had a bit of a revenge scheme in mind. Or call it a rebalancing effort. See, technically it was illegal for Jordan to hold so many shares as the underwriter of the public offering. So, he asked me to hold one point three million shares of the company in my name, even though they really belonged to him. Although I had agreed to hold them for Jordan, I had no intention of ever returning them.
Driven to Distraction was the first popular book about ADHD.
symptoms that I’d been blaming myself for my entire life: the sloppiness, the inability to keep track of important items, the temper tantrums, the negative impact that all of this has on relationships
I lost my concentration easily, missed appointments, and was always terrible at follow-up. Those were clearly all symptoms of ADHD. But on the flip side, I had the ability to hold half a dozen thoughts in my head at once
Rachelle Watts, a shoe designer who quickly became my chief collaborator and is still with the company
We would sketch out an idea in the office, make the shoe right there in the Long Island City factory, and then place it in the SoHo store almost immediately. This allowed us to market-test our designs and see how the buyers reacted to the shoes before launching a larger-scale production.
producing shoes overseas made the entire transaction so much cleaner. Instead of worrying about paying for individual materials and labor and insurance, we just bought shoes and sold shoes. Simple.
Somehow, I convinced Mark to quit his job, assuring him that, after a few months, I would call his former employer and explain that he hadn’t been able to find a new job and that I wanted to help him out by offering him a position.
I’ve dealt with this dynamic a lot in my career. My partners are there every day doing the work and putting in the long hours, and they sometimes resent it when it’s time to make the final call and it doesn’t go their way. I understand this, but at the same time I’m the one taking the risk, so I have to be the one making the calls. There is a plaque on my desk that says, “The Buck Stops Here,”
in 1996, they shut down Stratton Oakmont and barred Jordan and the other principals from the securities trade.
it was ironic that the regulators had shut down Stratton Oakmont, because by then dozens of similar bucket shops had sprung up around them. Stratton had started this trend and had been the most successful, but they were far from the only firm using the same types of schemes. Jordan smartly realized that he could still profit from the industry he had created by betting against the other brokerage companies’ worthless stocks. He had a secretary and needed a place to work, so I gave him an office in our building in Long Island City. There, he shorted stocks by borrowing shares and selling them, knowing that since their value was likely inflated at the IPO, he could buy them back later to repay what he’d borrowed at a lower price.
Saturdays are sacred in retail. If you missed one, there was no place for you in my world. The same thing went for shoe shows and the last day of the quarter
There was no such thing as “fast fashion” yet. Most shoe companies designed their entire line of shoes, had them made in a factory somewhere far away, and then sold them to stores maybe six months later. Meanwhile, we were able to anticipate a trend, jump on it, and have a shoe in the store that same day. Then we could immediately see how the customers reacted. Remember earlier when I said that returns on shoes that didn’t sell were a big cash-flow killer? That’s why I was so pissed off at Amelia when we had too much inventory of a shoe. Mass-producing a shoe that doesn’t hit the mark costs a huge amount of money. Having a sample factory and our own retail stores to test how a style performed helped us avoid that issue almost entirely. When we did a small test run and saw early on that a shoe wasn’t working, we could turn it around quickly by tweaking the style, adjusting the price point, or pulling it from the shelves completely. Though we were all about speed, we were also slavishly devoted to product and never cut corners when it came to making our shoes. At the same time, we knew that our customers were young, so we had to be incredibly sensitive to pricing. Once the teen market embraced our brand, it was extremely important to me to create shoes that our loyal fans could actually afford.
Painting those young girls against backdrops around New York City reminded me somehow of Eloise at the Plaza. It didn’t occur to me at the time that these girls were overly sexualized, though that idea became the subject of controversy and many heated conversations around the office. To me, the bigheaded girls just seemed fashionable and rebellious, a perfect fit for the young women who loved our shoes.
We placed ads on the back of the New York Times Sunday Style section, on New York City billboards, and in every fashion magazine geared toward young women at a time when magazines were king.
one of my jobs was to recruit members to join the board. I’d been careful to surround myself with people I trusted. Instead of just choosing people who knew about shoes or fashion, I often offered board seats to people from outside the industry who were sharp and who I knew would keep us honest.
At about six o’clock in the morning on June 20, 2000, about a dozen cops and FBI agents armed with loaded machine guns and decked out in full riot gear burst into my apartment building with the intention of indicting me on federal charges of securities fraud and money laundering.
Joel had already explained to me that if I went to trial and was found guilty, I’d get a much longer sentence than I would if I settled. By the way, this is why so many innocent people end up pleading out
soon as the news of my indictment broke, the price of Steve Madden stock plummeted from a value of thirteen dollars and thirteen cents a share the day before to only five dollars and fifty cents a share.
the customers—was huge, adding tremendous sales growth to the company right away. I was especially proud of the success of the men’s line because it had so little to do with me. That may sound ironic, but I knew by then that I could make great shoes. I was experienced at creating a fantastic product at an accessible price and still making a profit. It was a huge rush every time
In addition to prison time and fines, part of my sentence would likely be a ban from acting as an officer or director of a publicly traded company, which meant I would have to step down as the CEO of Steve Madden.
Harvey Sanders was the CEO of Nautica, and he swooped in with an aggressive offer to buy the company for seventeen dollars a share when I was at my most despondent about going to prison and afraid of losing everything. But at the same time that Sanders wanted a clean break from me, he argued that the company was worthless without me.
I knew that with him in charge while I was away, Steve Madden would be the same company with the same je ne sais quoi when I got out.
As an entrepreneur, you’re always selling. It’s not enough to just create something, no matter how amazing that product may be. You have to sell it
Under our agreement, which was covered by both courts, I faced a prison sentence of anywhere between forty-one to fifty-one months. Plus, I owed roughly eleven million dollars in restitution, fines, and fees, and was barred from serving as an officer or director of any publicly traded company for seven years. They set a court date for me to be formally sentenced in September 2001.
My sentence was for forty-one months, but I had gotten into a prison drug and alcohol rehabilitation program. This meant I would attend classes and meetings for nine months inside, and in exchange, eighteen months would be taken off my sentence.
I had been found guilty of sending funds to another inmate, time had been added to my sentence, and I was going from a minimum-security camp to a lowsecurity prison.
I had gotten kicked out of the drug and alcohol program, which meant the eighteen months were added back onto my sentence.
John’s strategy was to find strong local retailers who knew the shoe business and could help us open retail stores in the area. As we did in the United States
acquired and successfully stewarded brands such as Betsey Johnson, Dolce Vita, Big Buddha, Blondo, BB Dakota, Greats
my two great loves: shoes and golf
forty-one months in prison
You have to take care of the fundamentals—putting food on the table, paying your bills—before anything else. He lived by that rule, and from the moment I started my business, I have too.
I never did well in school, but I was an avid reader, and I especially loved biographies of movie moguls like Louis B. Mayer and Samuel Goldwyn.
I started working as a caddy at the golf course. For five hours a day, I carried two huge bags that each felt like they were bigger than me, and for that I earned fourteen dollars.
One of my strongest beliefs, especially when it comes to business, is that it’s better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission.
At Toulouse, I started to learn the rhythm of retail: how a woman tries on a shoe, what she’s telling you she wants when she twists this way and that in the mirror, whether her mind is made up when she asks to see a certain shoe or you should bring her another color too. It was sort of like dancing or kissing, an intuitive give-and-take.
ADHD is funny. Later on, it helped me drive my business forward in a fanatical, singleminded fashion. But in my home and personal life, it’s been much more of a burden.
In Miami, drugs were everywhere, and this is where I first fell in love with quaaludes, which we called 714s.
John had started a company selling home alarm systems called Madden Securities, and he gave me a job as a salesman. I traveled door-to-door selling alarm systems, went to stores all over Miami, put up flyers and stickers, and generally canvassed the whole area.
I learned from Jack the importance of making sure that everyone who works in a store is wearing items that are sold there. give shoes and accessories to staff members for free or at a huge discount so they are out there wearing and representing the brand.
If a woman asked to see one shoe in her size, Jack taught us to bring her another, similar style as well.
I crashed more cars than I could remember. I had to rent a car. Many times, I crashed those cars too. One of the cars I borrowed belonged to my old friend Danny Porush. A truck drove into the door and tore it right off. Danny and I didn’t speak again for several years.
I’ve always brought people in and given them a stake in the company. It helps them feel ownership and begets loyalty from talented people who would otherwise move on and eventually get another job.
At our first shoe show in June 1988, Nordstrom placed a huge order
I learned the valuable lesson then that, no matter how well things are going in business, you can never let yourself coast. You’ve got to keep moving and pushing forward, always looking ahead and around corners for potential problems and opportunities.
Unless there’s outside funding, cash flow is the biggest issue for any entrepreneur. Our early shoes were doing well, but I was still living hand to mouth.
Within the first few months of our arrangement, Sal and Nick started being late with my payments, and I needed those commissions to pay David and Miranda, not to mention my own rent. I lived with the knowledge that I was one late payment away from losing everything, and I carried this fear with me long after it was no longer true.
The amazing thing was that once their clients inevitably lost money on these shitty stocks, the Strattonites, as Jordan called them, somehow convinced them to invest in a “new, hot company” to earn back that money instead of calling it quits. It didn’t matter that this new company was just as lousy a bet as the first one. Steve Madden fit that profile. It was hardly even a company at that point, but that wasn’t a problem at all for the guys at Stratton. If anything, it’s probably why they were so interested in working with me.
In the meantime, though, I knew these guys could help me make money in another way: by bringing me in on their other deals as what’s called a flipper. In this role, I would buy shares of a company they were taking public before the IPO, and then sell those shares on the opening as soon as the stock prices were nice and inflated. In other words, I was pumping and dumping right alongside them
When I first became involved with Stratton, I didn’t know that what they were doing was illegal. Bear Stearns cleared all of Stratton’s trades
It was the spring of 1990, and I started producing the majority of my shoes at a little factory in Queens, which has now been the Steve Madden headquarters for thirty years.
David went from being my doorman to my driver to being in charge of shipping and receiving to managing multiple warehouses for us.
The magic of clogs is that they’re versatile. Women can wear clogs with dresses, skirts, or pants.
I named that shoe the Marilyn after Marilyn Monroe, even though it wasn’t remotely the kind of shoe she would have worn. I just thought it was a sexy shoe, and it deserved to be named after the ultimate fantasy girl.
Early on, part of my luck was that I had so little competition within the shoe business from my peers. It seemed like all the sharp, young people my age were working on Wall Street, so my competition was pretty much all coming from companies that had been in business for decades and still did things the same old ways. It was an older industry creating products for an older clientele. This enabled me to step in and be disruptive, though that term didn’t exist back then. I wasn’t a kid. I was in my thirties, but as far as the shoe business was concerned, I might as well have been wearing a diaper.
Say, for instance, we received a huge order from a department store for a thousand pairs of the Marilyn. That was great, but we wouldn’t get paid until after those shoes were shipped and received. This meant we had to have cash in the bank to fund the entire production of those shoes without relying on stores to pay their invoices. But it got worse. Then there was the fact that many retailers were late with their payments. So, how was I supposed to make more shoes for the next order and pay my staff? Finally, when a store bought too many pairs of a shoe and they didn’t sell, they could return them and get their money back.
Meeting our customers directly at the store gave me great insight into the type of young women who were actually buying our shoes. I wanted to know everything about them: what movies they liked, what music they listened to, where they bought their clothes, and, most important, what they wanted in a shoe. Styles were changing fast, and I had to keep up.
Jordan decided that they would keep 85 percent of those shares. They ended up selling about half of them, or roughly 40 percent of the company.
This was an unfair deal, and I knew it. A founder should retain far more than 15 percent of his or her own company at the IPO—30 percent would have been more appropriate.
I had a bit of a revenge scheme in mind. Or call it a rebalancing effort. See, technically it was illegal for Jordan to hold so many shares as the underwriter of the public offering. So, he asked me to hold one point three million shares of the company in my name, even though they really belonged to him. Although I had agreed to hold them for Jordan, I had no intention of ever returning them.
Driven to Distraction was the first popular book about ADHD.
symptoms that I’d been blaming myself for my entire life: the sloppiness, the inability to keep track of important items, the temper tantrums, the negative impact that all of this has on relationships
I lost my concentration easily, missed appointments, and was always terrible at follow-up. Those were clearly all symptoms of ADHD. But on the flip side, I had the ability to hold half a dozen thoughts in my head at once
Rachelle Watts, a shoe designer who quickly became my chief collaborator and is still with the company
We would sketch out an idea in the office, make the shoe right there in the Long Island City factory, and then place it in the SoHo store almost immediately. This allowed us to market-test our designs and see how the buyers reacted to the shoes before launching a larger-scale production.
producing shoes overseas made the entire transaction so much cleaner. Instead of worrying about paying for individual materials and labor and insurance, we just bought shoes and sold shoes. Simple.
Somehow, I convinced Mark to quit his job, assuring him that, after a few months, I would call his former employer and explain that he hadn’t been able to find a new job and that I wanted to help him out by offering him a position.
I’ve dealt with this dynamic a lot in my career. My partners are there every day doing the work and putting in the long hours, and they sometimes resent it when it’s time to make the final call and it doesn’t go their way. I understand this, but at the same time I’m the one taking the risk, so I have to be the one making the calls. There is a plaque on my desk that says, “The Buck Stops Here,”
in 1996, they shut down Stratton Oakmont and barred Jordan and the other principals from the securities trade.
it was ironic that the regulators had shut down Stratton Oakmont, because by then dozens of similar bucket shops had sprung up around them. Stratton had started this trend and had been the most successful, but they were far from the only firm using the same types of schemes. Jordan smartly realized that he could still profit from the industry he had created by betting against the other brokerage companies’ worthless stocks. He had a secretary and needed a place to work, so I gave him an office in our building in Long Island City. There, he shorted stocks by borrowing shares and selling them, knowing that since their value was likely inflated at the IPO, he could buy them back later to repay what he’d borrowed at a lower price.
Saturdays are sacred in retail. If you missed one, there was no place for you in my world. The same thing went for shoe shows and the last day of the quarter
There was no such thing as “fast fashion” yet. Most shoe companies designed their entire line of shoes, had them made in a factory somewhere far away, and then sold them to stores maybe six months later. Meanwhile, we were able to anticipate a trend, jump on it, and have a shoe in the store that same day. Then we could immediately see how the customers reacted. Remember earlier when I said that returns on shoes that didn’t sell were a big cash-flow killer? That’s why I was so pissed off at Amelia when we had too much inventory of a shoe. Mass-producing a shoe that doesn’t hit the mark costs a huge amount of money. Having a sample factory and our own retail stores to test how a style performed helped us avoid that issue almost entirely. When we did a small test run and saw early on that a shoe wasn’t working, we could turn it around quickly by tweaking the style, adjusting the price point, or pulling it from the shelves completely. Though we were all about speed, we were also slavishly devoted to product and never cut corners when it came to making our shoes. At the same time, we knew that our customers were young, so we had to be incredibly sensitive to pricing. Once the teen market embraced our brand, it was extremely important to me to create shoes that our loyal fans could actually afford.
Painting those young girls against backdrops around New York City reminded me somehow of Eloise at the Plaza. It didn’t occur to me at the time that these girls were overly sexualized, though that idea became the subject of controversy and many heated conversations around the office. To me, the bigheaded girls just seemed fashionable and rebellious, a perfect fit for the young women who loved our shoes.
We placed ads on the back of the New York Times Sunday Style section, on New York City billboards, and in every fashion magazine geared toward young women at a time when magazines were king.
one of my jobs was to recruit members to join the board. I’d been careful to surround myself with people I trusted. Instead of just choosing people who knew about shoes or fashion, I often offered board seats to people from outside the industry who were sharp and who I knew would keep us honest.
At about six o’clock in the morning on June 20, 2000, about a dozen cops and FBI agents armed with loaded machine guns and decked out in full riot gear burst into my apartment building with the intention of indicting me on federal charges of securities fraud and money laundering.
Joel had already explained to me that if I went to trial and was found guilty, I’d get a much longer sentence than I would if I settled. By the way, this is why so many innocent people end up pleading out
soon as the news of my indictment broke, the price of Steve Madden stock plummeted from a value of thirteen dollars and thirteen cents a share the day before to only five dollars and fifty cents a share.
the customers—was huge, adding tremendous sales growth to the company right away. I was especially proud of the success of the men’s line because it had so little to do with me. That may sound ironic, but I knew by then that I could make great shoes. I was experienced at creating a fantastic product at an accessible price and still making a profit. It was a huge rush every time
In addition to prison time and fines, part of my sentence would likely be a ban from acting as an officer or director of a publicly traded company, which meant I would have to step down as the CEO of Steve Madden.
Harvey Sanders was the CEO of Nautica, and he swooped in with an aggressive offer to buy the company for seventeen dollars a share when I was at my most despondent about going to prison and afraid of losing everything. But at the same time that Sanders wanted a clean break from me, he argued that the company was worthless without me.
I knew that with him in charge while I was away, Steve Madden would be the same company with the same je ne sais quoi when I got out.
As an entrepreneur, you’re always selling. It’s not enough to just create something, no matter how amazing that product may be. You have to sell it
Under our agreement, which was covered by both courts, I faced a prison sentence of anywhere between forty-one to fifty-one months. Plus, I owed roughly eleven million dollars in restitution, fines, and fees, and was barred from serving as an officer or director of any publicly traded company for seven years. They set a court date for me to be formally sentenced in September 2001.
My sentence was for forty-one months, but I had gotten into a prison drug and alcohol rehabilitation program. This meant I would attend classes and meetings for nine months inside, and in exchange, eighteen months would be taken off my sentence.
I had been found guilty of sending funds to another inmate, time had been added to my sentence, and I was going from a minimum-security camp to a lowsecurity prison.
I had gotten kicked out of the drug and alcohol program, which meant the eighteen months were added back onto my sentence.
John’s strategy was to find strong local retailers who knew the shoe business and could help us open retail stores in the area. As we did in the United States
June 8, 2021
Скорее 5, чем 4. Поэтому 5.
Люблю автобиографические книги написанные так, что охота прожить их вместе с автором.
Люблю автобиографические книги написанные так, что охота прожить их вместе с автором.
September 10, 2023
I’m really surprised not to find any reviews mention how terribly narrated the audible version of this book is. It totally ruined it for me, it was honestly the worst narrated book I’ve ever listened to.
Steve Madden may be a fantastic shoe designer and have built an incredibly successful business, but he’s not a narrator and unfortunately, he should’ve let someone else do this job.
If you are going to read this book I would suggest you buy the paper copy. The narration is strained, Madden often loses his place and there are long pauses right in the middle of sentences. When there aren’t long pauses because he’s lost his place, it’s like he’s trying to rush through the reading like it’s a race. There are absolutely no pauses after full stops, sentences run straight into one another until he needs to take a breath, which he often does right in the middle of sentences and very loudly. The tone is monotone and flat, never rising or lowering with the tone of the writing.
Sorry to go on but I just can’t believe no one listened to this and suggested he get a narrator in to redo it. I’ve seen far less badly narrated books get slammed in the reviews for the poor narration, to the point the author quickly rectifies it with a good narrator. Unfortunately with this, you couldn’t gain any momentum during the read as the sentences didn’t flow and it was so distracting, making it super hard to keep track of what was being said.
The overall story was interesting but not mind blowing in my opinion, who knows whether the narration influenced me more than I tried to let it, but from what I made out it was pretty average. The beginning was a little slow and boring for me, but maybe that was me needing to get used to Madden’s poor narrating skills, but the second half picked up and I found myself more intrigued to hear what happened. Particularly the parts where he went to prison and the different types of people he met. That was all very humbling and interesting.
Overall, the memoir was a 3 star for me, the narration a 1 star, so I landed on 2.
Side note: I only recently heard of the brand Steve Madden when I saw a pair of (very overpriced) trainers that I absolutely loved. Similar in design to the Adidas Ozweego’s but wayyyy cooler in my opinion (and way more expensive also). However, I tried them on and it was like standing on the concrete ground. They were so hard, with barely any cushioning and didn’t hug your feet at all. I was so surprised because of the price point, so I Googled are Steve Madden shoes known for being uncomfortable. And there’s so many forums discussing this all over the internet.
Obviously there are also people who think they’re crazy comfy. But realistically, for that many people saying they aren’t, and for the price point of the shoes, they really should relook at materials that add comfort. Obviously this is nothing to do with the book, just food for thought on the products themselves, because they are, in my opinion, really cool designs. Madden clearly has an eye for that sort of thing.
Steve Madden may be a fantastic shoe designer and have built an incredibly successful business, but he’s not a narrator and unfortunately, he should’ve let someone else do this job.
If you are going to read this book I would suggest you buy the paper copy. The narration is strained, Madden often loses his place and there are long pauses right in the middle of sentences. When there aren’t long pauses because he’s lost his place, it’s like he’s trying to rush through the reading like it’s a race. There are absolutely no pauses after full stops, sentences run straight into one another until he needs to take a breath, which he often does right in the middle of sentences and very loudly. The tone is monotone and flat, never rising or lowering with the tone of the writing.
Sorry to go on but I just can’t believe no one listened to this and suggested he get a narrator in to redo it. I’ve seen far less badly narrated books get slammed in the reviews for the poor narration, to the point the author quickly rectifies it with a good narrator. Unfortunately with this, you couldn’t gain any momentum during the read as the sentences didn’t flow and it was so distracting, making it super hard to keep track of what was being said.
The overall story was interesting but not mind blowing in my opinion, who knows whether the narration influenced me more than I tried to let it, but from what I made out it was pretty average. The beginning was a little slow and boring for me, but maybe that was me needing to get used to Madden’s poor narrating skills, but the second half picked up and I found myself more intrigued to hear what happened. Particularly the parts where he went to prison and the different types of people he met. That was all very humbling and interesting.
Overall, the memoir was a 3 star for me, the narration a 1 star, so I landed on 2.
Side note: I only recently heard of the brand Steve Madden when I saw a pair of (very overpriced) trainers that I absolutely loved. Similar in design to the Adidas Ozweego’s but wayyyy cooler in my opinion (and way more expensive also). However, I tried them on and it was like standing on the concrete ground. They were so hard, with barely any cushioning and didn’t hug your feet at all. I was so surprised because of the price point, so I Googled are Steve Madden shoes known for being uncomfortable. And there’s so many forums discussing this all over the internet.
Obviously there are also people who think they’re crazy comfy. But realistically, for that many people saying they aren’t, and for the price point of the shoes, they really should relook at materials that add comfort. Obviously this is nothing to do with the book, just food for thought on the products themselves, because they are, in my opinion, really cool designs. Madden clearly has an eye for that sort of thing.
June 20, 2023
"The Cobbler: How I Disrupted an Industry, Fell From Grace, and Came Back Stronger Than Ever" by Steve Madden is an inspiring memoir that captivates readers with its touching honesty and perseverance. Madden's vulnerability and self-reflection deeply engage the reader, making this a compelling and relatable story of overcoming adversity.
The book personifies the American Dream, showcasing Madden's journey as he battled addiction and built a shoe empire from humble beginnings. From selling shoes out of his car trunk in the 90s to transforming his company into a billion-dollar brand, Madden's determination and innovative mindset shine through.
The writing style of "The Cobbler" is well-crafted and keeps the reader engaged with its fast-paced narrative. Madden's unconventional hiring strategies and his unwavering commitment to product quality offer unique insights into the business world.
Originally published in 2019, this updated version of the book includes a prologue and epilogue that delve into the author's experiences during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. These additions showcase how Steve Madden, the man, and the company not only survived but managed to come back stronger than ever for the second time.
"The Cobbler" is an exceptional memoir that leaves readers inspired and uplifted. It serves as a reminder that owning up to one's mistakes and embracing change can lead to personal growth and success.
I received a copy of the book for a blog tour. This review is my honest opinion.
The book personifies the American Dream, showcasing Madden's journey as he battled addiction and built a shoe empire from humble beginnings. From selling shoes out of his car trunk in the 90s to transforming his company into a billion-dollar brand, Madden's determination and innovative mindset shine through.
The writing style of "The Cobbler" is well-crafted and keeps the reader engaged with its fast-paced narrative. Madden's unconventional hiring strategies and his unwavering commitment to product quality offer unique insights into the business world.
Originally published in 2019, this updated version of the book includes a prologue and epilogue that delve into the author's experiences during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. These additions showcase how Steve Madden, the man, and the company not only survived but managed to come back stronger than ever for the second time.
"The Cobbler" is an exceptional memoir that leaves readers inspired and uplifted. It serves as a reminder that owning up to one's mistakes and embracing change can lead to personal growth and success.
I received a copy of the book for a blog tour. This review is my honest opinion.
December 19, 2023
Shout out to “Driven by Distraction”
While this is about the author’s business successes and his journey along the way, it’s also an inspiration to those with ADHD (we have GOT to figure out another name for this). His honesty about addiction and self-medication are a testament to our need for society to clearly understand us NeuroDivergent and to employ our brains the way they were designed. Driven to get that “rush”, fast decision-making, high energy, lower attention to biological needs, mental hyperactivity, quick changes, risk-taking, visualization, etc. can be viable tools for realizing goals when they are nurtured.
The author brought up a very valid point:
Creativity encompasses so much more than just making art: leading, hustling, “seeing around corners”, predicting trends & problems [from noticing patterns – common for NeuroDivergents], being able to function surrounded by external stimuli, picking up on social cues, etc.
He had a lot of variety early on and was exposed to more of it than the norm. These seemed to give him advantages that his peers may not have had.
Some basic life tips:
Recognize people for their soft skills, not only for things that can be quantified.
Don’t be judgmental of people who are battling addiction – it’s a true illness and doesn’t come from nowhere.
Fave thang:
The chapter openers are illustrations with a short explanation of various shoe parts.
Looks like I’m heading over to the local mall to check out the store…I've never even entered it!
While this is about the author’s business successes and his journey along the way, it’s also an inspiration to those with ADHD (we have GOT to figure out another name for this). His honesty about addiction and self-medication are a testament to our need for society to clearly understand us NeuroDivergent and to employ our brains the way they were designed. Driven to get that “rush”, fast decision-making, high energy, lower attention to biological needs, mental hyperactivity, quick changes, risk-taking, visualization, etc. can be viable tools for realizing goals when they are nurtured.
The author brought up a very valid point:
Creativity encompasses so much more than just making art: leading, hustling, “seeing around corners”, predicting trends & problems [from noticing patterns – common for NeuroDivergents], being able to function surrounded by external stimuli, picking up on social cues, etc.
He had a lot of variety early on and was exposed to more of it than the norm. These seemed to give him advantages that his peers may not have had.
Some basic life tips:
Recognize people for their soft skills, not only for things that can be quantified.
Don’t be judgmental of people who are battling addiction – it’s a true illness and doesn’t come from nowhere.
Fave thang:
The chapter openers are illustrations with a short explanation of various shoe parts.
Looks like I’m heading over to the local mall to check out the store…I've never even entered it!
February 7, 2023
The Review
This was a well-written and powerful memoir meets business nonfiction read. The authors did a brilliant job of capturing a tone of honesty and perseverance in the writing of this book. The history and unique perspective on this particular angle of the fusion industry, as well as the way the industry moved through the 90s and early 2000s, was particularly engaging and remarkable to read about, as it brought about both nostalgia and a firmer understanding of how one of our society’s biggest brands came to be.
Yet it was the author's vulnerability and self-reflection that really brought the reader into this book’s narrative. The honest way the author delved into everything that happened in his journey, from his humble beginnings to his struggles with addiction, the smell starts to his business, and the impact of the recent pandemic on his understanding of the industry going forward, allowed the reader to feel connected to the author’s experiences and the profound changes he made in life to grow from those experiences.
The Verdict
Captivating, thoughtful, and engaging, authors Steve Madden and Jodi Lipper’s “The Cobbler” is a must-read memoir and business-related nonfiction read of 2023. The insightful and memorable nature of the author’s journey and the experiences that shaped not only an industry but the man behind one of the world’s biggest brands made this a book you won’t want to put down.
This was a well-written and powerful memoir meets business nonfiction read. The authors did a brilliant job of capturing a tone of honesty and perseverance in the writing of this book. The history and unique perspective on this particular angle of the fusion industry, as well as the way the industry moved through the 90s and early 2000s, was particularly engaging and remarkable to read about, as it brought about both nostalgia and a firmer understanding of how one of our society’s biggest brands came to be.
Yet it was the author's vulnerability and self-reflection that really brought the reader into this book’s narrative. The honest way the author delved into everything that happened in his journey, from his humble beginnings to his struggles with addiction, the smell starts to his business, and the impact of the recent pandemic on his understanding of the industry going forward, allowed the reader to feel connected to the author’s experiences and the profound changes he made in life to grow from those experiences.
The Verdict
Captivating, thoughtful, and engaging, authors Steve Madden and Jodi Lipper’s “The Cobbler” is a must-read memoir and business-related nonfiction read of 2023. The insightful and memorable nature of the author’s journey and the experiences that shaped not only an industry but the man behind one of the world’s biggest brands made this a book you won’t want to put down.
May 24, 2023
Rating: 9/10
*I was fortunate to be gifted The Cobbler by Steve Madden.*
I was SO excited to read The Cobbler when it finally came in the mail. Aside from the fact that SM is a major fashion house, I couldn't wait to get a detailed account of what led to Madden's imprisonment and how he redeemed himself afterward.
Madden is incredibly transparent and vulnerable about his rise to and fall from power; he discusses his battle with substance abuse then getting clean and building a billion-dollar shoe empire just to lose it all because of greed.
He could've made himself a victim of his entire situation but on the contrary, Madden takes full responsibility for everything that happened in his life. Instead of going around blaming or defaming people, he's able to recognize the faults of his actions and still speaks of others highly.
There are so many key life and business lessons in this book but the one that stands out to me the most is BE PATIENT. Taking shortcuts may get you there faster but sometimes getting there faster, especially when done unethically, can only hurt you more than help you.
Incredible book, worth the read
*I was fortunate to be gifted The Cobbler by Steve Madden.*
I was SO excited to read The Cobbler when it finally came in the mail. Aside from the fact that SM is a major fashion house, I couldn't wait to get a detailed account of what led to Madden's imprisonment and how he redeemed himself afterward.
Madden is incredibly transparent and vulnerable about his rise to and fall from power; he discusses his battle with substance abuse then getting clean and building a billion-dollar shoe empire just to lose it all because of greed.
He could've made himself a victim of his entire situation but on the contrary, Madden takes full responsibility for everything that happened in his life. Instead of going around blaming or defaming people, he's able to recognize the faults of his actions and still speaks of others highly.
There are so many key life and business lessons in this book but the one that stands out to me the most is BE PATIENT. Taking shortcuts may get you there faster but sometimes getting there faster, especially when done unethically, can only hurt you more than help you.
Incredible book, worth the read
October 18, 2022
Steve Madden's The Cobbler paints a picture of a young entrepreneur who sails against the status quo in the fashion industry to develop a brand that is hip, trendy, and a complete game changer. With the help of his family especially heis older brother John, Steve Madden is able to cultivate himself into being a successful businessman through designing and selling shoes to the public. He takes you through his business practices step by step taking the reader through the ways of which he built his brand into the powerhouse it is today. Steve Madden takes you through the trials and tribulations and achievements of his personal life and professional life and the decisions and moments that created the larger than life figure he is today. I highly enjoyed reading his book and I highly recommend anyone to read his book especially if they have a strong interest in fashion, business, and entrepreneurship.
June 20, 2023
I read /The Cobbler: How I Disrupted an Industry, Fell From Grace, and Came Back Stronger Than Ever/, by Steve Madden.
Here's the audio-book version:
https://www.audiobooks.com/audiobook/...
5 stars for story and for Steve's humility, but not written that well.
I had no idea who Steve Madden was until I read the Wolf of Wall Street, as he was featured in there - Jordan Belfort and Stratton Oakmont invested $500k in Steve's company, and then took the company public.
Steve tells the story in narrative style, of being a drug addict, getting clean and founding his shoe company, and then growing it to the successful business it is today (with a jail stint in-between for illegally holding Jordan's shares for him and allegedly manipulating stocks).
Here's the audio-book version:
https://www.audiobooks.com/audiobook/...
5 stars for story and for Steve's humility, but not written that well.
I had no idea who Steve Madden was until I read the Wolf of Wall Street, as he was featured in there - Jordan Belfort and Stratton Oakmont invested $500k in Steve's company, and then took the company public.
Steve tells the story in narrative style, of being a drug addict, getting clean and founding his shoe company, and then growing it to the successful business it is today (with a jail stint in-between for illegally holding Jordan's shares for him and allegedly manipulating stocks).
January 4, 2023
Is Steve Madden a likable guy? Possibly. Does he exhibit many of the problematic characteristics of hustle culture and CEO-world mentality? Completely. Is this still a fascinating read? 100%. Even if you aren't in the fashion world, could care less about shoe designs, and somehow have never heard of Steve Madden, you will find this book interesting. Madden captures the frenetic energy he imbibes into his business and transfers it into this book perfectly. It's a wild romp through drug addiction, startup culture, narcissism, prison time, Wall Street shenanigans, corporate takeovers, and so much more.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me early access to The Cobbler in exchange for my honest review.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me early access to The Cobbler in exchange for my honest review.
August 15, 2023
Honestly, I thought this book was going to be garbage. I intrusively bought this book at the airport, simply because I love fashion, booming business, and reading. I was familiar was with Steve’s life and work with Jordan Belfort, so I knew regardless the book would be at the very least interesting.
It was so much better than anticipated. Of course, Steve’s life is intense and one hell of a roller coaster, but the writing was also better than I thought. Although it’s not the most lyrically or profound piece of literature, it was an inspiring and motivating read.
If you love fashion, you will appreciate the creative nuances and genius sales skills that Steve has. Loved it, and I encourage everyone to read it!
It was so much better than anticipated. Of course, Steve’s life is intense and one hell of a roller coaster, but the writing was also better than I thought. Although it’s not the most lyrically or profound piece of literature, it was an inspiring and motivating read.
If you love fashion, you will appreciate the creative nuances and genius sales skills that Steve has. Loved it, and I encourage everyone to read it!
January 3, 2023
This was such an interesting book! I knew virtually nothing about Steve Madden, other than I have worn his shoes my entire life and that tiny part about him on Wolf of Wall Street. I deeply enjoyed learning about how he got started, driving around selling shoes out of a car trunk, and how he grew his company. It was interesting to hear about his time in prison, and learning how African Americans have been disproportionately impacted. Thank you NG for this copy!
January 16, 2023
I was a Steve Madden girl. I grew up in the early to mid 90s & even to this day in my late 30s still by his merch. I'd always been curious about his life & how the brand just came out of nowhere to be the "it" brand. I was also curious about his involvement with the wolf of Wall Street. And hearing about his efforts to help people after leaving prison & entering the workforce just makes me love what the brand stands for even more.
January 19, 2023
What a great updated memoir from fashion icon Steve Madden. Thanks to NetGalley for the copy for the purpose of this review. Five stars for me! I really like Madden’s style of telling his story and how he gets his thoughts right out there on the page. I was sucked in and intrigued by his beginnings and family life. I applaud him for how he deals with addiction and prison time. He keeps evolving. Great book!
March 2, 2023
I enjoyed reading Steve Madden's memoir. He went through a lot but somehow managed to achieve a successful life. The book is written in good and easy to read language. However in my opinion it was an unnecessary rush at the end. Basically the book finishes in 2012, 2014 when he split with Wendy is mentioned briefly, year 2019 was mentioned also for a moment and the last chapter was dedicated to Covid lockdown. It gives nearly 7-9 years gap, hence 4 star review.
August 10, 2023
This was surprisingly great!! Steve Madden is involved in the shoe design and retail like I'd never guess and is really honest with the kind of person he's been, the mistakes he's made and the life he's lived. I never knew he was involved with 'the wolf of wall street' scandal and even served time for it. I've always respected the shoes and had some idea of the brand identity but it's a great story. Would recommend the audiobook.
May 17, 2024
Some of my fav pink shoes i always wore clubbing were from steve madden so I had to read this memoir. I didn't know he had ties to wolf of wall street and i recommend this book to anyone starting a business because he def is a mogul for entrepreneur ish. I thought this book would make me buy another pair of shoes and i was correct so just beware if you're a shopper. Youll be looking up old brands contemplating your closet.
September 29, 2024
Pretty good
I wasn’t familiar with Steve Madden - the man or the shoes - so perhaps that’s why I didn’t get more out of this book, but it was still quite well done. I’m also not drawn to biographies of felons, so I guess this was the retailing aspect of the shoes that caused me to listen. That aspect was great. Definitely a tale of redemption, and I give him credit for owning his misdeeds, poor judgement and behaviours.
I wasn’t familiar with Steve Madden - the man or the shoes - so perhaps that’s why I didn’t get more out of this book, but it was still quite well done. I’m also not drawn to biographies of felons, so I guess this was the retailing aspect of the shoes that caused me to listen. That aspect was great. Definitely a tale of redemption, and I give him credit for owning his misdeeds, poor judgement and behaviours.
December 25, 2020
This book is incredible. It’s fun, well written, and provides exclusive looks info Madden’s life. The business savvy juxtaposed with the ADHD and struggles make for such an interesting narrative. I appreciated that he mentioned his involvement with Jordan but didn’t make that the focal point. Couldn’t put it down!
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