It's so sad. Like one of my favorite quotes is, doubt kills the more dreams than failure ever will. It's so sad to think of how many dreams never made it, not because the actual thing was too hard to do, because the person's doubt took them out of it before they got started. There's so many sliding doors moments in my life where things could have gone one way or another without you know, like there's such a tiny chance that it would have gone one way or the other.
And that was obviously the very first one that I had no consciousness of at the time and no appreciation of until gosh, I mean maybe my teen is when I was like, oh god, I could have actually ended up living in what was a third world country at the time and not having any of these opportunities. So that's made me always instilled a real sense of gratitude and appreciation and an attitude of like makes the most of everything because you almost didn't have it, or you could have not had it.
Hello and welcome to Outspoken. Today, we have a real treat for anyone looking for some inspo. We're joined by the creative, funny, talented, and gorgeous Sarah Holloway, who's now known as Sarah Davidson after getting married just two months ago. Sarah is a former lawyer turned co founder of Green Tea Empire, Matcha Maiden and Matcha Milk Bar. She also runs a hugely popular podcast, Sees the Ya. Sarah, thank you so much for joining us. We hear you've had
obviously a huge twenty nineteen. First congrats you've joined us in the thirty club and you've.
Also the best club, and you've.
Also gotten married to your partner of ten years. Can you tell us about the big day?
Oh my gosh, yes, it's still quite fresh in the memory. I was just looking back today at how long it's been. It's been two months officially of married life, and yeah, we had the most perfect day. It was absolutely beautiful. I think we made a very conscious decision right at the beginning, Like I'm a little bit of a like ocd A type personality at the best of time, so I had to make a decision at the very beginning that if anything was going to be too stressful, we
were going to cut it. We just wanted it to be an amazing, happy, fun party with you know, no bridezilla no stressing and just wanted everyone to have the best time and it was so so beautiful.
Now, for those who don't know, you are a massive fan of punts, and I love the fact that you managed to incorporate the saying MATCHA made in Heaven into your wedding. Was that important for you to get in?
Oh? Absolutely. I think we just wanted to inject as much of our personality as we could into it. And also like those were the things that kind of made it, made us not take it too seriously and just inject a bit of fun. And you know, at the whole five past five years, so half our relationship has been on the match of mission and building our business together or both our MATCHA based businesses together. So we just thought that was a really nice way to honor a
big part of our story. And it's a pun that is perfect for a wedding because you know you're making the perfect match. And then we actually got a big neon sign as well. And neither of our names worked very well for any other kind of marriage, Hasha, you know how some people's names work really well. So we're like, oh, well that can be our That's He's good.
I was gonna say, you said you would try not to make it too stressful stressful, but did you feel any pressure to have it be sort of an instagram worthy wedding? I suppose both of you having large followings.
I think I think we might have, like at the very very beginning, I think we probably thought about that, but we didn't have I mean, we're like, you know, F grade celebrities at the best like best case scenario, so we didn't have the pressures that some people do if they know they've got a magazine deal or something
like that. It probably just runs for our heads kind of in the background that we might have, you know, a few people interested in what it looked like, but in the end, most of the people who we knew would be our guests were family and friends who either don't have Instagram, haven't heard of it, or you know, there were very very few people there who actually kind of understand that world, so we knew it wouldn't be sort of an instagramm evetting just by the guests and stuff.
So I think that took a lot of the pressure out. And when we're you know, our family selves, like both our families are from the countryside, we go back to very basic, like Bogan people. So we definitely wanted it to be really beautiful and aesthetic, and we knew it also had amazing, amazing photographers, but it wasn't kind of a pressure. I don't think we made any decisions based on that. It was more just what we wanted it
to look and feel like. And you know, we went to a venue that we could have chosen something very minimal and like black and white and monochrome, but we went something that felt really homely and much more greenery, and that matched the whole kind of match of things. So I think it was really good that we had a big chat at the beginning about what was important
to us and what wasn't. And I think you can get totally carried away in the wedding process and missed the fun parts or the loved up, you know, spontaneous, relaxed parts. So I'm so glad we made an intention at the beginning to not get carried away, and then it ended up just being the best time. Like every supplier has just constantly was like, can you be a little bit more stressed because we're just not sure what
you want? Because we were so easy, I was like whatever, and they're like, I'm a little bit more direction.
So you definitely weren't a bridezill of it.
No, we were like, yeah, the total opposite. We gave our suppliers, you know, maybe a color scheme and like a few reference pictures and then after that we're like, okay, you do it. We trust you, and they were like, oh, that's pressure. But we you know, we really trusted that. We chose them because they were amazing, and we had a couple of key things like the neon sign. We really wanted to have the hashtag, you know, as a
big feature, but everything else was just whatever. I'm like, we chose all the default cutlery, the default linen, like everything was just the kind of basic option. And I don't think anyone remembers any of that anyway. So yeah, we were so happy.
Now, of course, you are the founder of Tea Empire, Matcha Maiden, and Matcha Milk Bar, but you also run an incredible podcast, ses Thea. Now you like to start every episode by asking guests what's the most down to earth thing about them, So we'd love to finally find that out about you.
Oh my god, Oh I always get to ask it brushes off. Oh my gosh, I think probably my bluepoons, the fact that I have a lot of chins at certain angles, the fact that I love to celebrate those chins. There's so much that's down to earth about me, and I think because you know, most of the start of my life and the start of my career was a very non fish your non fancy, non instagram the kind of world. It still feels a little bit new to me to be in a more glossy, fancy kind of
kind of lifestyle. So really, when we're not at events, or when we're not doing outward facing client things or podcasts or event or you know, live events or whatever, it is that I'm always just in my quondous pajamas with no makeup on. I like, I am a big nose picker, like have very small eyes when I don't wear eyemaker. I love, yeah, all the bloopoos. Every time
we do a professional photo shoot. I've made it a little a little personal kind of way to keep myself grounded that, you know, when I've been posting too many pretty photos with lots of makeup at an event with professional lighting and all that stuff, I have to cancel it out. With like the ugliest photos that I can possibly do, and they, yeah, they keep me really down to earth. So there's like a whole highlight on my Instagram of them. If you ever just want to have a chuckle, I love that.
You do that, because so much of Instagram is it's just so fake, and I know it does make people feel bad about themselves. Do you wish that more people on Instagram did their own bloopers?
Real? Absolutely? I think it's I don't it's funny. I think that for a lot of in a lot of cases, it can be really fake and quite convoluted, and people are really only choosing to put certain things out there for other people. It might not necessarily be that they're being fake. It's just that they don't think to post those other moments. They don't really they might not even know how useful it can be to other people. So I think it would be awesome for more people to
understand how good that can be for other people. Because I started doing it because I knew how much it reassured me when other people who seemed to be consistently immaculately groomed and looking perfectly styled, and you know, you forget that in between those moments there's a lot of real stuff, and when they show it, it just makes you feel not better about yourself because they look ugly or anything, but just more like human. It makes me
realize we're all human, we all have those moments. And it also helped me feel less uncomfortable about the fact that I was only posting the highlight moments. I just felt a little bit like my relationship with the platform feels awkward when I don't feel like I'm being completely rounded in what I'm showing. And it is hard because sometimes in your downtime you don't feel like taking a photo.
That's just part of the behavior. But since I've started making an effort to show all of the side, including the bits in between, I've had such wonderful feedback from other people who have like big following, small followings, who are on the platform a lot, who aren't on the
platform a lot. And it's also made me personally feel like you almost take the pressure off yourself as well to be so perfectly manicured and groomed all the time, because once you know people have seen the worst photo of you in the world, you're like everything else is a bonus, So it kind of also improved my own relationship with the whole world because it's a heart you know,
it's a new world. It's a hard environment to get comfortable with, and I think if more people were willing to show some of the bits that they might otherwise have been scared of showing, it will encourage everyone to feel like the standard is more realistic.
Oh that's so true.
I mean it is so scary as well when you see how many young people are on Instagram, and I heard some crazy stat that some teenagers aren't even going to parties because they feel like they can't even live up to their Instagram photos. Do you know, I know, is that what you kind of think about? I mean, obviously you're putting it out there so others might do the same and feel better, But are you mindful of your younger following?
Absolutely? And I think that's probably where why it's become something that I try and do more and more, because I do appreciate so much that I didn't have to face that when I was a teenager, and I do increasingly think as I we you know, we get closer to planning to have children, I get just so concerned about the world that they will enter into having that
from the time that they're really really young. So it's almost with that in mind that I think I need to start doing what I can to mold the platform in a way that it might be a little bit of a safer, less precious in place by the time
we have children and they're using social media. But definitely the younger audience, how impressionable they are, how much stuff out there there is that is misleading and that does lead to behaviors as much as them not going to things in real life, Like that's just so sad, And yeah, it just makes me so sad thinking that that could even be, you know, someone's life because we didn't have that.
So yeah, I think that. Yeah, the future generations and the younger generations now are definitely something I think about.
And talking about younger is You've previously described yourself as a child as someone who is artsy, fatsi and an ubernert.
What were you like as a kid and did you.
See yourself going down the path of running your own business one day?
Yeah, so definitely I was super arty, Fatzi. Even the fact that I use words like that, I've always been like that like really fluffy language, really like I was always dressed in two twos. I was ballerina until I was gosh, I was fifteen, I think when I left the Australian Ballet. But when I was younger and it was less serious, I was always just performing and making concerts and like making two tuos out of like seven layers of my mum's dresses, or painting makeup on other people.
Like Yeah, I'd loved to draw and listen to music, and then as I got older, i'd kind of write music and I loved everything. It's so interesting that I in my school years I kind of went a lot more the academic pathway on the other side of my brain. But when I was younger, I was very, very like curious about the art, and I had such a strong network,
such a strong family network. And both sides of our family are from the countryside, so I think we had a city kid upbringing in that all the opportunities that were available here we were able to make the most of. But then we also spend a lot of time on the dairy farms and out in the countries, so I've also had that real supportive It takes a village kind of feel of having country communities around us as well.
And yeah, when I look back at my childhood, I just think of it being so happy, really happy, full of excitement, and yeah, that's what I come back to now when I think about how we all have that kind of fun silly in a child, and we let that person go for a little while, but I try and come back to her.
I've heard you speak in the past about sometimes you think how different your life could have been. Obviously you were born in South Korea and being adopted at such a young age. Do you still think about that what life might have been like if you were still in South Korea always?
I think that's probably been one of my biggest drivers for I guess, like most things that I do, just thinking about how I could Like, there's so many sliding doors moments in my life where things could have gone one way or another without you know, like there's such a tiny chance that it would have gone one way
or the other. And that was obviously the very first one that I had no consciousness of at the time and no appreciation of until gosh, I mean maybe my teen years when I was like, oh God, like I could have actually ended up living in what was the third World country at the time and not having any
of these opportunities. So that's made me always instilled a real sense of gratitude and appreciation and an attitude of like, make the most of everything because you almost didn't have it, or you could have not had it, which has probably been one of the reasons why I burn out so often as well, because I do get a little bit carried away and trying to fit everything in and be part of every sport and every club and everything. But yeah, it's definitely driven a lot of my choices and a
lot of my attitude towards things. Has always made volunteer work and philanthropy a really big part of everything that I've done. So when I was a lawyer, you know, there are lots of legal clinics who can volunteer out there are also volunteer opportunities, and then when I left the law, we kind of transferred that into we worked in Rwanda and some schools to build classrooms and teach
classes and you know what. You know, for both Nick and I had always been important to have a volunteer component to what we do because his mum was also actually adopted. Oh yeah, I know, it's so crazy.
You spoke about the sliding doors moments. Was that one of the moments when you were deciding between law and whether you're going to pursue much a maide as your main career.
Yes, definitely that was. I think the next big sliding moment was that big career change and deciding whether to go with something that wasn't Actually. One of the things I try and talk about often is that when you're really unhappy, you'll make a change. But if you're not super unhappy, but you're not happy, like you're just blah, you're not as you know, there's nothing to kind of push you to make a change because it's not that bad,
you know. And because it wasn't bad, I was like, I could keep doing this, I could go for a great wage, a lot of learning opportunities, there were great travel opportunities within my firm, and it was obviously quite a respectable career that you could take in lots of directions. It was well paid. You know, there were so many
reasons why it was a good option. But then there was this kind of really uncertain but also potentially amazing, totally out of the blue opportunity that again was like so risky, but also was something that kind of ignited my excitement, that excitement that I had when I was a kid, that I didn't know that I hadn't had in so long until I had it again, and I was like, oh, this has been missing for a while, and it was it was it was something I was
able to do on the side. So we did the business for six months on the side while I was still working full time in the beginning, and it was easier then, Like, even though it was a scary thing to start a business, it's not as scary when it's a side hustle because the risk is so low. So that first six months was scary and crazy, but it wasn't nearly as hard as when it became suddenly like
you can't do both anymore. You have to choose. You have to cut one of them off, maybe not forever, but for like semi permanently, and you have to choose one or the other. That was when it became really scary, overwhelming, and one of those things where you can't actually not make a decision, like you have to just you can't do both anymore, so it has to be one or the other, and the longer await, the worst it becomes.
But I think the way that I always work things out in that situation is what's the once in a lifetime opportunity and law it's not once in a lifetime. There are things that are once in a lifetime in that career, but no one is ever not going to need lawyers. Yeah, and this reason're not going to go anyway, you know, Like I knew I could always fall back on those qualifications in one way or another, whether it was in the same job or a completely different one.
There's no shortage of times lawyers that needed. Whereas the business was growing at a pace in a you know, digital world that was so new, so unpredictable, but also so once in a lifetime, like no one else was doing it, we knew it was only a matter of time before other people kind of caught on and we had a chance to be the first one. So you know, we're like, Okay, this is the ones in a lifetime thing.
This is the thing that if I look back and I don't do, I might regret, Whereas if I look back on you know, the other way, I probably won't mind because one day, worst case scenario. If it doesn't work, I can just go back.
Yeah, there's always people to sue. And I was going to say, how did you exactly, how did you?
Can you tell us a story how you actually stumbled across match it, because I think it's so interesting.
Yeah. So it was such an accident, which is why I always talk about the Sliding Wars moment because it was so like, such a random, random thing that happened that wasn't even related to matter in the beginning. So I had got I think I was ten months into my first year as a lawyer, and we went to Africa. On the trip that I was talking about, I took a month off, which is so unheard of. You just don't do that in your first year of work or really most years of work. And so we went over there.
It was absolutely incredible, totally transformative experience. The kids over there were amazing, and we just really it really changed a lot of things for us both. But I came home with a gut parasite that I picked up over there, which was quite nasty. But I was so unconnected with my body at that time, like I just had no awareness of health and wellness of what it took to really look after yourself. It was very superficial, like I just exercised and eat well, and I was like cool tick.
So I ended up burning myself that and ignoring all the signs. I lost fifteen kilos from it before I really realized that anything had happened, was I know, And you know, the first five kilos, I was like grammy, and then I was like, why am I looking so skimmy? This is not nice. And I just couldn't digest things properly and it was kind of wreaking all this, all this kind of havoc without me really understanding what was
going on. So I ended up just still working really long hours and it didn't really hit me until I just completely collapsed at work. I had a dream or fatigue. I'd like burnt myself completely to it, you know, to total collapse. And I had take quite a few weeks.
I think it was even maybe months off work. And that was when I was banned from coffee because my dream or system was so fragile and compromised that they were like, you'll have a panic attack if you have a cup of coffee, so best just not do that.
A lawyer with an coffee.
My god, exactly, Oh my god. You understand. I was like cups a day kind of girl. At the time. I was like, what am I going to do? And that's when I kind of believe that the universe always works things out for you in one way or another. And I got sent to the firm's headquarters as soon as I went back to work in Hong Kong on a deal over there, and I was there for about I think eight months, and over there, Matcha is everywhere. It's not, you know, in the East, it's not the
buzzword that it's been in the West. Has been around for centuries. The Zen Buddhist monks have been using it for years and years and then meditation practices, and it's because it gives you. It's got caffeine and it gives you a really good boost of energy. But what coffee doesn't have is an amino acid called elthanine, which controls the release of the caffeine, so it's slower and you don't get a spike and then a crash. You just
get this sustained energy release. So I was able to have a boost of energy from caffeine that wouldn't kind of send me into a full flipout and I just got hooked. I was like, this is amazing. How has no one realized is a magical out there? And we were a really health food conscious society already, Like I was like, if people are willing to drink spirollina, which tastes like foot, probably going to be willing to consider green tea out of it just taste like green tea.
But then we came home couldn't find it anywhere, like just for ourselves, totally selfish needs. We went online and tried to find some, and yeah, we found a really good supply that was kind of halfway between the two options that were available, which was a really expensive ceremonial once in a you know, twice a year, you get it out when your grandmar comes over kind of tea, or there was like an Asian grocery sugary alternative that was really cheap and not high enough quality to have
the health benefits. And we were like, what's in the middle. Surely there's something in the middle, And we found some. We bought it for ourselves. He could only get it in bulk. It came and it was massive, and we were like, so we've got some powder to get rid of. We can do this, And that's literally how it started. It was like, we have too much powder, too much money. Let's sell some just some people and just as like
your little side project and see what happens. And the risk was super low because we'd already bought it, like scenario. We ended up with what we'd already bought, which was exactly the same.
That's a ten year supply of match for yourselves.
Yeah, exactly, and like, who don't need that. We're like, we'll get through it eventually, work case scenario, and then it just ended up doing well.
That's so good. I was gonna say.
A lot of people think that starting a business is so glamorous because they see, you know, different posts on Instagram. Can you tell us the reality of when you guys started matcha Maiden.
Oh my gosh, it's the opposite of glamor. It's it's got its own special vibe in that you're just so excited and you're doing everything for the first time and it's just so like so magical to be working on something that you care about. And it's different. But in terms of like glamorous moments, they are few and far between. We were literally we were doing everything ourselves. We had no idea what we're doing. And I think the cliche of you know, going on Google to figure things out
is a cliche because that's literally how everyone starts. Everything is googleable. We just went to Google and we're like, what do you need for a tea business? And just work backwards from like, like what's the minimum that we would need to get one bag ready for sale? So we figured out that you need a bag, you need to close the bag, you need to put something on
the bag. You know. It was very, very simple, and all of that was just us running around to like Ali Barber, getting things from eBay, going to office works. And then when we were packing, which we were doing ourselves, we hired a friend's commercial kitchen for like the middle of the night after our normal jobs, and then we're just like in our undis so that we wouldn't get fiber, you know, little like fibers in the packets with shower caps on. Packing in like a production line, and it
was just like breaking bag but green. The best way that I can describe it. It's such an old joke, like my friends always roll their eyes. You're going to say the same joke, but like that's exactly what it was. It was so un glamorous.
You should have got a few snaps of that.
There. They probably won't see the light, but they exist.
And as I felt like business women, I feel like there's a lot of guilt associated with working from home, and you know, you going from working in a corporate environment to then, you know, starting this business at your home. Did you struggle with that guilt from time to time?
Yeah, I don't know whether it's guilt. I think I feel the guilt more now. At the time, it was also accompanied by just so much like what am I doing? Like you'd wake up one morning and be like, yeah, it's amazing, and then you wake up the next day and be like, oh my god, I've made the biggest mistake of my life. Like there's just such an emotional rollercoaster that and you were I was so busy, Like we were just so overcome by how fast it was growing and how much we didn't know how to keep
up with it. So I think we were just so distracted in the first year and a bit that we didn't really have time to sit and think, you know, oh my gosh, we're so lucky, like with an amazing transition. It's more been since we've started to feel a little bit more confident and a little bit able to sort of chill a little bit more and do things on
purpose rather than just reactively. Now I'm like, often I'll just be sitting there, you know, in an amazing meeting with an amazing partner for the podcast or something, and I'm like, it's eleven o'clock on a Tuesday, I'm in a cafe. I would have been in a firm this time, like it's a weekday. Now is where I feel bad because I'm like it's too good, Like I have it too good. I'm having too much fun. This is just
too amazing. And I think also in the first you know, couple of years, you have so many dramas, like there are just so many disasters of stuff that go wrong, or that you're double guessing yourself or you're like shit, shit shit, But the guild doesn't really creep in until things start actually going well, and then you're like, wait, what, this is my job now, what do you mean? Or like I feel more guilty not so much working from home, but when we travel, when we travel for work and
we can work from anywhere. That's where I'm like, this is too good, Like surely this is there's something wrong in this situation, Like why is no one stopping me?
That's so good.
You mentioned that you've been speaking to a lot of famous people in your podcast, and one of my favorite interviews of yours is with Gary V.
What is he?
What was he actually like in person?
He's amazing, amazing. He's one of those people who you're never going like, you're never quite sure if they're going to be the same in real life as they are on social media, And he was like I was so curious to see if he would be as crazily energetic and as enthusiastic. Gorgue just kind of puts it on and he was exactly the same. Like I felt like I've known him for years, because he is exactly the same person that you see on every video and every story.
He's so enthusiast, stick about the things, he's passionate about. He's so intense, like he just he'll come in. When he came in, he was like on his phone and like really distracted, and then as soon as he puts his phone down, he's like, I'm on like for the time that you have me, you have my full attention and just like stares at you intently and listens really carefully.
It's kind of scary, but it was amazing. I was like, you're less distracted than we are, and like you have way more things going on than any of us, and yet you're able to give us more attention and then like I give my mum when we have a conversation or whatever. It was just really interesting to see that, Yeah, that that someone can maintain that much energy and it
is genuine and and he does. He cares so much about about just joy and spreading good things on you know, in the internet, and you know, you kind of think, oh, yeah, that's you know, that's a great tack to take. Because you're a billionaire, it's easy for you to say that stuff. And of course it's trendy to be spreading happiness. But he's genuine, really passionate about it. He's very driven by the world that he wants to create for his children,
and he's just so passionate about learning. And yeah, I was really really inspired and impressed by how but he was also chill, you know, like he also was like could have a laugh about around himself and wasn't too like business business. He was like yeah, talking about the lemonades dands that he used to happen he was a kid, and then talking about his kids, and yeah, I was like, you're just a person who's really cool.
I'm glad to hear he's just the same as he is on his in his content. Is he someone that you listened to a lot before? Yeah?
Yeah, I listened to him a lot, and I just I never was really sure how much I gelled with him, Like I obviously found him super inspiring, but because I wasn't sure that that is actually how he is, do you know what I mean? Like he just seemed too like too intense and amazing all the time, and I just wasn't sure how It's sad, you know, you know with some how you listen to everything, but I'm like, whoa,
he's screaming at me. And I loved it, Like I found that I needed his kind of material when I was having a really like lull in my motivation if I was feeling really good, like I might feel like he was like really intense, and you know, I'd be like ah, but no, I yeah, prolifically listened to his podcast and watched his channel, and Yeah, had been following him for a really long time and loved everything that he was saying about how entrepreneur entrepreneur entrepreneurialism is maybe
not for everyone, but these you know, he's really very real about what in the roles and about the things that he does and how he does them and looking for like how he picks things a head in the future and then spreading kindness and doing good things without influence like that had always resonated really strong strongly with me. So yeah, I was definitely a fan girl.
And you and your husband now, which I don't know if that's strange for you to call him your husband yet, Nick, he obviously runs oh weird, He obviously runs the bushy creative as well as working with you on Match of Maiden. How tough was it in the beginning to figure out that work life balance.
So difficult It took us years, Like we had gone from having such separate careers where we just operated in our own little worlds and then came home and had, you know, a quick chat about our day, but our stuff was very separate to suddenly like at home together, working from home, together twenty four seven and then working on the same stuff as well. So it was such
a big lifestyle change. And we also had no like experience in carving out structure, or in knowing how to work with each other, or making decisions on work things, or you know, we didn't even really know what each other's skills and weaknesses were yet because we never worked together and we didn't have a date night for maybe two years. I reckon like, we just didn't know that. Yeah, but I think as you're so excited, and especially for me,
it didn't feel like work. It still felt like my hobby, so I didn't really feel like it was all real. It just felt like play. For two years, we didn't even know that we needed that. We were just like, yeah, yeah, let's keep going. We let's do all the staff. But it wasn't until like two years later we were like, oh my god, we're becoming like business partners and friends
who live together. You realize that that is what happens when you don't take those times and you don't put boundaries in to make sure that you have two separate roles. You're not always in business partner role. You can be in a couple role, and you have to like have a cut off at the end of the day where you're not in work roles anymore, and you have to have weekends, and you have to have trips that aren't
work trips. And that was a really really big learning and transition that around the year two or three took us maybe another to kind of figure out where the right balance was and how to, you know, to talk to each other differently when we were having work meetings than we would when we were just chatting as a couple. And I think that probably was where we argued a lot. Like we don't really argue, but that year was like really tense because we were just like, why are we
so shitty all the time? Like it's just because we were in each other's face all the time.
Sophie and I work together and you can just be so brutally honest with family members, and I feel like it must be the same for when you're in a relationship with someone. Was that hard giving that honest feedback?
Yeah? I think that was probably where we fell over the most, is that we would take liberties with each other that you would never take with a third party, a third party business partner, like if you don't think someone's idea is nice, you won't just be like that's shit. You're feeling, you know, really great, like well done, you
like maybe we could do it this day. And we were just brutal to each other because you take liberties because you're a couple as well, so you're like, I don't have to talk nicely to you, like pad this out. And yeah, that's where we'd have like crazy disagreements because we'd just be so like hated and like, how do you speak to me like that I'm your career girlfriend or whatever. Yeah, So I think it was the casualness
that was the problem, not the other way around. So we did kind of feel like we needed to implement some structure and routine and systems and ways of speaking to each other. And we also hadn't divided departments. I don't know if you guys have had this, but when you're both the boss of every department, no one can make a decision and there's no final call, and it means there's a potential for argument in every single area.
But once we realized what we were good at what we weren't good at, and sat down and were like, this is my department, this is yours, and we can obviously chat about everything, but one of us will have the final say in each thing. We don't argue anymore because it's like no area where that can happen. So I think it's just a process of like experimenting with what works between your personal relationship and your business partnership.
But it definitely takes some proper effort, Like I don't think many people just fall into an amazing setup that way. You usually have to sit down and kind of chat about things and talk about your expectations, and communication is just the key, as long as everyone knows that you're trying your best and that you know we're acknowledging the things that don't work and the things that do. I think as long as you're talking to each other, I think.
That's amazing advice. I'd love to hear your advice.
For young business boys and girls. It might be listening if someone came to you and said they had this amazing product, but they've never run a business before and they don't know what to do. What would be your initial advice to them?
Oh, so many things, but I guess I think the biggest obstacle at the start of a new business or a new idea isn't actually doing the things. It's just your brain. It's convincing yourself that you're good enough to do it, or that the idea is good enough to do it. And I think it's so sad, Like one of my favorite quotes is, doubt kills the more dreams
than failure ever will. It's so sad to think of how many dreams never made it, not because the actual thing was too hard to do, because the person's doubt talk them out of it before they got started. So I think my main piece of advice would be just to start. Start before you're already done is better than perfect.
We wait so long to perfect things. And I particularly, I'm such an an anally retentive like OCD person that Nick really had to convince me like if we don't get it out, it's never going to get out there, and like you're just going to agonize over and over and over until you think it's perfect and then we'll be too late, or you'll just never get to the time when you think it's good enough. So I think I think my biggest advice would be to just get started.
You are so capable of learning. It doesn't matter if you don't have qualifications or a degree. Nobody actually does because no one's really done businesses in this climate before. It's such a different climate to what it was two years ago or three years ago, so everyone's kind of almost on an even playing field. And what you don't know,
you can learn very quickly. If anything, not being bogged down by the proper way to do things might actually save you some time or give you different perspectives on how things can be done. So, yeah, just just get started and talk to people who will make you believe that you can and will help you believe that it's possible. Don't go to the skeptics or the people who are
going to point out the problems. You definitely need them later on, but you can't let them talk you out of it before you've even begun.
That's such wonderful advice, and I love it making notes.
Yeah, I want to start, and I want to start a new business now. So inspire.
And what do you have planned for twenty twenty. I see that you've been on the road for your podcast taking that to audiences. Is that something we'll see more of next year?
Yes, definitely, we did our first live event, I always say we even it was just me. I don't know. I think it just kind of like makes you feel less silly, but it's just you. Anyway I am doing. I want to do a lot more live events because I found that just to be so feeling and exciting to meet the community. And you don't actually see your
listeners when you're recording podcasts. You don't actually get any response until much later, so you kind of forget that anyone's actually listening, which means when you get to meet people in person, it's so so fulfilling and lovely. So
lots more of those. In the process of writing my first book, which is the CZA Book, and that is coming out in September August or September, so I think a big part of next year will be just like the edit of that and getting it ready to kind of come out, and planning some exciting things to come out around the same time, like maybe some events or some fun merch maybe another flip book like whatever it is.
There's so much going on with the CZA brand and just continuing to build really cool guests into the program, and I think there's a lot of things I had on my list to add too, Like I really like to keep the breast ritten, the breasts, not the breast, maybe the breast. I really like to keep the guests really broad. And there's a couple of jobs or you know, titles or areas that I didn't get to tick off last year just because of availability and stuff like that.
Like I had a paramedic lined up and they just got too busy at work, and obviously you can't kind of pause paramedic work. That's pretty important. Yeah, you know, there's a lot of things like that that I just really wanted to do. I've got a war zone doctor lined up, which is going to be amazing. Wow. Yeah, just keeping adding new jobs and new areas of learning that people might not have heard about. So yeah, spending
a bit of time on that. I'm working on a few other podcasts which is really exciting with other partners, so that'll come out next year. And then we've still got the match of businesses, so a lot in the pipeline for both of them, and maybe babies. I think we might even start thinking about babies.
Yeah, where do you find the time for all of the gosh.
Yeah, I just was thinking when I said that I was like, oh, I don't really know where I'm going to do that, but we'll figure it out.
Lastly, we have to find out how, you know, Christmas is only a few days away, how will you be spending Christmas this year?
We're very simple for Chrissy. We just spend it with our family. We kind of alternate between Nick's family and Tazzy and my family here. And this year is a Melbourne year, so my mom's side of the family has a big Christmas lunch and we all just yeah, get really bloated in food, comat on turkey and potatoes. We
do that. We have like a Christmas lunch altogether, and then next year we'll go to Tazzi And our nephew is just at the age where this year he kind of doesn't quite understand Santa, but next year will be a really exciting like leaving out all the things and putting out, you know, his little Santa sack, so that next year will be kind of back to the super supermagical children's perspective of Christmas. But this year is just
really chill. We've had such a big year and we're just really excited to take a few days off we're heading to the country after that for a week. Yeah. We kept my grandmother's house after she passed away, which is two hours into regional Victoria. And it's like, literally looks exactly the same as when my mum grew up in it. It's hysterical, like nothing matches. It's all just like flower patterns of vomited on each other. And it's great,
like we do. There's hardly anything there. There's like five shops. We just yeah, really relaxed and I'll finish some riding up there and lots of sleepings and.
That Oh sounds amazing. Well, thank you so much for joining us on the show. We hope you have a very merry Christmas.
Oh you too. Thank you so much for having me.
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