Transcript
Joe Barhoum
Jessica, thanks for being on the show.
Jessica Lubahn
Thanks for having me.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, you bet you bet so you're in the Portland area just like me. But of course we can't get together right now. A little too difficult to coordinate.
Jessica Lubahn
Yeah yeah, no pandemic.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah well rapid kovid test just lying around the drawers quick. It sounds uncomfortable. Have you done akova test?
Jessica Lubahn
I have not done a code test, I just, well, you know. Yeah yeah, I have not done a kovit test. I just actual.
Jessica Lubahn
They bought a few of those Costco ones just to sit around just in case they now sell 'em at Costco. Yeah, I mean, you could always go to urgent care and things, but I always feel like that that extra step to actually go and get it done is such a barrier for me. So I have a couple of just waiting.
Jessica Lubahn
In in case I, I worry about it, you know, as a physician, I'm always worried that I could be exposing people, so then I have my own set just in case, yeah.
Jessica Lubahn
I don't know, just for Peace of Mind I.
Joe Barhoum
Guess yeah for sure for sure, so let's let's talk about your practice. So you're a urologist, that's correct.
Jessica Lubahn
That's correct, OK, so.
Jessica Lubahn
Yeah, I'm in private practice. I do general urology, I see men and women. I don't see any kids so, you know, urology involves anything that.
Jessica Lubahn
Basically, pee passes through, so your kidneys, your ureters, those tubes, your bladder, genitalia.
Joe Barhoum
So interested you in urology?
Jessica Lubahn
Oh yeah, that's a complicated question. You know. I guess nobody ever goes into medical school. You know aspiring to be a urologist like no kid ever grows up wanting to be a a urologist, but I think as you go through training and medical school, the things that draw you to feel are basically the people that.
Jessica Lubahn
Are around you and at that influential time.
Jessica Lubahn
And so when I was in Med student, I was really drawn to the urologist. I thought they had a really quirky sense of humor. I mean dealing with what we have to deal with. It definitely attracts the type I I loved how there you know the field is so vast you know you do kids. You do adults. You do these big cancer operations. You do fine reconstructions.
Jessica Lubahn
And in the end, people get better, so there are a lot of fields where there's a lot of interesting procedures, but.
Jessica Lubahn
You do these hero procedures on someone very very sick and very ill that they don't have a lot of time to even realize the benefits of it. Neurology is different in that people tend to be you are tending to help people in a really functional point in their life, and so you really I. I find that a little bit more rewarding.
Jessica Lubahn
And then there's a lot of technology in in it. You know, for robotic surgery that are the first specialty that really adopted.
Jessica Lubahn
You know laparoscopic robotic surgery and the scopic surgery. All these technologies urology is one of the first fields that really found a use for all of it. And so when I was in training and the robot was knew is one of the fields that best utilized it. So it was the.
Jessica Lubahn
Place you can get at the most.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, but that those are great.
Joe Barhoum
Reasons to find that passion, you know within this in the broad discipline a medison my my cousin is like my best friend.
Joe Barhoum
He's an internal medicine doctors. Yeah, general practice and everyone that knows him is always asking questions like.
Joe Barhoum
What is this?
Joe Barhoum
Does that mean he always just like rest ice and ibuprofen millimeter? But I gotta imagine.
Joe Barhoum
Do do you when you when you meet somebody?
Joe Barhoum
For the first time they asked you, did you say your urologist never go? Oh my God. Thank God I bumped into you 'cause I had a copy of it. Does that happen?
Jessica Lubahn
Now most people say oh, you're a neurologist. Oh, you must be so smart. And then I have to correct them and say no. I'm a urologist and then they usually say oh.
Jessica Lubahn
Well, that's interesting.
Jessica Lubahn
I mean, even my parents, even my mom, when I went into urology I told her I was going into urology, she said.
Jessica Lubahn
What am I going to tell people you do? And I was like, I mean, why don't you tell people I'm a doctor? You know you don't have to go into the nitty gritty. But yeah, she was just horrified that.
Jessica Lubahn
Of what this the area I might be dealing in? Yeah yeah. So I have a very come from a very conservative.
Jessica Lubahn
You know immigrant background and so it was pretty horrifying for her. She really wanted me to become a plastic surgeon.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, and so that was quite not quite what she was expecting.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, plastic surgery sounds. I mean I wouldn't wanna do that.
Jessica Lubahn
You know, you know.
Jessica Lubahn
You know, actually for a long time I did want to go.
Jessica Lubahn
Into plastic surgery and that was because when I went to medical school, the chairman of the Plastics Department was this woman, Susan Mckennan. She was a Mama for she was a chairman of the Department and she was really strong. You know, strong female figure, and so I really, really admire her and really really looked up to her.
Jessica Lubahn
And she gave this talk to us at as Med students where she did these nerves. So she was she. She didn't do cosmetics. She did peripheral nerves.
Jessica Lubahn
And so she did these amazing surgeries where people who had you know.
Jessica Lubahn
Severe injuries, nerve injuries. She would do these nerve transfers and so these she would re enter VE arms and it was just it was as close to like magic as you could get as a medical student and you know. So for a long time I thought wow that's.
Jessica Lubahn
That's who I want to be, and so I actually went through. I think that's why I got my mom excited about it. I went through a lot of my Med school thing.
Jessica Lubahn
Game that I was gonna go into plastic surgery and so my mom would tell me like I make me look make me look like I'm surprised always.
Jessica Lubahn
And then yeah, and then I I wouldn't tell her, but she's she is a part of the reason why, you know. I ended up not going into it 'cause I was like, I do not want patients like you. Who do they tell me all the time that they want to look surprised and more surprised?
Jessica Lubahn
So.
Jessica Lubahn
Yeah, so it's funny how? Yeah it's funny how life takes you on different courses.
Joe Barhoum
For sure, I want to talk to you about some of those other courses, but before we go too far from the family component so you were born in America.
Jessica Lubahn
Yes, OK, so I was born in LA.
Joe Barhoum
But both of my parents are from outside the country, right? And I'm one of four kids.
Joe Barhoum
But my my parents were.
Joe Barhoum
They really wanted to make sure that we had good education. You know, especially outside of high school and that we were able to land good jobs and stuff like that. But they're entrepreneurs, which I think is so fascinating. So my dad ran a nursery for 50 years, inherited from his uncle and then my mom worked with him. But you know they didn't want any of us kids.
Joe Barhoum
Starting our own businesses right is like just yeah go get a job, go get benefits. Go build a family and take care of that. And of course that big aspirations to become a lawyer to become a doctor, I end up a computer scientist in the salesperson for 15 years so you know, hey, not exactly glamour. But The funny thing is that we all have now.
Joe Barhoum
Ended up as entrepreneurs. Oh wow. Brother is an attorney, but he runs his own practice. My sister didn't finish college but she runs a very successful farmers market in multiple cities in the area.
Joe Barhoum
And then you know, and it's it. For other things you know in the family too. So it's very interesting how there's like this neural spirit. I think that comes from not just you. I'm not just using human eyes, data points or pulling in, but you know, there seems to be like a a passion for entrepreneurship with immigrants. Has that been your experience?
Jessica Lubahn
Yeah, definitely, I think.
Jessica Lubahn
I don't know if it's just as immigrants are a little bit more uncomfortable, a little bit more.
Jessica Lubahn
You know, you know, I feel like whenever you get complacent, that's when.
Jessica Lubahn
Things stop happening. I feel like when you still have aspirations and you know you don't come from, you know if you don't have a big trust fund and you have to be a little more resilient on your own, then I feel like that's the grittiness that is hard to pass on. I think as a first generation.
Jessica Lubahn
1st Generation in the USI think you really watch and you see how your parents struggle, and I think that has a huge impact on.
Jessica Lubahn
How you perceive things as you as you go through, you know as you get older you know. I remember growing up and I remember you know you don't ask for a drink at dinner, right? 'cause you're you're so you'd be. You'd feel so bad if your parents couldn't give it to you, you know. So you were really careful. You're like you, you're.
Jessica Lubahn
You're really mindful of what they're going through, 'cause you, I think you watch them struggle.
Jessica Lubahn
So you know, I, I think it's really real for for especially that first generation. I'm hoping that it translates further down, but I think it's it's a really hard quality to pass on. You know, 'cause for me, I could watch my parents. They had a language barrier.
Jessica Lubahn
So as I grew up, I was also really embarrassed of them because they spoke with an accent.
Jessica Lubahn
You know the food I brought was different. You know. You open up your lunch at school and it's and everyone's like. Ah, what is that? You know, it's it's really embarrassing I'm so I mean, I'm so glad that they had they had get it when I grew up growing up. I was so happy that I had a generic.
Jessica Lubahn
Name you know?
Jessica Lubahn
Jessica, there was always five other people in my class with that name, and so at least I didn't have to stand out in that area as well. And so I always really appreciated that of them. But you know, as you get older, you be. I think it you come full circle and you appreciate.
Jessica Lubahn
What you've come from and what that culture means and it does shed a different light on you know the American culture and and so I think it. I think now I'm so grateful for it, but I think it was really. I was really **** ** my parents growing up as a result of that. 'cause I.
Jessica Lubahn
Rejected it, try to try not to embrace it at all. An now as I'm older, I'm trying to.
Jessica Lubahn
Find it again and I'm trying to get them to tell me stories and you know and just speak to my kids in Chinese and.
Jessica Lubahn
And I realized that I don't. I don't know. At one point they stop speaking to me in Chinese when I listen to them. It's like wow, you really speak to me, mostly in English.
Jessica Lubahn
And so I don't know when they became so Americanized.
Joe Barhoum
Right, I can completely relate so my parents, my parents are from Syria and.
Joe Barhoum
It was really hard during the 9/11 period, right? Yeah, my parents were the first one out in American flags. Yeah, cars and everything. I was 16. Oh gosh. A 17 when it happened.
Joe Barhoum
Ish, a teenager young lady. I just turned 18 so this anyway if their Russian hacking everybody American flags and stuff like that on the cars because our last name I think is pretty obviously error, yeah.
Joe Barhoum
But first, all of our first names are are innocuous, right? Joe? Yeah? And then all of my siblings very similar, just innocuous names in America. But growing up you know they they didn't really speak to us in Arabic at all, and they're both fluent. Of course we all. They just never engaged that way because even you know, before 911 everything they didn't want us to be different.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, right, so they would made it went out of their way to make sure we weren't different. And now here I am with three kids in my own and I wish they spoke here, yes.
Joe Barhoum
I really wish they did. You know I want them to. There's not that there's anything wrong with the American culture, but of course, yeah, so much of what makes America amazing is that you have all these people from outside that bring their cultures with them, right? And there's some assimilation that happens, but it's not completely forgotten and you ask about your parents telling you stories. I've been interviewing my dad. I'm doing a podcast with him.
Joe Barhoum
We haven't heard any of it. Yeah, I'm just collecting all the video.
Joe Barhoum
You're asking questions like OK, don't tell me about when you were 16 and came to America and you heard flash for the first time. That's super cool, but tell me about when you were six, right? Yeah, about that like what was it like a village you know? Like that some? Yeah he lived in this village that was named after a spring that some traveler found as he's going from 1 village to another and he's like.
Joe Barhoum
Well, here's this.
Joe Barhoum
My spring we're going to build a town here like, I'm yeah.
Joe Barhoum
And then you know then, on top of that, like the the Church that was there was built underground. That's Christian Church.
Joe Barhoum
And I mean it's just all these cool little stories that I never heard as a kid.
Joe Barhoum
You know, yeah, never got to.
Jessica Lubahn
Hear that that's amazing. That's such a good idea.
Joe Barhoum
Thank you, yeah, I think so too. I think it'll be really cool once we release it. You know it's all on video and everything. Yeah, you know Dad's got all these great stories and then you know you hear about him coming to America and what that was like 2 and just.
Jessica Lubahn
With your kids are gonna love that too? I think so. I mean I had. I tried to get.
Jessica Lubahn
Each of my parents to write, write, write out their story. Of course, none of 'em have done it except my uncle. You know my uncle who was born in Portland. He's the only one of my direct family that are that is American, but he was his.
Jessica Lubahn
Parents had his.
Jessica Lubahn
His mom was born in the US but got sent back to Japan and then his dad came when he by himself on a boat. When he was 13. You know it's just believable, unbelievable and was totally illiterate his whole life and then had you know my uncle an then then they got interned and during World War Two I mean they had these incredible stories.
Jessica Lubahn
Even my parents, you know they when they were little, they had to escape communist China.
Jessica Lubahn
I went to Taiwan and then and then came to the US, and so they all they have all these incredible stories that they kind of minimize now and I just want them to write down. And it's so embarrassing now when I think about it. You know, when I was little, I remember 'cause my parents spoke Chinese to me when I was little, and when I went to school.
Jessica Lubahn
I remember my mom specifically telling me that if I spoke Chinese at school, she was going to cut my hair short. You know 'cause? She told me that she didn't.
Jessica Lubahn
It would be bad if I were American an I grew up speaking with an accent and so she didn't want me to. I mean now she'll deny it. She has no recollection, or, you know at all, but you know. But I agree with you that they they wanted us to be Americans and their and have no question about it, not to be.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, 'cause that's what she used to always say to me is you know when she when she got here they were in rural Illinois.
Jessica Lubahn
She went for a job interview. She didn't at a candy factory. She didn't realize she went to the wrong building, but they hired her anyway. She got a job there and so she's she did pretty well. Just, you know, with hard work, and so she was. She would always say like imagine what I would have become if I spoke English. You know, like you have no excuse.
Jessica Lubahn
Right, like like you're so lucky you speak English. You imagine if like I did it when I didn't even have no idea what people were saying.
Jessica Lubahn
Me and so that gives you a little bit. I think that gives you a little bit of of embarrassment. If you don't, you know you don't succeed or or you don't want to disappoint them. 'cause they did. You know they succeeded with so much less.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, yeah, so let's look at the twists and turns, right? Yeah, earlier.
Joe Barhoum
So you're doing some twisting and turning of your own, so you have this new business. It's called underwear millimeter, right? Tell me about it.
Jessica Lubahn
So under our leakproof underwear, and so as a urologist I see men and women who have urinary incontinence incontinence. So they have bladder accidents. They have a weak bladder, and I see how it really impacts their lives. And so people become socially isolated.
Jessica Lubahn
They're really embarrassed by this, and as a doctor, a treat it so you know I prescribe medications. I do surgery.
Jessica Lubahn
And do nerve stimulation, Botox, they have all these this huge regiment of things we do to prevent people from having these embarrassed episodes. But what really affected me was one of my family members had prostate cancer surgery and he was talking to me about it about how how embarrassing it was.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, especially in it, right? Right after the surgery, the recovery period, and.
Jessica Lubahn
So from a physician standpoint, I always thought he had a great result. You know he didn't wear pads, he was cancer free. I mean everything was working well and so you would think that that was.
Jessica Lubahn
Pretty darn great, but he talked to me about how this is the only thing in his life that has ever made him really depressed. Made him feel old and and then, you know, I I tried list. You know, when you listen to the pain that this causes.
Jessica Lubahn
Everyone, the interesting part is the amount of bother isn't isn't related to how severe the leakage is. You know some people.
Jessica Lubahn
Um fill up diapers all day long and they don't care. And then there are other people who have very very little leakage and they want you to do surgery. They want you to do anything to make it stop.
Jessica Lubahn
And so it just I was thinking about this a lot when I was pregnant with my first and it was like what? What is this? What is the pain of this and and you know, for the people, especially the people with the really minor issues, you know compared to what I see on a daily basis, it's not cancer. It's not going to just. It's all quality of life issues. But it's having such a severe impact on their day today.
Jessica Lubahn
Um?
Jessica Lubahn
It just really like I didn't feel like I could justify putting through them through like the risk of all these treatment options and so you know, in talking to patients it was, you know, it was the unpredictability of it. You know they.
Jessica Lubahn
They're afraid of the smell. They didn't want to feel old when they were changing the gym. They don't want people to look to make it look like they're wearing a diaper. They're too young, or you know to you then feel they didn't feel old yet they weren't ready for it and so.
Jessica Lubahn
At the time I was with my first, I was trying to be equal friendly. Trying to, you know, decrease our carbon footprint and I had looked into like a million different cloth diapering options. And so it just occurred to me like, well, the technology is there. Certainly there's absorbent material. Why isn't?
Jessica Lubahn
Why isn't something good enough and look? Why doesn't it look good enough?
Jessica Lubahn
And that would solve the problem for so many people 'cause it would take away the pain point of it, you know and you and you wouldn't have to have all the potential side effects of going through treatment for it.
Jessica Lubahn
And so yeah, so I went down, started going down that route just because it just seemed like this was such a need.
Jessica Lubahn
And it seemed like.
Jessica Lubahn
The part that was hard. Was there such a stigma against it?
Jessica Lubahn
Um, specially you know, especially women, just have a baby and you would think that they should be celebrated there. They just brought life into the world and yet you know, they're just so embarrassed that they now pee themselves. It's it just seems like just seems so wrong that you can't. You feel like you can't celebrate yourself.
Jessica Lubahn
Um and so for me is is part.
Jessica Lubahn
Getting the product part the starting the conversation that you know. As a urologist, my friends talked to me about it all the time and so just kirtomy like if everyone just knew how common this was.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, it wouldn't be so.
Jessica Lubahn
Painful, you know. It would be sort of another thing and so I feel like there, you know we've come a long ways in terms of breastfeeding in terms of periods. But if we could do the same sort of thing for incontinence, it would help so many people.
Joe Barhoum
So tell me about the product. It's a great mission, by the way, tell me about the product itself. Do you have one in front of you by the way?
Jessica Lubahn
I I have, I do have one. It's not a I mean.
Jessica Lubahn
I have a very large size in front of me, so I mean it has just kind of a I I wanted it to be to look like underwear that I would wear. Yeah and so it I wanted it to be kind of a seamless so you know you can wear it under under things without showing.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, you know, showing lines I wanted to be really comfortable, so the material is super soft. And then I wanted to make it feel like.
Jessica Lubahn
But you weren't wearing a pad and so wanted to make the pad as thin as possible an absorbent as possible. So that's the pad part of.
It.
Jessica Lubahn
Um and so that holds roughly 45 mils, so 9 teaspoons. 9 teaspoons. OK, yeah so.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, so yeah, I just wanted underwear that looked like I wanted nice enough underwear that that'd be.
Jessica Lubahn
Sort of an underwear that you would buy anyway, but but then, incidentally, it holds all the stuff that may be coming up.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, yeah, so the pad itself is not replaceable.
Jessica Lubahn
So each yeah, so you should wash it.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, just washing that's.
Jessica Lubahn
Very question dry.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, so are these available yet?
Joe Barhoum
For.
Jessica Lubahn
People who, yeah, they're available on the website www.underwear.com.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, and so it's ONDR.
Jessica Lubahn
Where where yeahyeah.com?
Joe Barhoum
And so this was the story behind the name.
Jessica Lubahn
So I KOA so this is where I'm. You know I have. I don't have a lot of creativity in naming and writing and things. It was several iterations of this. Ultimately it comes I wanted something that was basics that.
Jessica Lubahn
Like a noted, you know your your fundamentals, like the underlying so under it is kind of like underwear.
Jessica Lubahn
But I'm kind of, uh, cognizant of it, but maybe elevated so on an then Dr. So kind of not too is designed by doctor underwear.
Joe Barhoum
So your mom wasn't too thrilled about you being urologist was right.
Jessica Lubahn
What was her opinion on this?
Joe Barhoum
About you making hundreds.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, you know she's.
Jessica Lubahn
I mean she likes them so she wears them all right?
Jessica Lubahn
She gives me a lot of feedback, so she's worn every iteration of it and so she does give me a lot of feedback on what she thinks is good and not good, and she's very critical so is very helpful.
Jessica Lubahn
She's she's, I guess. She's kind of neutral to it. She likes it in as much that I'm doing something interesting.
Jessica Lubahn
And in as much as it makes me happy.
Jessica Lubahn
She doesn't think you know she doesn't think I should ever quit my day job to sell underwear, but I think that she's proud of it. You know, she's she, bought it several and sent him to all her friends and her friends have been buying him, so I think she's proud of it. But also it's.
Jessica Lubahn
Yeah, it's not necessarily something that she would have ever imagined there.
Joe Barhoum
That's super cool, though I'm glad that moms participating, yeah?
Jessica Lubahn
Uh, huh, it's very.
Joe Barhoum
Cool, so as far as you mentioned earlier, you know people who who deal with this sounds like it can affect people of all ages. Yeah, whether you had a baby or not right exactly and then that particular pad that you show that underwear uh-huh holds. I was a 47 Mills.
Jessica Lubahn
45
Joe Barhoum
45 mils
Joe Barhoum
So do you have So what went into that capacity?
Joe Barhoum
Being that you chose.
Jessica Lubahn
Mostly on so I could always make it hold more, but I felt like that was a substantial amount for a while. Still feeling really thin.
Jessica Lubahn
And so I felt like that was sort of the thickness that.
Jessica Lubahn
You didn't notice it very much.
Jessica Lubahn
But you know, eventually I think it would be nice to have you know, a lighter version, a heavier version as well, but it was sort of like a nice I think it holds most people who would want to wear this kind of.
Jessica Lubahn
Um?
Jessica Lubahn
Kind of underwear's. I think it's a good starting point. You know, the more layers you have, the more expensive from a manufacturing standpoint as well. So just it just felt like it was a good good place to start it was, it was.
Jessica Lubahn
Um?
Jessica Lubahn
Kind of capacity where I thought it was better than anything currently available on the market.
Jessica Lubahn
Um and yeah, so I thought it was then at least there were some differentiators.
Joe Barhoum
Yeah, that makes sense. And what about?
Joe Barhoum
Four different activities you have, like a workout, one in a day, one.
Jessica Lubahn
Well, not necessarily. I do have different styles, so depending on the clothing type you know everyone.
Jessica Lubahn
May have different preferences.
Jessica Lubahn
Um so for for some of the tighter workout clothes I have a song version, but it sort of depends on you know the more full body, the more it'll hold so. But you know with I had it for EQ. With exercise in mind when I was designing it.
Joe Barhoum
OK, perfect, So what do you know that you're it's a do business for you, right? So you're kind of yes, but what are some of the things that you're doing to get the word out and position the underwear for those who need it?
Jessica Lubahn
So I'm trying to do well a lot of social trying to build a social media presence and so I'm really behind on that. It was it. I know I should have started earlier, but it was hard for me to really promote something before I had it in my hands. You know, to to build an audience for it.
Jessica Lubahn
Um and I wanted to make sure it was achievable and had a good stable manufacturing partner as well, but once I had that nailed down, it was the production part was actually went faster than I thought it was going to go, so I didn't have a lot of time with that social media ads. So I have somebody helping me run social me.
Jessica Lubahn
Yeah, advertising trying to do some a lot of blog writing, guest blog writing podcasts, things like that.
Joe Barhoum
Very good, very good. So you launch the product in July, is that right now? Uh, So what are your goals like? What do you expect to be at the end of the year? We expect to be this time next year.
Jessica Lubahn
Well, so the goal is to diversify my line. Right now I have four styles.
Jessica Lubahn
For women in black and so that was just my first production run and I had pretty high minimums that I had in me.
Jessica Lubahn
And so I couldn't get too many colors. But now I'm starting to get more proof of concept of it. I would like for for my female side, want to diversify the color offerings and style offerings as well. I I have prototypes for a Mens line and so I do want to launch that.
Jessica Lubahn
Later on this year I have a few designs for sort of that tweeny age. I think that's a compl.
Jessica Lubahn
Also, an underserved population where it's the age between where you know the diapers or note. There are two older too big for diapers or the you know the underwear available for them. They don't want to wear for a baby, but they're too small for adults. That kind of.
Jessica Lubahn
Age so.
Jessica Lubahn
But I guess just slowly. I'm just myself. I have sort of designs out for those, but I'm also looking at different trying to try to. I have one factory that I'm working with right now and I'm trying to find maybe.
Jessica Lubahn
Additional partners just to keep it keep my supply chain stable just to bar against.
Jessica Lubahn
Unknowns.
Jessica Lubahn
Yeah, so just exploring those options.
Joe Barhoum
But So what have you learned is that new first time entrepreneur?
Jessica Lubahn
Oh my gosh, I can't even begin to everything. I mean Google. Google is amazing.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, you know the the I? I feel like the most amazing part of the entrepreneur world is that everyone has been so supportive and so one of the biggest things I've learned is to ask a lot of questions and ask for help.
Jessica Lubahn
And just, you know, one of I think one of the barriers to starting this. It took me, you know, two or three years to even get this going. And I think part of it was I was so afraid at some point that someone was going to take my intellectual idea and then somebody, somebody, one of my really good friends said, you know, you haven't started this.
Jessica Lubahn
And why is that you and I was like, well, 'cause I don't know what to do and she's like exactly because it's hard to start something even a lot of people have ideas, but the inertia to actually do something is such a huge barrier. There's a reason why you haven't done anything yet either, and so so actually I just started talking about it with everyone.
Jessica Lubahn
And then.
Jessica Lubahn
You know you know this person knows this person who knows this person and that was it. That enabled me to connect with.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, you know the designing process, the manufacturers and that has been completely instrumental in actually making this happen, but yeah, and the whole so so these are well.
Jessica Lubahn
One thing I learned is manufacturing in the US is very, very limited. I try to initially have this made in the USI tried three or four different factories.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, and you know the the American factories just didn't have the technology to do this actually, so every time I brought them my.
Jessica Lubahn
My techpack they would just say we just can't do that here. You can't do this in the US, so it's interesting. So yeah, so the manufacture.
Jessica Lubahn
I mean, it's just not really available in the US, So I went abroad, so that's been really interesting. Figuring out how to freight something and deal with customs and tariffs and.
Jessica Lubahn
Um, you know?
Jessica Lubahn
So there are so many little things that you just don't think about from, you know what you need to have on your label to what you put on your barcodes. So yeah, it it often feels like 2 steps for you know, one step forward, 2 steps back, one Step 4.
Jessica Lubahn
Or two steps back. You know you just right when you think you have everything ready, they'll just someone will say so. Send me your barcodes and you're like OK. Just you know, be right back Google. How do I give barcodes?
Jessica Lubahn
It's like oh please don't have to file for another. You know governmental like permit. That's going to take another three months to.
Jessica Lubahn
Before I could get that.
Jessica Lubahn
Which has been a lot of the process is like oh I need what?
Jessica Lubahn
License for this, you know?
Joe Barhoum
So it's fun to hear your journey, and I hope that we can actually do this. Maybe in six months or so, and.
Jessica Lubahn
Just yes, so where we are, yeah.
Joe Barhoum
So let's do it one more time. So how do?
Joe Barhoum
We get out to you.
Jessica Lubahn
So mostly by the website www.ondrwherewar.com.
Jessica Lubahn
I'm also on Instagram at and Facebook at underwear.com or at underwear they handle.
Joe Barhoum
So very good, well Jessica.
Joe Barhoum
Thank you for being on the show. I hope you had a good time and we'll do this again soon.
Jessica Lubahn
Yeah, thanks, thanks for having me my pleasure.