#331 Christian Dior

**David Senra** (0:00)
Back in 2019, one of the co-founders of my favorite app, the best app I pay for, I literally could not make the podcast without it, is called Readwise. I've been talking about it for years, I've been tweeting about it for years, every single other interview on other people's podcasts I go on, I talk about this, and I did this way before I knew I was gonna partner with them on my own product. So I built this product with Readwise. It's called Founders Notes. You can see it at foundersnotes.com, and it's founders with an S, just like the podcast. So foundersnotes.com.
I got a DM from Tristan in 2019, and he was the one that made me aware of Readwise. It was perfect. And the reason it was perfect is because I have way more highlights and notes on my books than most people do. So I have over 20,000. Over the years, I've added over 20,000 highlights and notes for all the books that I read for the podcast to the Readwise app. And the reason I do that is because I'm able to search everything that I've ever done. I use this every day. I search it every day. It really is the world's most valuable notebook for founders.
So I contacted the founders Readwise and said, hey, can we do this? Can we actually do this project together? I wanna make my own version. I want people to have access to everything that I see. Literally, if you sign up at foundersnotes.com, you are able to search and see every single one of my highlights and notes. It's exactly what I see. And so as an illustration of just one of the ways that I use this is at the end of this episode, I'm going to include this 20-minute episode I made where somebody asked me, how did history's greatest entrepreneurs think about hiring? And anytime I'm asked a question like that, anytime I'm making a podcast, what I do is I'm constantly searching my Readwise app, which is now available at foundersnotes.com, and it gives me a complete list of all the different ways that history's greatest founders have thought about whatever subject I happen to be thinking about or working on or investigating. So at the very end of this episode, you're going to hear me speak for 20 minutes, and it's answering the question, how did history's greatest entrepreneurs think about hiring? And all that information came from me searching my notes and highlights, which is exactly what you can do with Founders Notes. Keep in mind, this is made for founders already running successful companies. Those already running successful companies will get the most value out of this, because it's a way for you to reference the thoughts and ideas of history's greatest founders, and then you know how to apply them to whatever's going on in your company at this very moment, the other thing I want to tell you, it is currently priced at 50% what it will be, so it's actually going to double in price. And the reason I did this is because I'm adding a bunch of features that I think are incredible, and I have to build out the landing page and everything else. You sign up now, obviously, as I add features, you don't have to pay any additional. I truly do believe it is the world's most valuable notebook for founders, and the value you get out of it will be incredible. You can get immediate access to over 20,000 of my highlights and notes right now by going to foundersnotes.com.
A sensation was caused by an unknown designer named Christian Dior. He was producing long, full dresses using prodigious quantities of precious materials and thumbing his nose at wartime austerity. His new collection electrified rich, fashion-conscious ladies in all nations. But who was Christian Dior and where did he come from? His father was a successful businessman who ran a fertilizer factory specializing in liquid manure. The foundation of the Dior empire was shit in the literal sense. 50 years from now, Dior would be the beginning of Bernardo Nol's LVMH empire, which I talked about on episode 296, if you haven't listened to that episode already. It's one of my favorite episodes I've ever made. The profits of liquid manure allowed the Dior family to maintain a house in Paris. And a young Christian Dior took full advantage of it. He would love to draw, love dressing up with the help of his adoring mother, and he enjoyed designing dresses for his sisters.
He's a kid when he's doing this. This is another example of something you and I talk about all the time, that true interest is revealed early. But he did not start out working in the fashion business. One of his first jobs, he actually became a partner in an art business. His father putting up the money on behalf of the son. This is the prehistory of Dior's fashion business. Then troubles came. His brother was locked up in an insane asylum. His mother died. And then in 1931, during the Great Depression, his father went bankrupt.