the alpha magazine, spring 2011

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Spring 2011 | The AlphA MAgAzine | DelTA SigMA pi

Dear Sternies:

The hallmarks of a solid educational program are a meaningful in-class and out-of-class experience. While the faculty have a comparative ad-vantage in providing the former, students and professional staff have a comparative advantage in the latter. The Alpha Magazine is a wonderful manifestation of the leadership role that Delta Sigma Pi is playing at the Stern school to complement your in-class experience. It enables Stern-ies to explore the issues of the day, to collaborate with each other in disseminating student views on these and related issues and to engage with one another through the written word.

I want to thank the editor, staff and all who are involved in providing con-tent to the Alpha Magazine for their passion, commitment and ideas. I look forward to reading the contents of this volume when it is published and wish you well in your path to excellence. All the best,

Dean Choi

A foreword from the Dean

A note from the EditorFirst off, I would like to thank all the readers who made our first issue of The Alpha Magazine such a success last year. To our new readers, welcome. In our second issue, the featured articles take readers behind the glitz and glamour of the luxury industry, presenting students with career insights, inspiration, and advice from top executives in the business. As the economy climbs out of the recession, The Alpha Magazine encourages you to take a look at several ex-citing career options that are not usually considered among the typical Sternie. From an inside look at what it’s like to work at Trump New York, to a summer bonanza marketing Yves Saint Laurent fragrance in L’Oréal, there is something for everyone with a taste for luxury.

We still have everything you loved from the first issue, including articles with Red Mango founder, Dan Kim, finance maven Alexandra Lebenthal, and Chris Gallea, one of JP Morgan’s NYU recruiting captains. These stories are meant to offer the inspiration and insight to undergraduate business students who hope to represent the business leaders of tomorrow.

Lastly, I would like to thank my wonderful staff for dedicating countless hours into making this magazine a reality. Without them, the copy of this magazine that you are now holding in your hands would not exist. Please flip through the magazine at your leisure and enjoy all that we have to offer. Sincerely,

Derek Yueh

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Delta Sigma Pi | the alPha magazine | SPring 2011

the alpha magazineiSSue no. 2 | SPring 2011

new York univerSitY, Delta Sigma Pi

college years

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A Glimpse of New York LuxuryInterview with Joanna Lin, a Sales & Marketing Coordinator at Trump Tower.

Living in LuxuryInside look of the Palmer House Hilton through hotel manager, Todd Temperly.

22 The Eye of the BeholderMarc Stillman discusses his summer intern-ship experience in L’Oreal’s luxury division.

23 The Business Behind the ArtsJessica Duffet of Mitchell-Innes & Nash on the ins and outs of running an art gallery.

26 The Sweet SpotFrom Wall Street to St. Marks, Rex Rhee tells all about his journey to opening his own restaurant, Spot.

8Dean Spotlight: Frederick ChoiThe Dean Emeritus and Chair of Account-ing shares his insights on leadership, his ac-complishments, and his advice to Sternies.

9Club Spotlight: STEBA How this innovative club is bridging the gap between Tisch creatives and Stern business students.

11Through the Interviewer’s Lens Ever wonder what your interviewer is think-ing? Chris Gallea, one of J.P. Morgan’s NYU recruiting captains shares his side of the story.

propelling your career

12Your Office Fashion Survival KitEverything you need to transform your work wardrobe for a night on the town.

14Alexandra Lebenthal: Finance Maven and CEO This New York socialite and finance guru imparts some wisdom on conquering the boys’ club.

16Beyond the AtlanticJohn Lee discusses his two years at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and balancing his interests between business and law.

18Staying TunedUpperclassmen share advice on standing out from the crowd.

features 19

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SPring 2011 | the alPha magazine | Delta Sigma Pi

taking risks30Dejavu: Fashion Forward

As a NYU computer programming major turned successful boutique owner, Kai Yang took a risk to pursue his fashion dreams.

32Ice Cream at Your Doorsteps Stern MBA grad Diana Hardeman took the unconventional route after school to create one of the most coveted pints of ice cream in New York City.

34With Tenka, it’s on the houseLearn how former banker Nhon Ma is trans-forming the way New Yorkers eat, party, and play through their smartphones.

business guide

38Treat Yourself Well: Red Mango Founder Dan Kim stops by NYU to inspire students with his frozen yogurt dreams.

39Investment Bank Diagram Tired of pretending that you understand what investment banking is all about? No worries. We made you a chart!

41David Kovacs: Tips on SuccessWall Street Training instructor and Holly-wood producer, Kovacs shares his insights on conquering Wall Street.

40Career in Accounting? The differences between Tax and Audit.

Staff LiSt

Senior AdvisorLucy Liu

Editors-in-ChiefDerek Yueh

Dionisio Espinal Jr.

Design EditorConnie Chan

Advertising ManagerJenny Yu

PR ManagerKim Patel

Managing EditorJenny Lu

PublisherGM Printing

Our ContributorsManhattan GMAT {www.manhattangmat.com}; Tenka {www.tenka.com}; Broadway Nails and Spa {www.broad-waynailspa.com}; Vada Spa {www.vadaspa.com}; 20/20 Eyewear {212-228-2192}; Boyd Thai {www.boydthainyc.com}; Becker Review {www.becker.com}; Dejavu Bou-tiques {www.ilovedejavu.com}; Ben Wang {St. Peter’s Col-lege, DSP Brother}

Contact the magazineDerek Yueh {[email protected]}Dionisio Espinal Jr. {[email protected]}

DisclaimerThe opinions expressed here in this publication are the views of the writers and interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of The Alpha Magazine, their employers, the Stern School of Business, or New York University as a whole.

Citations Pg. 16 {http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-university-rankings/2010, LSE rankings}; Pg. 20 {http://www.palmerhousehiltonhotel.com, Palmer House history}; Pg. 28 {http://www.trumpintl.com, “5% of the luxury market”}; Pg. 39 {www.wallstreetoasis.com, firms listed for bulge brackets and boutiques}

college years

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[The Alpha Magazine]: What was your first reaction when you were asked to step up as interim dean?[Dean Choi]: I was surprised; I was very flattered to be asked to serve, because I love the students, the college, and thought that it was another opportunity to help out during this period.

[AM]: What is your greatest accomplishment as Dean?[Choi]: Working with the staff, students, faculty to move the school’s ranking from eleven to five. In the second year of my deanship, the college was tied for eleventh, and we worked very hard and each year we moved up a notch, and in the last couple years of my deanship, we were in the top five. To move in the rankings from eleven to five is not easy.

[AM]: What do you enjoy doing in your spare time?[Choi]: My first love is my two granddaughters and I just enjoy seeing them develop and playing the role of grand-father. It’s just a new phase of my life that I immensely enjoy- it’s more physical than you think. It’s exhausting if you do it right. I also enjoy landscaping. I’ve never been good at art, but I see it as a form of art that is very physi-cal because my work right here [in Stern] is just mental. It keeps me humble because you realize how relatively insignificant you are compared to nature; you’re trying to create something beautiful but you can never duplicate something nature has done.

[AM]: What is your favorite part of being professor/dean at Stern? Least favorite?[Choi]: The thing that I really enjoy as a professor and dean is student development; in the classroom when I

see the twinkle go on in a student’s eye when you explain something and they understand, that gives me such a charge. As dean, developing you for the professional role that you are going to play, that turns me on. It’s my pro-fession and I enjoy coming up with ideas to develop you students professional-ly. However, I don’t enjoy

the meetings; they are never-ending. They’re important, but you guys are my world and I enjoy interact-ing with students.

[AM]: What the best advice you have ever received?[Choi]: The best ad-vice is if you are not happy with something, then work constructively to change it. Don’t just complain about it or be bitter about it. For example, I went up to my profes-sor after class and asked him what it really took to be a good professor because I really want to motivate students and give them the best. He said that I had to get a PhD and love research. That didn’t sound fun to me, but I was willing to do it. And I did. It was something that bothered me but I did something to correct it and I don’t regret it at all.

[AM]: What keeps you motivated?[Choi]: My philosophy is that we were all put here for a purpose and each one of us is here to make our contribu-tion to society not matter how small. If we can make a dif-ference collectively then the difference is going to be very significant. Otherwise, why are we here? It’s a philosoph-ical question that I asked myself when I was your age. I’m not here to eat food, go to sleep. You’re living physically, but for what purpose? I sort of resonate to the idea that I’m here to fulfill my potential, whatever it was.

[AM]: How do you define a successful leader? What’s your take on leadership?[Choi]: This is my personal philosophy: I think leader-ship is all about empowering and motivating people to doing good things. So I don’t believe in the authority of position. It’s not, I am the Dean, therefore you do what I say and I’m powerful. In other words, I believe in the au-thority of merit. If I suggest something because it’s good for student development and I get you to buy into that, you become the champion to do that. Then that’s what leadership is about. It’s not about taking personal credit for that. In fact, I enjoy it when that person gets excited and gets full credit. I’m just the coach.

Dean Spotlightby Derek Yueh


Frederick Choi

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Club Spotlight

[The Alpha Magazine]: Tell me a little bit about STEBA and how you got involved. [Michelle Lin]: STEBA is a club that fosters students’ interests in the business side of the entertainment media industry. It connects and encourages collaboration be-tween creatives from Tisch and business students from Stern and bridges the gap between the two. Tisch people have ideas for projects and they need Stern kids to help spearhead them. We are mostly event-based and don’t re-ally have general events. In the past, we have had studio tours and interesting speaker events that bridge the gap between people’s interest in business and media. I got in-volved freshman year and served as an event producer and was the vice president of communications last year.

[AM]: How is STEBA different from other Stern and NYU clubs? Why should students join? [ML]: It is a relaxed club where you choose what you want to do. Most of the events are held at night when Tisch kids can come. There is a cross-school collabora-tion and it’s the only club at Stern that is focused on me-dia. While most other clubs are focused on getting you jobs, STEBA is more involved in media and the resources available in New York, even though a lot of job employ-ers do send applications to our club. Everything at Stern is so focused on your career that sometimes the clubs miss out on the college experience. Exploring and developing interests is what college is about and we try to capture that in our club.

[AM]: What initiatives do you have for STEBA in the upcoming year? Any major events? [ML]: So this year is all about reestablishing and get-ting more Tisch people involved so we have equal par-ticipation from Stern and Tisch. Also, STEBA wants to promote the BEMT (Business of Entertainment Media and Technology) minor for Tisch students. We have that Tisch creative side that adds a fun aspect to our club, so that’s why we want to cosponsor with Fusion Film Fes-tival. We are also planning a film screening of American Psycho in Cantor. We are a very social and casual club where members are friends with each other outside the club. The structure is not very rigid and our meetings are like conversations between friends.

[AM]: What’s the appeal of the entertainment business as opposed to more traditional Stern jobs such as bank-ing, accounting, etc.?[ML]: I think it’s a passion play. You’ve been exposed to the media ever since you were a kid, and it’s something you’ve been interested in; it’s like fulfilling a childhood dream. Kids don’t usually grow up wanting to become investment bankers. You can see someone working in the media industry for a long time, usually starting off from the mailroom and climbing their way up.

Continue on page 10

Interview with Co-President Michelle Linby Derek Yueh


college years

Delta Sigma Pi | the alPha magazine | Fall 2010

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R[AM]: What have you learned from your experiences from being in STEBA? [ML]: I learned that if you really want to go into the busi-ness you really have to try and go for it. Don’t be set on a specific timeline. Most of the executives at those major studios and television networks all started someplace ran-dom. Don’t be set on a set series of events. Look for op-portunities that will help you grow since media is always changing. Those executives truly invested themselves in not just one skill set. Get as much experience as possible because if you really love it, you really have to pursue it.

[AM]: What’s the future of the industry? [ML]: It is probably going to get more fragmented and independent films will have more market share. The mov-ie theatre experience is dying. Home video watching is growing and the media is going to focus more on home movie watching. They are also trying to find a way to capitalize on the online presence of movies. Now that technology has made it possible to see more movies, it is moving towards the long tail concept. Because there are festivals and creative ways of financing independently, it will become more fragmented and less traditional.

[AM]: How do you want to see the club grow when you graduate? [ML]: I want an active presence on campus and our brand name to be out there more. I don’t want it to be just speaker events; I want it to serve as a forum for free collaboration. The connections should be in the purest form, connect-ing the Tisch talent to the business-savvy Stern students. I want it to remain very social, where Tisch film students can come in and find Stern students to help spearhead projects.

Michelle Lin is a senior in Stern majoring in Finance and International Business with a minor in Producing.

Ever wonder what your summer investment bank-ing interview sounds like from the other side of the table? As one of J.P. Morgan’s Team Captains

for NYU, Chris Gallea shares his experience on recruit-ing season from the interviewer’s perspective and tells us what he looks for in potential summer banking analysts.

[The Alpha Magazine]: How long have you been interviewing undergrads? [Chris Gallea]: 10+ years.

[AM]: What do you think is the hardest part about being the interviewer?[CG]: Each year, several hundred very talented students from each school apply for the limited number of ana-lyst positions we have. Through resume submissions, informal meetings and presentations, we narrow it down to those that we will interview. By just getting to the in-terview, you’ve distinguished yourself amongst the very best. From there, we have a 30 minute window, to further identify those folks we think will make an outstanding banker for the long term. [AM]: Is it true that the interviewer’s mind is made up within the first few minutes of the interview?[CG]: No.

[AM]: How would you define your interviewing style?[CG]: There’s no one style. Different candidates will have different personalities, different backgrounds, dif-ferent cultures. We are looking for a diverse group of the most talented people and you need to recognize that dif-ferent people have different styles.

[AM]: In that case, what about technical versus fit?[CG]: Not everyone brings a finance background to the interview, so I focus less on technicals as we often inter-view liberal arts students. What I am looking for is prob-lem solving strengths and a positive attitude.

[AM]: What is one of your favorite questions?[CG]: If you didn’t have an opportunity to do banking, what would you do?

[AM]: What’s the worst question that you’ve been asked by a candidate?[CG]: A question for the sake of a question or any ques-tion that shows that the candidate either a) didn’t listen to what we were talking about for the last half hour or b) didn’t do any research or due diligence in preparation for the meeting is a bad question. People feel like they need to ask questions to show interest. I think that’s helpful, but it’s important to listen to the actual conversation.

[AM]: Can you describe some of your best or worst interview experiences?[CG]: The thing that shuts down a lot of interviews is when people don’t bring a good attitude to the meeting. The best interviews are the ones where people are them-selves.

[AM]: When were you surprised by a candidate during an interview?[CG]: All the time. I am consistently surprised by the folks we meet at NYU and get a much better feel for their individual strengths and qualities during the interview as opposed to looking at a piece of paper.

[AM]: What kind of advice would you give to candidates preparing for interviews?[CG]: The analyst program is more like a marathon than a sprint. What we’re looking for is someone who not only brings a great attitude to the team and is represented by a desire to learn and work hard, but can also demonstrate commitment and the ability to see projects through.

[AM]: Lastly, any thoughts on thank you email etiquette?[CG]: If you’re going to take the time to send a thank you note, try to tie it back to the conversation from our meeting.

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through the interviewer’s lensJ.P. Morgan’s Chris Gallea

Chris Gallea is a Managing Director in J.P. Morgan’s Diversified Industrials Group. He is a former Stern graduate.

through the interviewer’s lensby Lucy Liu



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Your office fashion survival kit: from day to night No time to go home and change after a long day of work? Now you don’t have to. Our student fashionistas are here to show you how keeping a few pieces in your office drawer can quickly transform any wardrobe from day to night - so you can be chic anytime, anywhere.


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Your office fashion survival kit: from day to night by Lucy Liu


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Alexandra Lebenthal, CEO, philanthropist, author, so-cialite, mother, and wife has been on Wall Street for over twenty years. Business is in her blood, with her storied Wall Street family, where her grandparents founded Leb-enthal & Co., Inc, a municipal bond specialist firm, back in 1925. Alexandra graduated from Princeton University with a B.A. in history, started her career at Kidder Pea-body, and later joined her father at Lebenthal in 1988; by the age of 31, Alex was the Chief Executive Officer of Lebenthal. Ms. Lebenthal started a new after leaving the firm in 2005.

In 2006 along with Lebenthal & Co. LLC, was Alexan-dra & James Advisory Services LLC which caters to the “Lost Affluent” for investors anywhere between $2-20 million in assets. In addition to running her own compa-ny, Ms. Lebenthal has many philanthropic efforts she is a part of such as Rita Hayworth Alzheimer’s Association, Hale House, and New Yorkers for Children just to name a few. She is also involved in many cultural institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art and American School of Ballet.

Ms. Lebenthal is now the successful author of her recent-ly published novel The Recessionistas that hit shelves in August of 2010. Being a respected figure on Wall Street, she has been named one of New York’s 100 most influen-tial women by Crain’s New York Business.

In the following interview Ms. Lebenthal shares her ex-perience on how she balances her busy lifestyle, and of-fers her expertise on how to conquer the world of Wall Street.

[The Alpha Magazine]: How are you able to balance your professional and family life? [Alexandra Lebenthal]: I have an amazing support sys-tem; it took me years to learn how to rely on other people. But I just reached a point where it was okay for me to delegate my own responsibilities to others. My husband supports me in whatever I pursue so I am extremely lucky. Finding spare time is difficult but if I do have the rare moment, I spend it with my kids lounging around the house.

[AM]: How has your liberal arts education, specifically your major in history helped you in your financial ca-reer path?[AL]: Honestly, what you study in college does not de-termine your career path. History actually is extremely helpful in business. Being knowledgeable about political and financial history makes you aware of past trends in the economy. It is about learning as much as you can and then applying what you have learned. Look at me, I did not go to business school and I turned out fine.

[AM]: It is a rare thing to see a “multi-family” business on Wall Street today. How is working in a family office? What do you like most about it?[AL]: The type of politics that goes on in big corpora-tions does not exist in our office. I mean the same family has been working with this company for over 85 years. I was not extremely close to my brother before, but work-ing with Jimmy is great; he provides a fresh perspective on things. There is the legacy-my grandmother ran the company well into her 90’s. I still use her cherry desk in my office.

AlexandraFinance Maven, CEO, and AuthorLebenthal

by Kim Patel



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I was not going away.’[AM]: After working for Lebenthal in 2005, how and

why did you start A&J with Michelle Smith? [AL]: I just wanted to start fresh. I did not want to be a part of the sale of Lebenthal to another company so I left. Michelle and I had been friends for years and always wanted to do a project together. We talked about doing a radio show and A&J became our project-it was diffi-cult but knowing people in the business helped. Michelle oversees A&J and Smith Divorce Strategies and I mostly oversee Lebenthal & Co. capital markets.

[AM]: Your recent book “The Recessionistas” has just come out--what made you decide to write about the fi-nancial crisis? [AL]: I decided to write The Recessionistas because I get to see it from both sides. I am an outsider and insider be-cause I see it from Wall Street but social circles as well. I started this column in the NY Social Diary and people responded; they loved it. It was easy for me to talk about this world in fictional terms because I am indeed a part of it. I created these characters; they are a mix of people I know and things I have seen. It is based on real life events but it’s a tightly plotted mystery packed with information. Pulling from my own experiences isn’t hard; I know my audience and anyone can read my book and learn a little about the financial world and what really happened in the recession.

[AM]: As a businesswoman, how were you able to con-quer the boys’ club of Wall Street?[AL]: Honestly, a sense of humor and brashness. I do have experience but I am a small woman with a big per-sonality. The question to ask is what can I do to show these guys I am not going away; it might be easy to ignore my voice but to ignore my actions is a whole other deal. For example, we were in the middle of a $2 million bond deal with another bank and I was being a little pushy to try to get the allocations done. This bank was just being ridiculous in getting the funds. I got to the point where

I just had to do something to show these guys I was not going away. So I sent a bouquet of long stemmed roses to the guy at the trading desk so that everyone could see them. They had a card saying how much I appreciated him trying to get me the funds. I got an e-mail later about how much he appreciated the roses and about an hour later, the funds were received.

[AM]: What is your philosophy towards life? [AL]: At the end of the day no one will take care of your problems. If you want something, go get it; do whatever it takes. I have this theory about the “bank of karma” where if you help someone else or deposit goodness, you can always go back and take out a loan; people will return the favor. Attaining success feels great, but it takes hard work to get to where I am. Unfortunately, well the hard work sucks.

[AM]: What advice do you have for business students today looking to get into the financial field, especially women?[AL]: Try a lot of different things. Stay attuned to your feelings in anything you pursue. It is a simple task but be engaged in what you do.

[AM]: What do you think defines a successful business-person?[AL]: Make people respond the first time-and if you hear the word no then that is a temporary placeholder. Business just isn’t fair, but if you want something, you do anything it takes to get it.

‘I got to the point where I just had to do something to show these guys


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Every semester more than 300 New York University (NYU) students take the trip across the pond and arrive in the land of pubs, X Factor, and Union Jack flags. London, one of the first and most popular study abroad sites NYU offers, remains a leading capital city in the world and the nexus where business, theatre, and literature merge to not only shape the city’s historical significance, but dictate global cultural flows. Academically, the top prestigious universities in the world are found in this country. London School of Economics and Political Science, or more commonly known as London School of Economics (LSE), finds itself among the top of the list as a leading institution for Social Sciences and Management, currently bowing at #4. Located at the heart of centre London, LSE offers degrees at both the Undergraduate and Graduate lev-els, forging new grounds in the subjects of anthropology, international relations, and social policy. This recognition attracts students from over 150 countries since the founda-tion school’s inception in 1895. I recently had the oppor-tunity of sitting down with John Lee, 2nd year law student at LSE whom holds positions of responsibility in the Law Students Union, Business Society, and Debate Society.

[The Alpha Magazine]: How is the undergraduate and graduate programmes structured at London School of Economics? Are they similar to the American system?[John Lee]: It is actually a completely different structure from the American educational system. Here, it is usually around three years long, regardless if your course study is a social science or not. I believe the only exception is medicine, which averages five to six years. In a sense, you start already knowing what you will “major” in. Therefore, you are able to take law courses at the undergraduate level. After three years you graduate with a qualifying degree. If I am not mistaken, in the states you need an undergradu-ate degree to pursue a law degree. Here, an undergraduate degree is not necessary.

Having said that, I do feel the American education system has its advantages; one of them being the existence of the liberal arts college. Here you decide before entering uni-versity, and do not necessarily have the room to explore. In

a way, you have a course in mind and there is, “No turn-ing back. This is definitely what I want to do”. At the same time, the qualifying degrees you obtain here are applicable to a diversity of fields. [AM]: Please tell me more about the education system for a student in the Law graduate program at Lon-don School of Economics. [JL]: The law programme at LSE is structured quite differently than your typical law programme back in the states. The programme at LSE is structured with seven compulsory subjects, of which you need to pass all seven in order to obtain a qualifying law degree. These compulsory subjects include Criminal law, Contract law, Tort Law, Trust & Equity, and Euro-pean Union law. In addition, the university will require you to take additional 4-5 modules per year that fall under your general interests. Once you complete the necessary subjects and modules, you can either pursue the bar and become a barrister or choose to become a solicitor, which requires another qualifying exam. You end up working in either a law firm or chamber.

[AM]: Please explain the difference between a barrister and solicitor.[JL]: Barristers abdicate inside the court. Solicitors take part in bigger, international limited liability partnerships. Solicitors handle all of the commercial transactions, but must engage barristers in instances inside of the court. However, they are able to do everything else outside of the court, such as negotiation, arbitration, etc.

[AM]: Which are you more inclined to pursue?[JL]: I am gravitating more towards the role of solicitor. In my opinion, it offers more international career possibilities. Inclusively, I am more interested in the commercial and

beyond the atlanticby Dionisio Espinal, Jr.



London School of Economics

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corporate sector of the Law, which is where solicitors op-erate.

[AM]: How are you able to balance your interests in business and law with your participation in both the Business Society and Debate team? Is there one disci-pline you prefer over the other?[JL]: It is definitely not easy. At LSE, you are very well connected during your classes or lectures as well as out-side of the classes. You are definitely left to your own devices with an immense exposure to vast resources you can reach out to. It all depends on how you allocate your time. I still am trying to strike the balance between the two. I have not perfected it by any means, but am very dedicated to both organizations and strongly believe in both of their goals.

[AM]: In regards to student life at LSE, how much of an international pull does London School of Economics have?[JL]: LSE prides itself in its international appeal. I be-lieve around 70% of students here are international and many choose to attend because of the post-graduate pro-grammes. Post-graduate students realize that when it

comes to the social sciences, LSE is the best to go to. Many students come with the idea that having an international degree coupled with international experience will yield lu-crative results. I definitely see the value in that thinking. There are many personal and varied reasons.

[AM]: The Alpha Magazine is an initia-tive of Delta Sigma Pi, a prominent busi-ness organization at New York University. Would you please elaborate more about the Business Society here at LSE?[JL]: From the sound of it, I feel that both of our organizations hold the same value. The business society brings the leading Eu-

ropean organizations to campus and allows its members to interact in a more intimate level. We bring corpora-tions that represent all business disciplines from finance, accounting, marketing, consulting and even law. For in-stance, we have top partnerships with leading global cor-porations like Barclays Capital and Allen & Overy.

[AM]: Can you please list advantages for an American student to pursue coursework at London School of Eco-nomics?[JL]:

LSE is centrically located at the epicentre of London. • Whatever your interests are, you will find something here. For business-minded students, down the street you • have Goldman Sachs and other top financial firms. LSE holds a spectacular career service. LSE has many prestigious courses often rivalling the • ivy leagues back in the states.It is the top institution for economics and you have the • option of working both in London and in the states.

‘you are definitely left to your own devices with an immense exposure to vast resources you can reach out to.’


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Staying Tuned

Eric Ha | Stern Class of 2011, Moelis & Co | I-BankingDavid Lee | Stern Class of 2011, J.P. Morgan | RiskFeliks Zarotsky | Stern Class of 2008, Sun Capital Partners | Private EquityJeremy Stegman | Stern Class of 2011, J.P. Morgan | I-Banking

Business Related Readings

Feliks: http://www.nytimes.com/pages/dining (Dining blog)

http://thedopeycowboy.com (Wall Street humor blog)

www.zerohedge.com (Finance blog)

www.seekingalpha.com (Stock market blog)

David: Seeking Alpha’s “Wall Street Breakfast” column is your

•best bet to keep you up to date with the markets without

convoluted details and jargon. Seeking Alpha is also a

great site to steal opinions from other professionals to

make you sound like an econ genius in an interview.

Dealbreaker is a great site for some tongue in cheek ar-

•ticles, but don’t dismiss this site just because it’s funny!

It’s theStevenColber

t of financial news-rid

iculous but

gives great points.

Too Big to Fail •

by Andrew Sorkin is probably the most

comprehensiveguideo

nthefinancialcrisiswri

ttensofar.

Don’t be intimidated by the book’s size (over 600 pages)

- there are so many details in this book that it reads like

a movie script than a book.

Liar’s Poker•

is a classic book on the world of sales and

trading during the 1980’s.Michael Lewis does a great job

of simplifying how sales and trading works and also goes

into depth on the start of mortgage backed securities.

What Would you Recommend foR life,

just Because?

Feliks: They should watch Hard Knocks, Califor-

•nication, and Top Chef.

David: A Dictionary.•

otheR tips/WaRnings foR undeRgRads tRying to look intelligent...Eric:

“Beconfident,butnotcocky”-Iknowit’scliche,butlookdeeperintoit.It’snotaboutflashingallyoucansayyou•areabletodo.It’sabouttyingitandflashingitwhileyou’rerunningthroughsimplethings.

Feliks:Don’t act smart. Coming from a guy who has interviewed plenty, I’d rather talk to someone who’s honest about not •knowing something, rather than someone who doesn’t know anything but pretends he/she does. Although, in both cases, neither will get hired because they’re both dumb.

David:It’s not about what you say, it’s about how you say it. Whether it is for interviews or for classes, practice communi-•cating what you know. You can be the next Albert Einstein but nobody would know if you can’t express what you are thinking.

Jeremy:Thinkbeforeyouspeakandappearcollected-theconfidenceyoupresentinyourdeliveryisoftenmoreimportant•than engaging content.

Recommended leisuRe ReadingsEric:

Mitch Albom - The Five People You

•Meet in HeavenDavid:

Sun Tzu - Art of War•

Dale Carnegie - How to Win Friends

•andInfluencePeopleFeliks:AnthonyBordain-KitchenConfidential

•Harry Potter Series

•Dave Berry - Big Trouble

•Jeremy:

Sports Illustrated•

The Economist•

CNBC’s Squawk Box•


your one-stop reading guide to standing outInbusiness,networkingisanecessity–itrequiresfinesse,grace,purpose,andaboveallelse,theabilitytoengageotherswhenyou’retalkingtothemandleavethemwantingmore.Yetwhenitcomestothejunioryearrecruitinggrind,manystudentsfailtomakeanimpression:theyhuddlearoundtheirjobtargets,searchingforthe“rightquestions,”the“smartanswers,”andthewell-placedjokethatwillmaketheirinterviewersorrecruitersrememberthem.Luckily,acharismaticfewhavediscoveredeasierandmoreeffectivewaystostandoutfromthecrowd.It’stimetowipethesweatoffyourhandsandcrackopenafunnybook–acoupleofSternseniorsandgraduatesareheretogiveyouarundownonthereadingmaterialthatwillgiveyoutheedgeyouneedtosucceed.

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inside scoop on the business of luxury The Business of

20 Ever wonder what it would be like to work in the hotel industry? Well, if you have a gift for managing large-scale productions and a penchant for making people happy, luxury hotel management may just be the path for you. Whether it’s overseeing the latest changes in decor, ap-proving room renovations, or planning for the hotel’s lat-est evening gala, hotel managers live in a dynamic and multidisciplinary environment where the ultimate goal is creating and directing the perfect guest experience. To learn more about breaking into the hospitality indus-try, we spoke to Todd Temperly, the Hotel Manager at the Palmer House Hilton in Chicago as well as a 16-year in-dustry veteran. Temperly received his BA in hospitality at the University of Wisconsin-Stout and arrived at thePalm-er House about two years ago after leaving his post at the esteemed Waldorf=Astoria in Manhattan. While he had begun his career in Chicago Hilton and Towers in house-keeping (working as floor manager and in front office) be-fore working in New York City, his return to Chicago was less about the location as it was about the property. “You must have a love affair with what you do.” says Temperly, who believes that passion is incredibly important to suc-ceed in his sector. “If you’re serious about the industry, the Palmer House, like the Savoy Hotel in London, is one of those iconic hotels that you work a lifetime in the indus-

try to achieve a position at. Once you’re there, you’re at the top.” And indeed, as one of the most prestigious hotels in the world, the Palmer House is perhaps Chicago’s most cher-ished and historic landmark, with a legacy dating back to 1873 when it became one of the most extravagant wedding gifts of all time. Since its inception, it has become a much-loved destination for US presidents and cultural legends alike. Palmer House continues to awe guests with its lux-urious, romantic decor and famous Empire Room, home to the last four decades of entertainment’s finest. Below, Temperly gives us his perspective on the industry. [The Alpha Magazine]: What would you say makes the hotel industry unique from other industries?[Todd Temperly]: Even though we go to the same place to work every day, in the hotel industry, what pans out throughout your day is completely different day by day, week by week. No one day is boring – there’s always something fresh, always something new. Tomorrow, we could have the president of the United States here, and the next day we could have a wedding or a prom or a black tie gala event. Plus, we have an army of professionals behind the scenes making each production look seamless.


by Lucy Liu

“ guests come and go, but the team is always there.”

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[AM]: What would you say is perhaps a not so glamor-ous aspect of the hotel industry?[TT]: Well for hospitality professionals, it’s really physi-cal work. The room attendant role is probably one of the most difficult jobs in the building. Add to that the require-ment that you’re engaging with guests every day, and it can get pretty exhausting. [AM]: What would you say is the hardest part of what you do?[TT]: As the hotel manager, the expectation is that I’m not managing from the office - I’m managing from the floor. The hardest part of what I do is sourcing and collecting new business revenue streams. Even though we’re start-ing to see a recovery in business travel and leisure, there’s still a lot of competition out there. We struggle to maintain a high rate of integrity without overpricing ourselves. It’s a fine balance for us to walk – we have to offer a profit-able organization and contain our costs wisely, but we also want to offer the luxury product that others have come to respect. That’s why we make sure cuts are always non-impacting to guests. [AM]: Any memorable moments you’d like to share? A favorite guest, a favorite experience?[TT]: I love my job. It’s hard to pinpoint one spe-cific thing. I would say the times that I value most are the behind-the-scenes con-versations that I have be-hind the cafeteria table, the team potlucks, the family get-togethers. The walls are just brick-and-mortar, but the people – my team members, their children, their grandchildren – are very, very special to me. Guests come and go, but the team is always there. We have a very seasoned veteran staff. Two days ago, we had our Annual Pinning Ceremony celebrating people for forty years of service. We have a staff shy of 800, and most have been atPalmer House for 10+ years. [AM]: You mentioned that the Palmer House is one of those “end destinations” for people seeking to advance in the hotel industry. In your opinion, why do you think the PalmerHouse has been so successful compared to other hotels?[TT]: The Palmer House has 140 years of unparalleled

service that no other hotel else can boast. It’s strategically located in the center of the city. We like to say that there’s no one hotel that speaks to Chicago that speaks to Chicago better than we do. We’re not glass and brass; we’re a ho-tel that has character to it. We have a beautiful lobby. We have a world-class staff that’s seasoned and have worked in their positions for years. [AM]: Finally, what kind of advice would you have for students interested in breaking into hotel manage-ment, particularly luxury hotels? What’s the first step for them?[TT]: They should get some kind of hotel experience un-der their belt, like an entry level supervisor or line posi-tion. It’s very difficult for people to lead in our industry without having a type of understanding what it’s like. You have to have some experience to be a respected leader in the hospitality industry. Some hotels offer a management rotation program – if students get that sort of opportunity, they should be a sponge, and learn from the people around

them. They must come with a com-manding presence, and give more than they take. The Hilton family offers 9-month lead-ership and training programs in a range of departments, for example, food & beverage or rooms (rooms would in-clude housekeeping, guest services, front offices, etc.) At the

end of their rotation, they would be placed into a leader-ship position – typically in the hotel they trained at. [AM]: Lastly, what would you say to students who are interested in the hotel industry, but are afraid that they may not succeed or advance in the field?[TT]: It’s natural to be afraid. Just acknowledge it and don’t be boastful coming into any organization. Ask peo-ple: how long have you worked here? What advice do you have for me? If they see you have a passion, they will not let you fail. A lot of times, people who work in the indus-try will hit a wall. That’s why at the Palmer House, for example, we have an established mentor program where we partner new hires/junior leaders with seasoned leaders just to have casual coffee, chat etc. on a regular basis.

“ guests come and go, but the team is always there.”

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the eye of the beholderAs the world’s largest beauty and cosmetics company, L’Oréal is undeniably one of the most sought-after places to work for both beauty and marketing enthusiasts alike. With global reach in over 130 countries and over 500 new product launches every year, it is a firm that needs candi-dates to have the creativity and brand development skills to carry on its celebrated 100-year legacy. Below, Marc Still-man shares his summer experience in luxury products, why he fell in love with his new career, and advice for students who are interested in breaking into the beauty industry.

[The Alpha Magazine]: What made you change your mind about pursuing a career in law?[Marc Stillman]: Law is based on the past, based on precedent and the decisions that have been made before – business is so much more guided by the future and how to adapt. I took a year off in Madrid to try other classes: business, fashion photography, action sociology, market-ing, geography, etc. When I came back, I was offered a retail management position in Mexico, but I knew it was not what I ultimately wanted to do. It is stressful work and so many things are out of your control.

[AM]: Where did you learn about L’Oréal and what sparked your interest in luxury?[MS]: When I started business school, I was looking for companies that had would let me be creative. L’Oréal is very forward thinking and cutting-edge for all the products they develop, and I was attracted to the company culture as a whole. In terms of choosing division, I had always had an affinity towards luxury. Luxury requires a deeper under-standing of the brand – since most people aren’t exposed to these products as often, to succeed in luxury, you need to have a real interest in the brands – you have to understand their history.

I learned more about L’Oréal when I participated in their 3-day recruitment weekend event, Taste of L’Oréal. There were fifty of us there networking during cocktail hour, and I got to meet a lot of brand managers at the firm, and really got a candid glimpse at what working in luxury is all about. The first day of the weekend was about getting a taste of

the culture. Saturday was about evaluating us in eight hours of case interviewing. We had to develop a new Maybel-line fragrance and our idea was to create per-fume that looked like makeup – for example,

mascara that was actually roll-on perfume.

[AM]: How was your summer experience and how was it structured? [MS]: Each intern had a specific summer project. Some worked on a competitor at L’Oréal – one person did a 360° analysis of D&G fragrances. Others worked on product analysis and launches. A lot of interns worked on digital marketing campaigns with an emphasis on social media. One of the biggest challenges in the industry today is how to bring of luxury brands to social media outlets without diluting the luxury aspect. A lot of the interns were on these projects, it is such a new form of media, and the potential to reach new customers is so great.

My particular project was on a skincare product launch for YSL. Most people don’t understand how long it takes to launch a product – if a product were to be launched today, it was probably conceived and put in motion two years ago. Skincare is regulated by FDA. I was working directly with the brand marketing director.

[AM]: What kind of challenges did you face in your sum-mer?[MS]: In general, luxury is a very fast-paced business. You have to hit the ground running, whether it’s fashion or beauty or whatever in luxury you’re working on. You are constantly turning around fashion cosmetics for your two main seasons. For a holiday look, for example, we may display together a specific shade of lipstick and eye shadow to create a specific look.

[AM]: What kind of advice can you share for those con-sidering brand management and/or luxury cosmetics, and what kind of skills would you say you need to suc-ceed?[MS]: A MBA is always a great way to gain more expo-sure – if undergraduates are considering a MBA at some point, I would definitely encourage that. In terms of luxu-ry, so much of luxury is based on history – the story of a brand, its history, how it was built. Somebody interested in breaking into that should start getting involved in the his-tory of a designer and start learning the story of the brands you’re interested in. From my experience, from a skills standpoint, attention to detail is very important, creativity certainly helps, but above all else is passion for the brand and for the work that you’re doing. If you don’t love the product that you’re planning to sell as a brand manager, you can’t sell it effectively. Organization and other skills you can really learn on the job, but without passion, you can’t really succeed in luxury.

by Lucy Liu

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[The Alpha Magazine]: So you’re currently pursuing an MBA at Stern? [Jessica Duffett]: I am in the Langone pro-gram, I attend class 2 nights a week, and spend the rest of my time here working in the gallery. It’s my first semester in Langone.

[AM]: Do you actually want to get into the art business?[JD]: At Stern, I am pursuing a specializa-tion in wealth management with a focus on fine art assets - a very niche concentration. I have been working for galleries for the past four years and now I am augmenting my art expertise with a business background at Stern. I hope to combine my education and expertise towards my long-term career goals of estab-lishing a leading art advisory and/or gallery.

[AM]: Where have you worked before?[JD]: I have been here for the past four years, but before that I was at the Leo Castelli Gal-lery, a historic gallery on the Upper East Side. They were the first gallery in New York to show Roy Lichtenstein, so joining Mitchell-Innes & Nash [who represents the Estate of Roy Lichtenstein] was a natural trajectory.

[AM]: So could you tell us a little bit about your background?[JD]: I am originally from Portland, OR and I went to Scripps College in Claremont, CA for my BA. Scripps is a small liberal arts college for women, and I did an art history and stu-dio art major. I did not get a strong business background and that is something that I am developing at Stern.

businessthebehind the artsAt first glance, business and art seem to be at opposite ends of the

spectrum, but in our interview with Jessica Duffett of Mitchell-Innes & Nash, Jessica reveals the parallels between art pieces and stocks, tips on breaking into the exclusive art world, and how the New York art scene is changing.

by Kim Patel and Derek yueh

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[AM]: What drew you to this industry? What about this fine art industry appeals to you?[JD]: I entered the art world from an art history back-ground so I was initially interested in the work from a scholarly perspective, but as I became more familiar with the commercial side of the art world I found that to be equally fascinating. I am definitely committed to the in-dustry.

[AM]: People associate art a lot with self- sacrifice and business with making profits; how do you strike the bal-ance?[JD]: I don’t know if I really see art as being about self sacrifice. I am fortunate to work with artists who are suc-cessful and who are doing very well; however, that is a small minority. I think that we are in a day and age where being an artist is a viable career/profession but it still can be challenging to make ends meet.

[AM]: Art is considered to be really subjective - what is the process you go through to price a piece?The prices for works of art are of course a function of the markets for the artist. Artists that have been in major museums, shows, and collections have higher value, and provenance (history of a work’s ownership) is also sig-nificant. For example, we have been pricing photographs that are going to an art fair in Paris next week, and one of the photographic editions in the series was acquired by the MoMA and also the Bard College Museum of Art. So the value of that particular edition is $12,000 while another photograph from the same series that was in the collection of major museums might have lesser value. We also often look to recent comparable works sold in auc-tions in setting prices.

[AM]: Does the artist’s education matter when it comes to pricing?[JD]: Definitely, but there are also self-taught artists who become very successful. It has to do with talent, who is supporting them, marketing their work, and the galler-ies that represent them. A gallery isn’t just an exhibition space; we are responsible for marketing the artists on an international level.

[AM]: Which brings me to my next question, how do you go through the process of choosing artists or get-ting artists?[JD]: Mitchell-Innes & Nash works with very estab-lished artists. Therefore artists that join the gallery’s pro-gram are typically artists that we have been following for quite some time, or are referred to us by artists that we currently represent. Everything happens very organically.

Colleagues or collectors might introduce us to someone’s work, and we start thinking about it and visit their stu-dio.

[AM]: Would you say networking is pretty important?[JD]: It is HUGE. The art world is ultimately a complete-ly network driven industry.

[AM]: Can you shed some light on the owners of the gallery, David Nash and Lucy Mitchell-Innes?[JD]: Lucy and David are hus-band and wife. They established their careers and both became major figures at Sotheby’s New York. David Nash established the Impression-ist and Modern department at Sotheby’s New York and became the head of Im-pressionist Mod-ern worldwide. His wife, Lucy, established the Contemporary Art department in NY and was the Worldwide Director of Contemporary Art. She is now the President of the Art Dealers Association of America. They are serious heavy hitters. So what happens is that the Madison Ave gallery functions basically as a private dealership- so they sell secondary market blue chip works. Here [the Chelsea gallery] we do contemporary exhibitions. The business is largely supported by the secondary market.

[AM]: What does blue chip mean in the art world?[JD]: For example, a 10 million dollar Rothko. You know this is a sure investment. Cutting-edge contemporary art can be more speculative (referring to a quilt-patterned piece on the wall). That’s the difference. Blue chip is a more reliable investment, just like blue chip stocks. I was listening to NPR the other day and they were talking

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feature: business of luxury

about how the gold boom is happening right now. You think about gold and it’s an object, but it’s really just an idea. It’s the same thing with art. It’s an object; some-thing you have and it’s really an idea that has value.

[AM]: What advice would you give to students trying to break into the art world since it’s so exclusive?[JD]: I would say go see shows, read Artforum, Art in

America, and the New York Times every Friday, all the reviews. You just have to go see the art. Know your stuff; my advice is pretty straightforward. It’s an exclusive industry, but if you know what you’re looking at, it’s not hard to get into. This industry is also all about networking.

[AM]: What sets apart the art in New York from the other cities across the coun-try? Especially Chelsea?[JD]: New York has its own long history of becom-

ing the center of the art world. It started in the twenties when all the European artists came over during the war, and it has remained that way. New York has always been a center for artists to come to, and I think it will continue to be. Chelsea is a newer phenomenon; at one point it was more upcoming but now it’s established and very commercial. But the interesting neighborhoods to look out for are the Lower East Side, which has a very exciting developing gallery district and Brooklyn. What happened was that the gal-lerists started uptown then Soho happened in the 80s and Chelsea happened in the 90s and now it’s the Lower East Side.

[AM]: What are the most important things that you learned during school that helped you in your career?

[JD]: I think developing an eye, from going to and look-ing at shows with people who have a real depth of knowl-edge. I feel that my director here, Jay Gorney, is a mentor. I’ll go with him to the contemporary auction previews twice a year in May and November and look at works. Looking at work with someone who has expertise is something you can never learn from a book or classroom and it’s really subjective and valuable.

[AM]: What kind of advice would you give to a young person looking to invest in their first piece of art?[JD]: Buy something you love. I know it sounds corny but no matter what happens, you will have something you care about. Buy something you love, but know your stuff. The first step is just reading and paying attention to things. For example, I just acquired a sculpture by a young artist who’s showing at a gallery in the LES who recently had a great review in the New York Times. When some-one starts to get attention who is young and still reason-ably priced, it’s a very good time to invest. See if there is buzz around an artist and if it’s relatively affordable and you respond to the work, then do it. Also, an affordable place to start is with print editions and photographs. The galleries in Bushwick, Brooklyn are an excellent place to go to and find affordable works by emerging artists.

[AM]: Do you purchase art with a “buy low, sell high” mentality, or do you look for something you want to keep?[JD]: Personally, right now I’m interested in starting a collection. I have a really little collection that I’m build-ing. I want to develop a cohesive collection that I will sustain, and at the same time I’m definitely interested in things gaining value.

[AM]: How has your perception of the art world changed since entering it?[JD]: It’s been a really crazy time in the art world. When I first started working in galleries in New York in 2007, it was the all-time high record for Warhol prices at auction, and the Green Car Crash sold for $71.6 million. Then, all of a sudden, it was rock bottom. It’s just been a wild ride. The industry was hit really hard by the recession. It was a rough time but things are coming back now. It was a significant correction to the market. The recession also eliminated a certain speculator collector contingent in the market. I think that that eliminating this level of specula-tion is really a positive thing for artists, so that they don’t have someone buying their painting and flipping it two years later.

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Paintings: Roy LichtensteinPhoto couRtesy : www.miandn.com


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the sweet spot[The Alpha Magazine]: Could you tell us a little bit about your background, how you got into the food in-dustry, and the inspiration for Spot?[Rex Rhee]: With Spot dessert bar, we wanted to collabo-rate with our chef Mr. Pichet Ong, who is widely known as a master of his art in terms of Asian themed desserts. We got together and wanted to do Spot Dessert Bar, something that is inspired on our Asian culture, and we really wanted to share that with New Yorkers. You see what is happening in the culinary world, especially New York; there are a lot of fusion restaurants. People are a lot more interested in infusing or trying different types of cuisine. Why not do it in the most diverse place in the world? But at the same time why not try and infuse it with a flavor profile and style that is somewhat reminiscent of what we grew up with, and infuse it with interesting ingredients like lychee and matcha green tea. Our desserts are not too overbear-ing, not deep in portion sizes, and not just sweet infused like most American desserts. You almost feel as if you are having a meal because you have those components in dif-ferent layers in the desserts like proteins, veggies, and ac-companiments in your main entree.

[AM]: What gave you the courage to go into the restau-rant industry since it is so risky?[Rex]: The restaurant industry itself was my first job. I was a host, waiter, and bartender during school. My par-ents do very well for themselves, but at the same time, my dream was to have my own restaurant and to work in the hospitality industry. The inspiration really came from being in the epicenter of the money making capital of the world. The only advice I can give you is that nobody is going to wait for you, so you might as well just go ahead and do it. If that is what you really love to do at the end of the day, that is the passion that will drive you forward. There are a million other people in this city that are faster, stronger, smarter, but if you get to that idea first and take a shot at it, what do you have to lose?

[AM]: What are the realities of running your own busi-ness? To outsiders, this seems like a glamorous job.[RR]: On the outside, it is definitely glamorous. It is great because it brings a bit of exposure to our industry, where as ten years ago these cooking shows were boring. It is a tough industry to work in because you work with perish-able items—in terms of what you are trying to sell. You

deal with time and time never stops. You have to formulate a way in which you al-ways package and present your product and be able to sell it because your food is going to expire. The biggest challenge is motivating your staff on a daily basis and having them see the bigger picture. When you run a restaurant, you not only have to deal with your guests’ personali-ties, but your employees’ personalities as well. You have to be able to think on your toes and be a chameleon. Ten years ago, PR was getting your restaurant into The New York Times, for that high-end super exposure. But now thinking about where the future is going, there is a huge push in social media, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Four Square. So why don’t we change our business approach? I want everyone in the neighborhood to know us. I want the colleges to know us, the people who will come in every day or once a week.

by Kim Patel and Derek Yueh

Operating in the heart of St. Marks, Rex Rhee and his team are redefining the way people think of dessert. Here’s the story of how Rex left Wall Street to open pursue his dreams in opening a restaurant.

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[AM]: Do you read Yelp and other reviews? [RR]: Yes I absolutely do. I go on Yelp every day, as well as social networking sites. In terms of really building a foundation for your business, you have to stay in tune with the people that are giving to your business. At the end of the day, if you are not a people person, then the hospitality industry is not for you. You have to talk to everyone that comes in, and get their opinions. We do customer comment cards and we will give you a free dessert on your birthday if you give us a comment. We want people to really feel like they are a part of something—to a place that always knows your name or your favorite dessert, or what coffee you like. When I read a bad review, I email them back and I want to know why. I want people to have a good experi-ence. However, it’s not for everyone and if it’s not for you then I want to know why it wasn’t.

[AM]: So it is a very proactive approach?[RR]: Of course, in this business and in our other restau-rants we try to be ahead of the curve. With the economy, there have been hundreds of restaurants that have closed, but that also means there are hundreds of restaurants that will open. We always want to be ahead of the curve and re-ally get to know the people that come in here.

[AM]: What’s something unexpected that you learned when you opened Spot?[RR]: The hardest part about scaling down from a high-end restaurant to a more local grassroots mom-and-pop shop was living by the day. The books always have to be right; you really have to sell every day, and if you have a bad day you are going to see yourself in a rut automatically. Whereas in my old restaurant, if you have a good week, you don’t see it in the books for at least another quarter. You have breathing room, but here every day is a grind and every day you wake up trying to figure how to get more people into the restaurant.

[AM]: What skills did you learn in school that could be transferrable to the hospitality industry?[RR]: I think in the hospitality industry, the number one thing is just not being shy. The biggest thing I learned work-ing in finance, and corporate restaurants with executives ten years my senior, you learn how to humble yourself and really take their experiences to make it your own. You learn how to emulate the better qualities of all these successful individuals, which is why networking is the biggest thing with business in general. It’s who you know, not necessar-ily what you know. If you cannot facilitate the relationships that you build at the end of the day, you are only one person and one person cannot do everything.

[AM]: What’s the process for creating a new concept for a new restaurant?[RR]: I think the most substantial thought process is really identifying your target market and understanding what’s going on in the world. With our new restaurant concepts, none of them are high-end because this economy is not ready for it. It’s not ready for a 300-400 seat restaurant. You have to cover your costs and sell out every night. Even the biggest executives in the city have their spending ac-counts cut, so it doesn’t make sense opening up a high-end restaurant. You follow the trend, but at the same time you always have to be a trendsetter as well.

[AM]: A lot of the food is organic and your furniture is sustainable. Why is this integral to your business? [RR]: It goes along with the theme of being all-natural. It really helps when people come and they see that while we are a natural dessert bar. 80% of this restaurant’s wood was taken from a recycled barn. Décor of the place goes along with the menu, and it’s the beginning of creating the ex-perience. Chef Ong creates the all-natural desserts and we have to create them in terms of aesthetic. It’s a big plus for us. We want people to feel natural warm and at home.

[AM]: How about your social media aspect? [RR]: There are so many different reasons in terms of doing social media, such as having a big fan base. When someone goes to our fan page and they see that we have thousands of fans, it gives us more credibility. From a business perspec-tive, now that I have attracted 1,700 fans, every time I post something on Facebook 1,700 people will receive it. It’s all about exposure at the end of the day; you’re not going to get everyone, but if you can get a little bit of your entire network, that’s great.

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[The Alpha Magazine]: How did you develop an interest in the hotel management industry?[Joanna Lin]: I was an Economics major and a Business Studies Minor, so like many of my peers, I did an intern-ship at an investment bank and realized that a career in that field did not interest me at all. So I had to take a step back and think about what I wanted to learn more about, what interested me, and what kind of atmosphere I would thrive in—not just what everyone else was doing. I loved going to hotel restaurants and bars, and developed a cu-riosity about how such high-end establishments operated behind the scenes. I was a finance intern at the Hilton for a semester, then worked at the Hotel on Rivington as the Sales & Marketing Intern. My experience there landed me my current position at Trump New York.

[AM]:What are your day-to-day responsibilities as Sales & Marketing Coordinator at Trump New York?[JL]: I work closely with the managers of each depart-ment to coordinate all group arrivals, and I also work with the restaurant Jean Georges to coordinate catering for all meetings and events that occur at the hotel. Every week, I attend a meeting to update the Executive Committee on the status of these bookings. Trump New York is 1 of only 6 five-star properties in New York City, and we cater to the top 5% of the luxury market. Our standards are very high and we work hard to ensure that everything is abso-lutely perfect prior to arrival. Many of our guests are VIPs and celebrities, so I liaise with their travel agents/tour managers to obtain contracts, rooming lists, billing, and all special requests. You’d be amazed at some of the re-quests some of these people have, and even more amazed at how we are able to accommodate almost anything they ask for.

[AM]: What has been your favorite or most memorable experience so far since you started at Trump Hotel?[JL]: The hotel just went through a $30 million renovation

and the rooms are simply fabulous! I love taking clients on tours and impressing them with our property. Trump just recently received the Five-Diamond rating, so now it is the only Forbes Five-Star, Five-Diamond hotel with a Five-Star restaurant (Jean Georges) in New York City. We had a great celebration with lots of champagne!

[AM]: What were the most valuable real-world skills you acquired during college that has helped you in your ca-reer?[JL]: I think the most important thing about college is not the skills you acquire, but the refinement and better un-derstanding of your passions, interests, and career path. Be curious. Ask questions. Wonder about why’s and how’s. Pursue internships in what interests you, not just because it ties into your major or because everyone else is apply-ing. If you’re doing what you love, it’ll show in your en-thusiasm and your job won’t feel like “work” at all.

[AM]: What advice would you give current students in-terested in entering the business/marketing side of the hotel industry?[JL]: All you need are three things: passion, drive and enthusiasm. I learned everything about the hotel industry on my own and from my internships. You have to treat your clients like gold because it’s all about catering to their needs. Sometimes, they have very simple requests that only require a phone call, but the fact that you went out of your way to help them will make a positive and last-ing imprint in their minds about you and your hotel. This is the first step to working your way up.

[AM]: What are some of your short term and long term career goals? [JL]: I’m still relatively new to the industry, having start-ed full-time in May, so what I’m focused on now is just learning everything I can about hotel operations, sales, and revenue management. In the long term, I’d like to travel overseas and work in Europe, which has some of the most high-end hotels in the entire world. In the very long term, I’d love to be like Andre Balasz and open a boutique ho-tel that defines who I am and what I believe a great hotel should be.

a glimpse of new york luxuryTrump New York | interview with Joanna Lin

by Jenny Yu

Joanna Lin is a recent NYU graduate, and is currently a Sales & Marketing Coordinator at Trump New York.


taking risks

30 Everyone knows that fashion is a tough gig. For every Jason Wu and Christian Siriano, there are thousands of fashion hopefuls still struggling to receive an ounce of recogni-tion for years of hard work and talent. One might even say that the industry is rigged

against their success – significant startup costs, a crowded market, low entry positions, and a constant changing sea of consumer tastes pose limitless obstacles, especially to a young col-lege graduate trying to get a foot in the door. So why then would anyone attempt to succeed in the ruthless world of fashion? If you’re like Kai Yang, owner of the trendy upstart East Village boutique “Dejavu,” the answer is simple: an undying love for fashion itself.

When Yang graduated NYU in 2003, he was a computer programming major who hadn’t landed a full-time job. Yet, what most people would consider the ultimate career setback, Yang now considers a blessing. “Imagine if I had gotten into Bear Stearn’s IT department,” he jokes good-humoredly, “where would I be now?” Of course, Yang had never been much of a stranger to challenge. Born in Taiwan and educated in the US, Yang had always worked extra hard in high school to overcome his shyness and heavy language barrier. Yang was also initially waitlisted for NYU before his efforts in an interview with the admissions office paid off. “I cried when I finally received my acceptance letter to NYU,” he recalls humbly, “I just burst into tears.”

It was with this same humbleness and resilience that Yang faced the uneasy prospect of job-lessness that loomed upon his graduation. Without any firm to turn to, he decided to open up a business of his own. Yang had luckily saved up enough capital over the years to be entre-preneurial through a part-time business selling products on eBay. With over $150,000 racked up in two years selling everything from wholesale pieces to Furbies, Yang finally decided put the money to good work.

The inspiration to open up a boutique came from his family. Although Yang had little experi-ence of his own in fashion, his family was in the business back in Taiwan and it had always

dejavuonly until you try, will you knowby Lucy Liu


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seemed to Yang as an attractive business opportunity. In mere months, Dejavu was born on the streets of Flush-ing, Queens. In addition to offering an alterations service (which it still owns today), the store was mostly stocked with pieces accumulated from friends and family. Nowa-days, with two locations and a third opening soon in Soho, the collection has expanded vastly. As a sought-after re-tailer for coveted European brands like Save the Queen, Deca, and Angelo Mozzillo, Dejavu is well on its way to becoming a “must-stop” destination for women looking for the latest trends in fashion. Despite recent success, however, Yang is the first to admit that Dejavu’s first few years were bittersweet. “For the first five years, I poured in money, borrowing from banks to stay in business.” Debt piled on to the young business, and without sufficient cash flows, Yang feared that he wouldn’t be able to pay it off. On top of struggling to keep his company afloat, Yang also had to cope with lack of support from his family. “They felt ter-rible about me getting into fashion. They paid so much for my tuition at NYU, and I went ahead and opened a boutique in Chinatown. I wasn’t even a designer – I was just a guy selling clothes. I’m still a guy selling clothes.” And although Yang was committed to his business, he admits that the pressure during his early years drained him emo-tionally. “The truth is, I wasn’t happy at all,” he says, “I brainwashed myself to tell myself that I was happy.”

Relief finally came in 2007, when Dejavu turned its first profit. There were several reasons for this: one, Yang’s eye for style was getting sharper. “After years of hardship, I became better at choosing what pieces would sell,” he says, explaining that his style is often inspired by Audrey Hepburn. “When I buy things now, I ask: would Hepburn wear this? If yes, I would at least consider the piece – but if no, definitely not a buy.”

Having visited the newest Dejavu location, it is undeniable that part of Yang’s success is attributed to his painstaking attention to detail. The space is entirely his own – contem-porary and luxuriously eclectic – as carefully constructed as the clothing it sells. Except for the occasional splashes of color from dangling jewelry and a whimsical looking sketch of a woman gliding down one side of the interior, the store is encased in walls of pristine whiteness. Clearly geared towards the local area’s fashionable, young clien-tele, the store is stocked with pieces from mostly France and Italy. When asked what he looks for while scouting, Yang answers simply: “Timeless pieces. Good construc-

tion. A beautiful drape that complements a woman’s fig-ure.” Given Dejavu’s growing clientele, Yang has clearly found a combination that works.

With most of his debt finally paid off, Yang has had some time to expand his own skills – namely, designing cloth-ing himself. Recently, Yang has been attending Parsons for 6-8 hours a week, where he is currently enrolled in the school’s certificate program. Today, many of his tailors actually help design pieces, and the company has since branched out to carrying Yang’s personal designs along with his hand-selected European and American brands. According to Yang, designers come from various differ-ent paths and backgrounds, but most attend fashion school to some capacity before entering the industry.

Despite his recent training, however, Yang still labels him-self as a stylist rather than a designer. Yang insists that he has really “never been the designer, only the buyer.” De-

signing for now seems to be one of his side gigs; his true passion lies in scout-ing beautiful pieces from various global brands and aggregating them under the Dejavu roof. This sort of task, says Yang, teaches him how to keep sight of what consumers want, an essential un-derstanding that some designers, too ea-

ger to hop into the industry, forget to keep in mind.

As for the future, Yang is focusing on two European lines, Cop Copine and 2026, which he describes as fresh and young and, unlike the Korean private label brands that have been popping up all over the city, are superior qual-ity and machine washable. As word spreads, Yang hopes to see Dejavu expand even more on its success. “We could make money from selling our company,” he says smiling, “but I won’t, because I know our company will get bigger and bigger.”

With a thriving business and multiple hardships under his belt, Yang offers a few parting words of advice for those of us who still haven’t yet ventured into the real world: “You can have as many dreams as you want to,” he as-sures us, “just focus on one at a time. If you fall it’s okay, just get up and keep trying. Be loyal to those you love, your family, and for the friends you make. Struggles will keep coming to you, but that’s life- and to me that’s what life is all about: solving your struggles. Whether you are successful or not, it’s about how you handle your prob-lems. If you don’t get the result you want, learn from it, stand up again and keep going.” The words linger in the air between us. Well said, Mr. Yang, well said.

only until you try, will you know‘if you really want to do some-thing, say fashion, and you have no prior experience, give it 200% and do it for a couple of years and you’ll be ok.’


taking risks

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milkmade

[The Alpha Magazinge]: What are the realities of start-ing your own business? From an outsider’s perspective, making ice cream seems like a dream job.[Diana Hardeman]: Running an ice cream business may seem like a lot of fun, but, let me tell you, it is a lot more difficult than it seems. I run all of the operations – cre-ate the flavors, make the ice cream, handle the customer service, do the deliveries. It is, indeed, fun, but it’s ex-hausting at the same time. It’s also difficult, as a single business owner, to be the only one determining the direc-tion of the business. While the autonomy is great, it can be daunting at times.

[AM]: “The New York Times” has referenced Milk-Made as the most expensive pint of ice cream in NYC? What attracts people to your brand so much? [DH]: Yep, we are the most expensive ice cream in the land. Although, included in our price is hand-delivery to our members’ homes or offices. Additionally, that article failed to connect to their previous feature on the diffi-culty of being a small-batch local food producer here in New York. Alas. I think there are a few things that attract our members. One, it’s the delivery. I mean, who gets ice cream delivered to their door? It’s crazy. Two, the unique

flavors. We come up with crazy flavors with whatever is seasonal or strikes my fancy at the greenmarket. For example, I turned my favorite winter beverage, the Hot Toddy, and my childhood lunch, a Peanut Butter Brown Sugar sandwich, into ice cream flavors. And finally, it is handcrafted in tiny batches with the highest quality in-gredients.

[AM]: What is one thing you learned in school that has really helped you operate this business?[DH]: Well, my initial reaction is to say nothing. Writing business plans and even consulting someone else’s small business, like I did in business school, really does not prepare one for starting and running her own business. As far as skills gained, I’d say accounting. Knowing how to project my businesses finances is the most important thing I took away from Stern. If you don’t know anything else in business, know that. Less tangibly, I think I really grew from having met so many people who do so many inspiring things. It’s contagious and definitely propels me forward with my business.

[AM]: What is your advice to students who want to start their own business, especially in the food industry?

by Derek Yuehice cream at your doorsteps

a pint of peanut butter & jelly ice cream

Diana Hardeman received an MBA from Stern, but instead of following the traditional corporate path, she started her MilkMade, own unique business of hand-delivering her homemade ice cream to her subscribers.

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[DH]: On one hand, I’d like to say - just go for it. You have an idea, or you see an opportunity – act on it. I started this business because the opportunity pre-sented itself and I acted on it. We served ice cream to friends, received a bit of press, and had hundreds of people sign up to become a MilkMade Member, so I decided to just go for it. Further impetus may have been that I had seen other op-portunities in the past that I bypassed, and kicked myself years later when someone else had pursued them. That said, however, having just jumped into a business, I recommend really creating a plan before hopping into something. The plan will change hundreds of times, but it is important to always be work-ing toward a goal. I think there is a balance between plan-ning and just being brazen.

I think for a food business, it is a bit more difficult because there are a ton of logistical details that go into making the product – sourcing the ingredients, finding a regulated space to produce, distribution, and navigating through the myriad of New York food regulations. I recommend talk-ing to other food producers and also seeking some advice from small business advisors in the city.

[AM]: What’s your social media strategy when it comes to marketing MilkMade?[DH]: Just be real. I don’t think I’m very good at the so-cial media stuff – I tweet and update facebook and our tumblr when I remember to. I like to take picture of the ingredients and the production process and just be very candid about it all.

[AM]: In business school, there’s so much peer pres-sure to get that top job at a bank, but what made you decide just to risk it all and just go for it?[DH]: Let me tell you, I wasn’t always here. In my first year of business school, I actually explored the corporate world, specifically banking. I was interested in learning more about the carbon markets and sought an internship as a commodities trader. That route didn’t work out for me, which was a blessing because when I look back on it I wonder – what was I thinking? I’m so glad I pursued that route; it was a great experience and I learned so much dur-ing the recruiting process. In my second year, I knew I did not want a corporate job so I did not pursue the traditional recruiting that Stern facilitated. It was a risk because we were in the middle of the financial crisis, but I had the confidence that I could make whatever I wanted to work,

work. Following graduation, I took on a number of freelance consulting jobs for small businesses in the area, and then MilkMade happened. MilkMade ended up taking more time than antic-ipated, forcing me to take the risk and focus all of my energy on the business. It was a risk, but it was exciting! And in the back of my mind I always knew that if it came down to it, I could get a regular job if I needed to.

[AM]: What would you say to people who have doubts in their minds about starting a new business?

[DH]: You will always have ambivalence about what you are doing. I love what I do and I hate it. You will always have ambivalence, but that is just the reality and you just have to keep moving forward no matter what. It’s so much easier for me to say this to you than to actually maintain that perspective, by the way. When my business school peers hear what I am doing, they think it must be the cool-est job. But the reality is, I am probably at the same point, as far as enjoying what I do, as everyone else is. Running my own business may be more fulfilling in certain ways, but I think when you do well at something, you feel good about it no matter if it is for someone else’s business or your own. When things get tough, and you just do not want to create that spreadsheet or churn that pint of ice cream, that is going to be the case whether it is for your own business or someone else’s. You just have to keep on moving.

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taking risks

Tired of prepaying for online deals? How this daily deal site is changing up the rules of promotion-based digital marketing.

Shopping online is not always easy. That last romper you bought on Gilt Groupe? Too small. That “$100 for two” brunch deal that you recently purchased on Groupon? It expired last week and you forgot to redeem…again! Well, maybe you didn’t entirely forget: the last restaurant that you reserved snazzy seats for looked a lot nicer online than it did in person, so you were worried that this one might turn out the same way. But wait! Before you begin considering a hiatus for your credit card, consider this instead: an online plat-form where you get access to special deals and discounts all around Manhattan without ever having to prepay a single cent. Good news for you: as of a couple months ago, that platform now exists. Welcome to Tenka, the new-est phenomenon to hit the world of promotional-based digital marketing. Unlike other daily deal sites, Tenka knows that you’re a New Yorker on the run and lets you find, share, and redeem promotions from your favorite lo-cal restaurants, events, and services instantly with your smartphone. And that’s not all, when you hook friends up with deals – you get paid for getting them into the store. How’s that for social capital? The brains behind this mobile coupon-house is CEO and co-founder Nhon Ma, a 28-year-old former invest-ment banker and Google Strategy & Operations manager who recently got his entrepreneurial kicks starting up a Korean taco truck in Jersey City, NJ. Below, Ma discuss-es the inspiration for Tenka, his experience going from banker to Googlite to entrepreneur, and his insights on the rapidly expanding world of digital marketing.

[The Alpha Magazine]: How did the idea of Tenka come about?[Nhon Ma]: Well, it was through a combination of things: my few years at Google understanding the digital market-ing space, helping build Google’s Print Ads business that opened my eyes to the opportunity in promotional based marketing, and more recently, helping drive Google’s next billion dollar business, Display, where I discovered the power of leveraging data. Also, last year around this time, my buddy (who’s a Stern grad) and I started a Ko-rean taco truck out in Jersey City called The Krave. We did every type of advertising possible with digital plat-forms: Facebook, Foursquare, even Google Adwords, but none of that resulted in any sort of traffic to our store. We thought about doing a Groupon deal, but paying 50%

revenue share would have been too costly for us and we would have had to deal with the administrative headache of crossing out names of people who bought the Groupon when they redeemed. We couldn’t even be featured unless we set an unlimited cap on the number of Groupons we had to sell.

The market right now for this type of promotion-based advertising is huge. Foursquare is getting onto some-thing interesting now with the whole check-in feature and Groupon has actually been doing very well driving people into these stores - we’re just coming in there and allowing merchants, who can’t access this platform, to create their own deals and actually disseminate these deals through people. For example, if you were to share something on your network or give a deal to your friends through Tenka, we’re calling this “hooking up” a deal. Say you redeem a Burger Creations deal, you love the place, and you want to become an advocate of it – all you have to do is mes-sage the deal to your friend via facebook and if they go to the store and redeem the deal on their phone, you then get paid out a financial reward for the affiliate business you drove in. We view ourselves as the next-gen deal site / platform, where it’s all about socially curated deals.Ultimately, our goal is to help the community. So as you accumulate rewards from helping out these local stores, eventually there will be a system where you can donate that money back to a local charity. That’s the end vision of what we want to do. We want to provide tools to small businesses to allow them to track and drive traffic at a cost-effective rate, but also help them establish a relation-ship with their customers and allow users to give back to their communities.

[AM]: Hm, so what do you think is more sticky? Paying before or paying after?[NM]: It’s all about the user experience. If you were to buy on Gilt Groupe or Groupon, it’s an impulse buy. While there definitely is a push to go redeem, it’s not deeply integrated into your lifestyle – you have to print out a coupon, make reservations… it’s not on your smart-phone in a convenient and accessible way that fits with your lifestyle (from eating to going out). There’s a reason why 50% of pre-paid deals are never redeemed. Person-ally, I like to actually go into a store and see something before I buy it. Our value proposition back to the user is

by Lucy Liu

it’s on the housewith

really the convenience of having a deal in your pocket, where it’s an exclusive deal, but you can still go into the store first before you use it.

[AM]: What kind of deals can you offer if the user is not paying you upfront? [NM]: It’s the same types of deals. Right now, we have 50% off at Chikalicious and Burger Creations, which are the same types of deals that you would see on Groupon, except the user doesn’t have to commit upfront and lose money if they don’t redeem.

[AM]: If you’re doing similar deals like Groupon and other companies, how do the ven-dors respond? Are they more willing to work with you? How comfortable are they with the technology?[NM]: Actually, two of the merchants we have right now have actually done Groupons before and they’ve done other daily deal sites - so it was actu-ally an easy pitch for us to say: “Hey, our value proposition is that you can cap your deal whenever you want, we’re more cost-effective – you can just login to our site and put down the price you’re willing to pay per cus-tomer we drive into your store…” So it’s a complete auction-based model like Google’s Ad Words – we took a lot of what we learned at Google and applied it to this space. At Groupon, you still have to contact a salesperson and it could take three weeks just to get your deal out – so there’s still a huge market for merchants who are trying to drive some traffic. One more thing, Tenka is very integrated with Facebook: in order to redeem a deal, you have to sign in through your Fa-cebook account. This is appealing to merchants who have Facebook pages because there really is no mechanism as of now to drive new fans to their pages. Even if you have 500 people “like” your page, you have no idea how many of those “fans” actually convert to sales. That’s where our technology comes in – are your current fans advocating your page? Are they referring more friends?

[AM]: Let’s talk a little bit about your background. So you started out at Citigroup and then you moved to Google. What was that like?[NM]: At Citigroup, I started out in a rotational group in

the equities division. In 2004, there were a lot of mergers with electronic trading platforms, and in my second year, Citi acquired this company called Lava Trading, which did a lot of real-time trading, algorithmic trading, etc. In my second year, I was rotated to that division, which sparked my interest in technology. During my two years in the fi-nance world, I accumulated a lot of great analytical skills – I think those types of skill sets are beneficial in general because it brings a lot of accountability to the things you do. But the whole finance thing wasn’t working out for me. I wanted to get into something new and Google just made sense. So I got into the sales finance role, which was super interesting since at that time Google was extremely entre-

preneurial – I was fortunate enough to do a lot of work with startups within Google, one of which was called the “Print Ads program,” headed by Tim Armstrong, who is now the CEO of AOL. Google wanted to get into the print ads space and digitize the whole thing and make it extremely efficient.

This whole experience exposed me to the industry of promotional-based marketing – where a lot of small businesses, especially mom-and-pop shops, leverage primarily newspaper promotions and coupon discounts to drive traffic. It also made me real-ize that there was this huge gap for a digital platform in this space. For ex-ample, say you were a mom-and-pop shop that used Google’s self service print ads module to put your ad in the NY Times. At the end of the day, once you have your ad in the NY Times, how would you know if someone ac-tually cut that out and brought it into your store? What’s great about the whole web marketing digital world

is that you can track everything and leverage data. For consumers, you only pay if someone comes into you store and redeem something. And for a small business, like the Krave Truck company, it is our chance to wow customers with our services.

During my last two years at Google, I helped build Google’s next billion dollar business: Display. I worked on all facets of the display business from YouTube, Dou-bleClick, Google Display Network, Ad Exchange, etc., which strengthened my understanding of the possibilities of digital advertising.

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On the Business

[AM]: What is your revenue model like?[NM]: It’s a pure CPA model – cost-per-acquisition. So say you are a local merchant who goes into our system: you put in what you’re willing to pay per customer and a daily budget that you can’t surpass, say $100. If you’re paying a dollar per customer, every time a customer re-deems a deal, you pay us a dollar. It’s also completely self-service – vendors can just log in to Tenka and put in their own deal.

[AM]: What do you plan on doing to market to mer-chants?[NM]: On the merchant side right now we’re employing a direct sales approach – our team of intern reps (mostly NYU students) who are business development/sales/mar-keting are integral in bringing our product to the market. They are the ones giving the pitches and getting merchants on board. So it’s still very sales driven right now.

[AM]: Were there any startup costs?[NM]: Oh yeah. Lots of costs. The biggest are legal fees. We raised Series A funding and legal costs were huge.

[AM]: What about coding and programming?[NM]: Actually my partner, the CTO, his name’s Tim, is in charge of coding out everything. He came from Google as well and developed the Google finance Android app. We worked together in the Display business and he has a deep understand of digital marketing. He also comes from a military background so he’s really on point with everything. He’s one of the smartest guys I’ve ever met.

[AM]: Can you tell me about your experience getting Series A funding? [NM]: I was completely new going into the process. I had a lot of advisors from Google who helped me big time, one of whom made a lot of introductions and is on my board – she’s amazing. The word on raising capital - we raised our capital from angel investors – is that you need guidance. It’s hard to actually do it yourself – you need to know people. The process for us was actually pretty fast, and we were able to raise within a month. The con-nections are probably the number one key to funding, al-though perhaps even above that, you need a great team. Like, if you don’t have an amazing tech guy as your part-ner, well… (he laughs) For example, we met a few of our angels through this Google event that I was hosting. It was a competition for HBS entrepreneurs who were looking for funding on their own. Five startups were pitching to a room full of angel investors – I met an investor and took it

from there. It’s all about networking.

[AM]: Mind if I ask if you’re making profits? And if not, how do you pay your team/retain talent?[NM]: Not yet, but we are already making revenue, far ahead of expectations. Quite unheard of for a startup that has launched in only one month to be making revenue. Our funding goes to pay salaries.

The Future of Tenka

[AM]: Some people say that these daily deal sites are just a fad of today’s generation. What is your opinion on the sustainability of the digital promotional marketing businesses moving forward?[NM]: Ultimately, I think social recommendations carry a lot of weight and a lot of startups are simply trying to leverage this. We are the next-gen deal site, centered on socially curated deals. The guy I used to work with for Google Print Ads, named Tom Philips, is now the CEO of this company called Media Six, and what we’ll con-tinue to see over time, I think, is this huge emergence of startups that are based on this kind of social data. Let’s find out who these social influencers are, get advertisers to match up with these guys, so that these social influencers can drive traffic and leverage their social capital. I think the sustainability of this model will be dependent upon the propensity of people to be genuine with their recom-mendations. For example, referring shouldn’t be just for the financial rewards – it should be about helping out your friends, and ultimately helping out the community and lo-cal mom-and-pop stores.

[AM]: You mentioned that Tenka is ultimately about giv-ing back to the community. Can you explain how that process will work?[NM]: Sure! So this is going to be a V2 feature that we’re going to build into the system. As you refer people to spots and you’re driving in traffic – so say you are paid a dollar per person and you bring in 10 people you get $10 – we want to give people an option to donate this money to a local cause.

[AM]: How do vendors respond to this idea?[NM]: They love it. The money they are giving to Tenka is going to their customers and then going directly to the community. It’s like a co-branding thing.

[AM]: I know that Tenka started out focusing on restau-rant promotions, but it looks like you’re branching out to nightlife and service deals as well. On that note, what are your plans for expansion?

[NM]: The whole concept of Tenka is literally deals in your pocket. Everywhere you go it’s supposed to be like your keys to the city, in a way that is embedded in your lifestyle. You have amazing deals around campus to share with your friends; you can use your Tenka pocket to get into clubs, events, and services. One night, you could be using our deal to cut the line and get free admission into Katra, and the next morning you could be getting free coffee from the Mud Truck. We definitely want to ex-pand into the events vertical, as well as services.

On Being an Entrepreneur

[AM]: Tell me about your typical workday.[NM]: Right now I’m involved in pretty much every-thing non-tech. I usually spend my day in our NJ head-quarters, which includes a lot of working with our busi-ness development team, getting their feedback on what merchants are saying, what users are saying, etc. I start off the day touching base with the CTO and making sure everything is good on the engineering side and then working with the intern team to see if we’re hitting our goals on the day-to-day basis. So it’s a lot of high level strategy mixed with tactics on how to get the job done – and intermittently throughout this whole thing is paying bills printing out collateral, stuff like that – everything you need to get the business off the ground.

[AM]: Ok ok…so here’s the million dollar question. If you had the chance to do it again, would you skip fi-nance and go straight into entrepreneurship, or do you think it was better for you to start out on this route, making connections and building your brand?[NM]: It’s hard to discount the finance experience, be-cause I think that kind of frames my whole way of think-ing about analytics. Especially when you’re trying to drive a business or when you’re trying to manage a team,

accountability is key. Being able to look at the numbers and determine trends and insights is something that I’ve developed, where you can pick up things really fast and make decisions right off the bat. But at the end of the day, there is a balance to this too: you have to balance analysis with going with your gut. If I had to do it again- it’s tough- in college, I was never really set up with the entrepreneurial path until I got into Google and kind of saw an opportunity and what it would take to make it happen.

[AM]: So basically…entrepreneurs are born when they need to scratch that itch? [NM]: Personally, I felt like I always had that itch to do something – I was just looking for that thing. Investment banking was for practical reasons; day in and day out, I just wasn’t fulfilled. The money was good, but there had to be more to it.

[AM]: So what would you suggest students do while they are still looking for that “thing”?[NM]: I think what really works out is starting with a bigger vision of what you want to do. Throughout high school and college, I always wanted to give back to the community and even though I was fortunate enough to get into some of these great schools, I never really got the real opportunity to give back. When I was at Citi, I didn’t have time to do anything, and then when I realized there were digital platforms where I could do something scal-able in a way that could ultimately produce some good, I jumped on it. My advice would be to continue develop-ing this type of thinking, because if you have a purpose in what you’re doing – that will work. Especially if you want to get into something entrepreneurial, it’s all about high-level purpose. You shouldn’t start a company just to make some cheese, there needs to be some bigger sense of purpose to it.

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business handbook

Last year, Delta Sigma Pi invited Dan Kim, owner of the enormously suc-cessful frozen yogurt chain Red Man-go, to speak at NYU about his expe-riences as an entrepreneur. Not only did students get to hear more about Kim’s philosophy behind the Red Mango brand and the career choices that led up to his departure from the finance world, a lucky few were also announced the winners of the Red Mango Ad competition, organized by Kim and DSP. Along with her ad be-ing placed in the Washington Square News, the first place winner was also awarded a $500 Red Mango gift card. Now that’s a generous amount of fro-yo! I had the honor of attend-ing Kim’s presentation, and these are a few things he had to share:

Where it all began…

Dan Kim was born in Korea and im-migrated to the United States with his parents. From a young age he saw the struggles of immigrant parents in raising a family. His parents hoped he would pursue being a doctor or a lawyer - yet, despite being valedicto-rian of his high school, Kim decided early on that he did not want to take a traditional career route. Instead, Kim loved photography and art, and enrolled in UC Berkeley where he studied economics, which, for him, was a practical way to tie together all the things he enjoyed. After learning from his upperclassmen friends that internships were extremely impor-tant, he landed a consulting intern-ship in LA and later decided to pur-sue investment banking for its many exit opportunities. He admitted that, at the time, investment banking was “frankly the highest paying and most competitive job options I had, and I

am a competitive person.” Today, this same competitive spirit helps keeps the Red Mango empire a strong con-tender in the growing frozen yogurt industry.

However, Kim eventually decided that the corporate environment just wasn’t for him. When he worked for internet companies during college, he says, he found the environment to be so much more passionate. In addition to a more relaxed dress code, he was better able to express his creativity.

When asked “Why yogurt?” Kim re-plied, “Food is the shortest path to happiness.” Berkeley, he said, really exposed him to the concept of health consciousness and nutrition, while giving him insight to an untapped market opportunity. Like Starbucks and Jamba Juice, he wanted to cre-ate a brand that could deliver on emotional attributes. As a result, he formulated three objectives for his yogurt brand:

A good tasting product•Social, fun lifestyle experience•Healthy experience•

At this point, one student asked Kim what he would’ve done if not yogurt and he joked back: “Dumplings,” fol-lowed by, “just anything to do with food, maybe a restaurant.”

learning about yogurt

Kim started by learning as much about yogurt as he could. Besides doing some basic research on Google and Wikipedia, he also had to think about locations and building stores. In terms of hiring he suggested “pick people smarter than you.”

Looking back at his rapid progress, Kim admitted that there was defi-nitely an aspect of luck in his success or success of most entrepreneurs, but that working hard always put him in a betterposition.Thefirsttippingpointfor Red Mango was when USA To-day published a very favorable article on Dec 31st when large numbers of people are traveling. In one night, Red Mango rose to fame. Suddenly, Kim was receiving calls from execu-tives wanting to invest in Red Man-go, including a personal call from the CEO of Blockbuster. The second tip-ping point for Kim occurred in 2008

treat yourself Well red mangoby Jenny Lu


39

when Red Mango secured a $12 million invest-ment despite the tough economic conditions. For Kim,themostdifficultsacrificeofallhissuccesswas “losing more control as the company grows.” Yet, the tradeoff of having investors own ½ to ¾ of the company meant that Red Mango also had the capital to hire a much more professional team to aid its continual expansion.

team mango for the Win

Red Mango continues to grow day by day with persistent effort from Team Mango. With many ideas for Red Mango still in the works, Kim left thestudentswiththisfinalinsight:“intheend,it’sreallyaboutfindingyourpassionanddecidingonthe lifestyle that you want.”

[[[

What’s all this talk about investment banks?

a dummy proof guide about the basics of an investment bank

investment bank: a financial institution that helps its clients raise capital

bulge bracket bank vs. boutique bankSize: • a Bulge Bracket tends to work on larger deals (mulit-billion dollars)experience:• Both are able to offer different types of experiences. In a Bulge Bracket there is more training, easier networking, and more exit opportunities. In a Boutique Bank there are closer connections within the firm (size is smaller) and one is given earlier responsibilties and exposure.

frontoffice:communicates with clients and initiates dealsmiddleoffice:monitors front office functions and manages risk

backoffice:carries out administrative and support personnel; includes internal operations

bulge bracket:Goldman Sachs• J.P. Morgan Chase• Bank of America•

boutique:Evercore• Lazard• Moelis•

Chart Courtesy of David li

Just recently, I had the pleasure of interviewing David Kovacs, some-one who did not take the cookie cut-ter route. He is an instructor at Wall Street Training, which provides the right training and skill sets to make students and financial professionals competitive. Kovacs is a man who has been competitive throughout his career. He specializes in private eq-uity, investment banking, and ven-ture capital in mature and emerging markets. Kovacs is also a Hollywood executive producer, producing many highly anticipated films. He has ana-lyzed hundreds of deals, executing both sell-side (M&A) and buy-side (Private Equity and Venture Capi-tal) engage-ments. Dur-ing my one-on-one with Kovacs, he let me in on a few se-crets on how to be suc-cessful in any field.

Kovacs was born and raised in Staten Island, and graduated from CUNY Staten Island at the age of eighteen with a bachelor’s degree in economics and finance. He took classes at three or more other colleges and was able to collect the credits. Within the span of four years, he received a high school diploma and college de-gree. At the age of eighteen, Kovacs was ready to take on the financial world. He started his career at Citi-Group which was “the place to be at the time.” He says the one key to getting ahead is finding a mentor. “Mentors will open doors for you and groom you to move further up

the ladder-that is how I moved into Private Equity.”

What makes an eighteen year old get into a field like investment banking? Kovacs responded with the one rea-son most business students go into it, “MONEY!” Money was the driving factor behind Kovacs’ career choice because “if anybody ever tells you they like 100 hour weeks, they are ly-ing. Find a niche…and work on it.” If you do not have excellent writing, analytical, or modeling skills, invest-ment banking is just not for you.

Kovacs urges students to always ask WHY. Students today tend to stop

thinking after college. The leaders in business today are always thinking, whether they were still in college or dropped out. It’s as if student’s brains just shut off when they find a job where they can get the paycheck. But the thing is, that paycheck is slowly going away. It’s going towards those

who are much more competitive. “Wall Street is not going anywhere; it is just cutting its fat.”

David Kovacs works with the CFA and founder of WST, Hamilton Lin. WST is different from competitors because they train many of the bulge bracket banks and private equity firms as well as the SEC. “Investment banking is all about managing people, it is a so-cial network. I am very lucky to have the rolodex I have. From executives to students, I treat them with the same level of respect.” WST provides that fundamental skill set to set you apart from others. You must have excellent communication and technical skills.

It does not matter what your major is, it’s all

about being prepared. “Why would you spend thousands of dollars on schooling to just go and screw up a half hour job interview?” It just isn’t worth it, and the instructors at WST are the perfect people to help.

Kovacs advises what makes a successful leader is listening. “Lis-tening, absorbing infor-mation, analyzing, for-mulating an intelligent opinion, reflecting, and

speaking intelligently about it-that is how you have your voice heard.”

If you would like to find out more about Wall Street Training check out http://www.wallst-training.com/.

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‘mentors will open doors for you and groom you’

business handbook

David Kovacs: Tips on Successby Kim Patel


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Considering a Career in Audit or Tax?by Jenny yuDavid Kovacs: Tips on Success

Accounting has become an increasingly popular career field in recent years, especially after the Enron scandal in 2001 which led to greater demand for accurate, truthful financial reporting. It also caused the dissolution of Arthur Andersen, then part of the “Big Five” accounting firms. Today’s “Big Four” includes Deloitte, Ernst & Young, KPMG and Pricewa-terhouseCoopers.

Audit and Tax are two of the most popular fields for accounting majors these days. Are you considering a career in ac-counting but unsure which path is a better fit for you? A great way to find out is to undertake a summer or year-round internship position to experience the job responsibilities firsthand. If you haven’t done that yet, don’t worry! We’ve got it covered.

Why did you choose Audit/Assurance?

What were some of your responsibilties?What personality traits/characteristics do you

think are important for your field?

Why did you choose Tax?

What personality traits/characteristics do you think are important for your field?

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