Sneaker entrepreneur Trent Out Loud is a Harry Jerome Award winner
May 5, 2022
Outside of high school football, Trent Out Loud did not receive an award until last Saturday when he was recognized with the Young Entrepreneur honour at the 40th annual Harry Jerome gala.
In fact, he had no idea that the awards existed or who Jerome was until he was nominated.
“It was only after I did my research that I learnt this is one of Canada’s most prestigious awards started four decades ago and that Jerome was a brilliant person,” he said. “I now have a responsibility to promote the Harry Jerome Awards, using every social media platform at my disposal.”
The award was reassuring for Trent whose life has been a roller coaster the last few years.
In March 2020, the deadly coronavirus brought the world to a standstill.
The impact has been devastating.
Workers lost jobs, businesses closed and many went into bankruptcy and countless people around the world will take a long time to mentally and physically recover from the damage inflicted by the virus that claimed almost six millions lives globally.
Five days after the World Health Organization declared the virus a pandemic, the sneaker entrepreneur returned to Montreal from Barbados after four days of heavy drinking, smoking weed and partying.
Barely managing to make it upstairs in his apartment, he puked green bile all night because of alcohol poisoning.
Trent Out Loud was recognized with the Harry Jerome Young Entrepreneur Award (Photo contributed)
With his Exclucity multi-million dollar business struggling to stay afloat, quarantine was a respite for Trent to gather himself and figure out his next moves.
“It was time for me to have a lockdown of my own if I wanted to live to see the end of 2020,” he said in the second of his new books, ‘How Sneakers Ruined My Life: The Entrepreneurial Journey that Shifted My Mental State’. “Had it not been for the pandemic, I would probably be in the same place that I was two years ago. Sitting still, looking at yourself and dealing with your own thing is the best policy I found when it comes to how to get things done.”
During the pandemic, Trent increased Exclucity’s net profits by over 2000 per cent. It was the company’s most profitable year ever since 2006. The gross margin also went up to over 43 per cent, compared to 25 per cent in 2018 and 37.5 per cent the following year.
With the company’s loans reaching over $2 million, Trent cleared the debts in less than a year.
The details of how he was able to turn things around so quickly will be in his third book, ‘How Quarantine Saved My Life’, expected to be released by year-end.
“Looking back, I can’t believe all the drinking, travelling and what I was putting my body through,” he said. “I was going to the gym every morning and that was healthy, but it is not healthy to go to bed drunk at 3 a.m. in the morning and sleep for about two hours before going to the gym which I enjoyed. I don’t know how I made it this far.”
It is not the first time Trent has dug himself out of a deep hole.
Excluded in 2017 from selling the Jordan high-end sneakers after the introduction of the Tier Zero program, he lost almost $2.23 million the following year.
With invoices piling up, landlords at his five Exclucity stores demanding their rent and key staff members quitting, Trent was down in the dumps.
The rebound has been progressive and satisfying.
Earlier this year, he was the only Canadian featured in Complex magazine’s guide to Black-owned sneaker stores and boutiques globally.
“This is very rewarding and validating,” Trent said. “But it also begs the question, ‘Why am I the only one and why aren’t there more’? The lane that we are in is an urban one and it is a demographic that we as Black entrepreneurs know about.”
Creating and building a brand that is recognizable around the world has caught the attention of sneaker executives, among them former Nike Director Will Shelby.
“Trent’s knowledge through trial and error represents, creativity, consumer understanding, mad people skills, excellent business intuition and tenacity at the highest level,” he added.
An astute businessman, Trent Out Loud has created and built a recognizable brand (Photo contributed)
It is predicted that the global sneaker market will reach $120 billion in the next six years.
How did this product once seen as a symbol of athleticism become so dominant in the commercial market?
“Hip hop and culture have a lot to do with it,” Trent pointed out. “It started as a thing of comfort, but the hip hop generation 20, 30 years ago said we are not going to change our sneakers to come into your boardrooms. When my parents came here, they didn’t feel comfortable attending formal events wearing sneakers. The millennials changed that the same way they did with the wearing of jeans.”
Trent’s favourite sneaker is the White Air Force One that was the first basketball shoe to use the Nike Air technology.
“You can wear it with anything at any time and you will look dope,” he said.
A few years ago, Trent launched the ‘Trent Out Loud’ platform to leverage his entrepreneurial knowledge and provide entertainment.
“It first started out like a meme page and YouTube channel and when I was going through my downturn and in a bad place, I turned the camera on me to show daily behind the scenes with Trent,” he said. “That didn’t work. Through the pandemic and looking within me, I have learnt that you don’t have to be loud to be heard. When you are quiet, you could just as be vibrant and vivacious. This brand is a little bit more refined than it was a few years ago and what I hope to do with it is give back in some way to young entrepreneurs so they can avoid some the pitfalls I had to go through.”
For young aspiring entrepreneurs, Trent has some sage advice.
“Don’t try be like me,” he said. “You must be your own person. What you can do is look at other people and their stories, which is what I do, and take bits and pieces from that. I have always studied great business leaders, ranging from Ted Turner who started CNN to Howard Schultz who was the Chief Executive Officer of Starbucks Coffee Company and former owner of the defunct Seattle Supersonics professional basketball team. When you read about entrepreneurial journeys, one of the things they emphasize is that you hire people who are smarter that you. I knew from the moment I got into business that the team is the most important cog in the wheel. It is impossible to do it alone without a great team.”
Knowing at a young age that he wanted to be self-employed, Trent started Hip Hop Exclusive that morphed into Exclucity, selling long tees and du-rags out of his car trunk. He also managed musicians and modeled in New York and South Africa before focussing on the sneaker industry.
Dealing with peaks and valleys in business requires having individuals in your corner who can help you negotiate the emotional roller coaster.
Trent’s maternal grandmother, mother and older sister are those special people.
Ethlyn Harris came to Canada from Jamaica in 1956 under the West Indian Domestic Scheme that paved the way for Caribbean women to enter Canada annually. They were subsequently granted landed immigrant status in return for their services.
Harris, who passed away six years ago at age 91, walked nearly 20 kilometres in shoes borrowed from a male neighbour for the interview.
His mother migrated in 1961.
“Those three women are pretty much the reason why I am the way I am,” said Trent whose father is also an immigrant from Jamaica. “My grandma brought six family members to this country within a few years after her arrival, my mom worked long shifts as a nurse and my older sister, a first-generation Canadian, put herself through school and got a Master’s degree. Their stories represent strength, resilience and determination. They have my back and are my harshest critics. They are the people that I strive to impress, not those on social media.”
Trent Out Loud has overcome adversity and is in a good place now (Photo contributed)
With two Exclucity stores, one each in Toronto and Montreal where he was raised, Trent — who was close to filing for bankruptcy — is well on the way back to the top.
“With all the years of things going up and down, I would like to see some consistency,” he said.
Trent is in a good place now, far removed from those dark days when he was on welfare, his world was crumbling around him and suicide was considered an option to escape the pain he felt.
