Topics ran the gamut from green energy to diamond bras at a conference this Saturday sponsored by the Young Entrepreneurs at Tufts (YET). It featured two panels of speakers and a keynote address by Glenn Rothman, the CEO and co-founder of the diamond company Hearts On Fire.
Hearts On Fire, created in 1996, is one of the world's fastest-growing luxury companies and is best-known for providing the diamonds for the 2006 Victoria's Secret Fantasy Bra, which was priced at $6.5 million.
During his speech, delivered in Alumnae Hall, Rothman spoke about his journey to the top of the entrepreneurial world, explaining that he became a businessman almost by mistake.
He was rejected from Harvard Medical School after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania, so he began selling Moroccan wallets on the street in Harvard Square. After a few months of sales, department stores like Filene's Basement began placing orders for his merchandise.
"It was 1972. I didn't know how to keep books, I didn't know how to register companies, I didn't know how to keep invoices," Rothman said. "I had no business plans, just four wallet samples."
During the next decade, Rothman and his wife, Susan, established themselves as buyers and sellers of Middle Eastern clothing and accessories, eventually opening a boutique in Boston.
Rothman explained that, while the income was good, life as a salesman was very taxing.
"We decided to reevaluate our lives," he said. "Let me tell you something about being an entrepreneur: It's 24/7."
He and his wife sold their business in 1978, and shortly afterward they were introduced to the world of diamonds while attending a dinner party in Birmingham, Ala.
"The diamond business was a closed industry at the time. You had to be born into it," he said. "Outsiders didn't get into the diamond business."
Rothman said that in the beginning it proved difficult, but his luck changed in 1980 when he met a diamond buyer in Antwerp, Belgium. With the help of the buyer and bank loans, Rothman's business soon took off.
"I'm a big believer in debt, I believe you use 'OPM': other people's money," he said. "I believe in borrowing from the banks."
So when the Bank of New England failed in 1991, Rothman found himself in a financial crisis. He said that they had to shrink his business by 60 percent in order to pay back more than 10 year's worth of loaned money.
"I realized that I needed to reinvent myself [and] the business if I was going to stay in," he said.
As a result, he went back to school, attending a special program for owners and managers at the Harvard Business School.
"The more you learn, the more you earn," he said. "If that's the only thing you learned from me tonight, I'll be a very happy guy."
Rothman closed by saying it is up to individuals to take control of their lives if they want to be successful.
"If you don't know who you want to be when you grow up, then life is going to happen to you," he said. "You aren't going to make life happen."
YET members said they were excited that Rothman gave the keynote address.
Senior Robert Petti, the group's director of operations and a co-facilitator for the conference, said that after hearing Rothman speak in his entrepreneurial marketing class last year, he decided to try to bring him to campus for the conference.
"He spoke with such passion," Petti said. "I wanted to give him an opportunity to speak in front of a bigger audience because he has one of the best entrepreneurial stories I've ever heard."
Sophomore and YET member Emilie Coen said that Rothman was someone that most people in attendance could relate to because last year's Fantasy Bra has attracted a lot of attention.
"[The bra is] something that everyone's heard of," she said.
YET President Jonathan Katz, a senior, felt that the organization's programming was a success.
"It is my hope that students walked away from the conference with at least one new thought about what they want to do in life," he said.
