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Richie Mashiko is the CEO of She’s Birdie and the Head of Beacon, a division of Iris Financial that does fractional financial consulting for DTC brands. Email Richie at richie@irisfinance.co.

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A brutally transparent turnaround story. Richie Mashiko walks through how he took She’s Birdie from a $3M loss and $6.5M in obligations to an operationally disciplined business paying down debt—without Meta ads.

We break down the debt stack, negotiation order, cash-flow forecasting, and the exact operating changes that created free cash to service creditors.

What you’ll learn fast:

– Debt triage that works: Prioritizing bank lines with personal guarantees, restructuring MCAs, sequencing suppliers and vendors, and why lawsuits are rarely the optimal path for counterparties.

– Cash-flow clarity: How a weekly cash-flow model drives decisions and sets realistic paydown schedules.

– Opex rightsizing: Cutting bloat from ~$500K/month to ~$75K, what to cut first, and how to preserve core capabilities.

– Ad spend discipline: Turning off losing channels, operating with Amazon ads only, and rebuilding profitability before scale.

– Unit economics that fund the plan: 90% landed margin before fulfillment, ~30% all-in cost of delivery, and why high margin + favorable terms enable rapid debt reduction.

– Supplier terms that matter: 25% deposit, 75% net-120 after cargo-ready—how to negotiate (and keep) terms through a downturn.

– Operator mindset: Replace vanity growth with durable free cash flow; define “winning” as consistent distributions, not fantasy exits.

If you’re feeling margin pressure, stuck in growth-at-all-costs habits, or unclear on your balance sheet, this episode gives you a concrete operating playbook you can adapt immediately.

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CHAPTER TITLES:

00:02:10 – The Rescue Mission Of She’s Birdie

00:05:06 – Initial Growing Pains Post Covid (Product Development)

00:11:49 – How We Almost Got Bought By Amazon

00:16:55 – Breaking Down The Balance Sheet

00:22:46 – Keeping The Bank From Freezing Assets

00:24:05 – Operational Vs. Finance Challenges

00:31:17 – Bad Ad Dollars

00:35:20 – Manufacturing Terms

00:40:19 – The Secret Sauce

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ADMISSION

Get the best media buying training on the Internet + a free coaching call with Common Thread Collective’s media buyers when you sign up for ADmission here: ⁠⁠https://www.youradmission.co/andrew-faris-podcast⁠

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