Trav Knows How to Make the Most of His Time
Time is such a tricky thing. Some people have so little of it, while others sometimes have too much on their hands. Ironically, the same thing can be said of money. Travis Lubinsky (Trav for short) decided that he wanted to make a difference with his time on this earth and decided to combine his love for watches and helping others into a company that puts compassion on the clock. Trav’s company, Flex Watches, isn’t just highly successful; it’s built on a foundation of giving back.
Trav got his start in college, printing T-shirts for his fraternity. At the time, it was just for fun, and he didn’t think much of it, but his dad convinced him to get a business license and build a website. A year later, he had started selling T-shirts to his university and local businesses, as well. Thanks to his social media marketing savvy and ability to anticipate and meet market demands, his T-shirts eventually grew into a multimillion-dollar company that printed licensed products for Californian state universities, clubs, and sports teams. Celebrities and athletes soon followed.
By the time Trav had turned 20, he had already made his first million. By the time he was 25, he was running a highly successful company that made millions in revenue a year. Thanks to his hard work, ability to sell his product well, and flexibility, all of this was even possible. “I was forced to make some changes and adjust my business plan to fit the constantly changing market of manufacturing and apparel. When you’re starting or running a business, it’s about leveraging your success into bigger and better things. Never be satisfied and always be ready to build upon the foundations you already have,” he explains.
Then at 25, Trav also founded Flex Watches. As the name suggests, flexibility was a core tenet of the whole business, both in its practices and in its products. Flex Watches are built around the idea of watches with interchangeable parts that come in fun styles. Each color represents a different charity, and those charities get 10% of the proceeds whenever someone buys a new watch. This is something Trav had been dreaming about since he was 14.
Today he’s been featured on MTV’s Real World and CNBC’s The Profit with Marcus Lemonis, and he has worked with brands like Star Wars, Minions, and WWE and his products have been worn by celebrities like Diddy, Lebron James, and the Kardashians. Trav has also been able to work with major business moguls like Daymond John from Shark Tank.
After all this success, people often ask him for advice. Typically, they’re looking for a single piece of “secret” advice that will get them the life they’re dreaming of. There is no special secret sauce, however. “Being successful is a matter of being creative, resourceful, motivated, and, of course, hard-working. Lacking even one of these qualities is the main reason why so many startups fail in their first year,” Trav remarks. He stresses how important it is for business owners to put their business above everything else, at least for the first year. Startups don’t have a lot of resources, so the founder has to be flexible and be able to put in a lot of their own time.
Trav is currently working on a handful of projects. He owns seven companies that sell consumer products online, has his own online course teaching other entrepreneurs how to build their personal brand and grow their network, and runs an e-commerce agency that helps other companies market and sell their products online. In addition to all of this, Trav is an advisor to several companies in the DTC space, including a skincare brand, a CBD company, and a coffee business. Head over to Travis Lubinsky’s Instagram page, @trav, to see what he’s currently doing, and get some entrepreneurship advice as well as messages of support and motivation along the way.
