Andrew Desiderio shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Hi Andrew, thank you so much for joining us today. We’re thrilled to learn more about your journey, values and what you are currently working on. Let’s start with an ice breaker: What are you most proud of building — that nobody sees?
Happiness, undoubtedly. We are all naturally capitalists by nature and love to sell our product and dream of financial bliss. But there is something special about creating a product and seeing people genuinely happy and excited about it. It is truly humbling for somebody to see your creation and appreciate it so much that they get a dopamine rush from it. Without a doubt that is the greatest motivator, and I do believe if you can create that feeling with genuine intention that the successes will come inevitably.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I am Andrew Desiderio, the owner of Rhyle Swim and Gone Bananas Beachwear.
Gone Bananas Beachwear is San Diego’s preeminent swimwear store. In 2020, at the onset of the pandemic, we took a risk on the opportunity to create our own bikini line in Rhyle Swim. Many companies were struggling under the weight of the pandemic and as a multi brand retailer we worried about the loss of product diversity in our retail store, so we felt a chance to add some curated products that we were lacking was worth the risk of creating a new company.
We are glad we did as the pandemic changed retail forever with the surge of e-commerce and so many of our wholesale suppliers becoming more vertical. While we will always balance our amazing relationships with our wholesale suppliers, it became a lot of fun to add our expertise to designs of our own and since we did not want to risk our suppliers worrying about us copying their designs, it added a lot of creativity to give unique designs that our San Diego market really showed us they longed for.
Now we are going into our 5th year and what we expect to be our best yet!
Amazing, so let’s take a moment to go back in time. What’s a moment that really shaped how you see the world?
When I was a teenager, and in the throes of being an angsty teenager, I was having a meltdown one day. At that age your world views are really developing, in both a macro and in a micro way. For myself, this meltdown was about struggling with understanding why some things don’t work out the way you want them to even if you feel you did every thing right. I said to someone, “It’s just not fair!” and probably with a little callousness the response to me was “No one said life is fair!” and that for some reason pops into my head almost weekly. Sometimes in a self deprecating way, sometimes in a motivating way. It is such a simple truth that life is not about fairness, but with that comes humility and motivation if you can step back to see a greater perspective. At your highest highs, it brings appreciation for reaching those highs as you know there is no guarantee at any moment, and at your lowest lows it is a motivator to keep pushing because sometimes some moments are just a challenge specific to you and that doesn’t mean that it cannot be overcome.
What fear has held you back the most in your life?
The fear of failing. While that may manifests in many ways, it can become paralyzing to me.
The most paralyzing of which is the fear of failing to be the version of myself that I believe I am, I guess they would call this our ego. But sometimes my fears create worry that if I try and fail at something that it might mean I was not as capable as I believed or not as worthy.
Sometimes a little grounding is important to break through those restraints. To know that it’s going to be okay, no matter what it will be okay, naturally as long as you aren’t risking your life.
It’s okay to challenge yourself, it’s okay to go for it, it’s okay to take chance. Most importantly it’s okay to fail. It does not mean that the end is near. It may not be pretty, but it does not mean that was the only chance at success.
I think our readers would appreciate hearing more about your values and what you think matters in life and career, etc. So our next question is along those lines. What do you believe is true but cannot prove?
That we are stuck in a hustle culture since the pandemic and that it is bad for consumerism.
At no time will I ever deny that it’s getting tough out there. Every day it seems like a new price hike, a new bill, a new challenge. But in the product and brand development stage we are stuck in a deluge of side hustles and gambits that really feels like we are lacking true passionate and creative producers. I won’t even attempt to articulate some political perspective of this, but from my perspective of the onslaught of side hustles and part time businesses we really lack true fundamental advancement in what we are consuming. In my industry alone there are more swimwear companies than any time in history yet somehow it seems like the least amount of creativity and design. What I truly believe is true is that so very often the motivation appears to be about hustling for sales or leveraging a trend rather than passionately creating a product and business that advances that industry.
Okay, so let’s keep going with one more question that means a lot to us: What is the story you hope people tell about you when you’re gone?
That I just truly cared. Sometimes all of that passion manifests itself with a little abrasiveness, but the reality is every day I put every ounce towards what I do. Whether that is designing bikinis, whether that is helping customers, whether that is trying to teach my employees new insights or whether that is in my friendships and relationships. Apathy is not an emotion I hold. I hope everyone has a story about how passionate I was in those interactions I held with them.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://rhyleswim.com & https://gonebananasbeachwear.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/rhyleswim
- Other: TikTok.com/@gonebananasbeachwear
TikTok.com/@rhyleswim
Image Credits
@marianaleonphotography
