Pip Edwards Has Something To Say

you're listening to a mama mia podcast Mama Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and Waters that this podcast is recorded [Music] on welcome to no filter I'm Mia fredman and a couple of weeks ago I saw a headline on a gossip site you might have also seen it and it made me so angry that I posted about it the headline was pip Edwards Revenge body PE Nation founder shows off her incredibly toned Physique in a skimpy bikini now pip Edwards as the headlin said is the co-founder actually of an incredibly successful business called PE Nation but this article had pictures taken without her knowledge or permission of her at the beach just trying to live her life going for a swim and along with it was an entirely madeup story about how she'd supposedly lost weight to take revenge on a famous ex-boyfriend who'd been in the media because he'd had a drunken drama after allegedly being caught cheating on his girlfriend hiip Edwards wasn't even there when all of this happened but her name was mentioned and she was forced to release a statement that became iconic this is not my circus in other words please remove me from this narrative I want know part of it and yet this gossip site and many others managed to reduce an independent self-made businesswoman who has had enormous success and is so many things including being a single mother of a teenage son and a business owner and an icon in the fashion industry and a Trailblazer they managed to reduce her into an accessory and the idea that her body was somehow changed or modified in response to the drama in an ex-boyfriend's life struck me as just so deeply unfair so I posted about it people left a comment on my post and we started talking today you're going to hear that conversation and you're going to get a glimpse of a woman who's finally finding the courage to speak for herself and make her own narrative how do you reclaim and reassert your identity from a narrative and a circus that's not of your making you start to talk the real shit like you start to really speak your truth and I guess that's why I'm on here today pip Edwards is a force she describes herself as turbocharged you'll hear that in a second and it's always struck me as absurd that such a driven powerful and successful woman is not just this time but so often reduced publicly to a socialite or an influencer or a support player in someone else's circus well not anymore pip Edwards is finally finding her voice now it was hard to get this interview with you firstly cuz you don't talk to anyone but secondly you don't have a lot of time and we were dming and you said I have between 12:30 and 1:30 on Tuesday and I was like right we'll make it work I'm so sorry no that's that's reflective of your life yeah if I looked at your life from paparazzi photos or Instagram I would think but what does she do all day she just has to get ready to go out and take some selfies just do Pilates all day pilates class can you talk me through your day yesterday from the minute you woke up to the minute you went to bed yeah so woke up my son was sick had to deal with a mountain of homework to do that he hadn't done and year he's in year 11 he's fatigued he plays a lot of basketball so you know just that was a bit of a a spanner in the morning I then go to Pilates which is my Monday Tuesday Wednesday routine and that is my only hour to myself where I can actually distract my mind and focus on my body so that's awesome you go out to studio and I've been going to her for seven years now one-on-one like it's quite intense but it's really good and I broke a sweat there which was great and then I get into the office and well yesterday I had a photo shoot I started off with a photo shoot and then I went into a product meeting what was the photo shoot for was it for Media or was it something it was for Med photo shoot around my profile for a certain lift out coming understand so similar to this it's like as the face of a brand as a high-profile personality in the face of a company you have to do media that's part of your job media sh yeah especially when it comes around I would guess post the Stella coming out of that like there's a lot more of that yeah so I had the media photo shoot then I had regular product meetings every day so so what's a product meeting well that's down with the design team with the product team I'm going to talk a bit of internal language but we're selling in Q4 we've just finished selling in Q4 this year we're about to sell in q1 next year so Jan March and then we've just finished designing Q2 next year and we're starting to design Q3 next year which is July August September so we've just got to you know you analyze the data you got to keep bringing that back and reviewing and changing so I love to hold their hand through that process and so I'm quite involved in the trenches there so that was that's a product meeting how many people work for you 50ish yeah and what kinds of things do they do it's a full setup we've got you know HR Logistics Finance Marketing sales online digital marketing design product development I mean it's a fully functioning Masterpiece and your role as what is your title creative director and what does that mean what do you do I think I set the vision the energy across the business but I think if we were to split CLA and I split and div we divide and conquer so Claire's got more of a skill set around product and technicality around product whereas I come from merching like planning stories color Creative Design but Visionary across yeah and then I just go on and then I go on so CLA would start the product up front we start together with the creative brief then she goes into actually doing the technical stuff with her team while I'm prepping all the other stuff with the marketing Sales Online yeah okay so you've got meetings in the middle of the day with a product team then what do you do well Mondays tend to be a little bit more fluid because Tuesdays is the big trade day so what does that mean Tuesday is like we you know analyze the week's trade from data seed to marketing the online DTC is itcc direct to consum so we Analyze That from all those angles and then so you look at all the numbers on Tuesday what you sold from the week before products print like analyze it all from international local by we look at it by store by Outlet we even look at it by retailer so wholesale and then product level down to you know numbers price point markdown current that sounds quite boring how I fucking love it well that's what's interesting Sor that's my favorite bit because I think my fa favorite part is seeing something turn or not work and then trying to understand why why they're not and then taking that feedback back to the design team and trying to still be disruptive in terms of design but also the commercial ends you know it's a business so I want to ask you about that but how many outlets is PA Nation sold in I think we have around 500 touch points I think so all the the numbers and stuff come in on Tuesday yeah just to wrap it up they wrap it up on Monday to present what kinds of things might you learn out of that data well change what you do moving forward this is technically still q1 so q1's janif fed March we've just wrapped up designing q1 so I can impact next year's by little tweaks but we're developing Q2 and so we're a year in advance in designing but utilizing all the information that's available to us today and it can change and fluctuate but you know you can start to pick up regular patterns if you're interested every day which I am a graphic might switch off a color might not work um would not to bring it back or do we change the panone color so you have those kinds of meetings all the time but we're really working towards this just collaborative across Department because there is a lot of information that we need so we have those meetings all the time involving head of sales head of product design and marketing to kind of be as robust as you can are there some times when you get feedback that it's like you really wanted something to work and it didn't like of course what are some times where there are some things I would call that like a loss leader so there's things that are commercially you look at it you're like Nob brainer money in the bank kind of you know be an example of that black leggings black leggings or leopard right that's a no-brainer but then there'd be like a more forward like paneled maybe you know a little bit more color blocked something that's a little bit wild but I would say that a brand piece and I would put my foot down to have it even though sales like no we're not going to get volume I got it doesn't matter if that's part of the story or a new way of styling It Forward we're doing it cuz you can't build a brand on black leggings well if you look at the history of sales in any brand over the last 20 years I'll say the top 10 products would be black so where's the color in that like and and when I mean color where's the personality where's the brand yeah right can you leave the office anytime you want do you know what's really funny I'm sure I can I don't I ask permission cuz I'm a I don't know that's a weird thing by me I'm who you ask everyone I I sometimes say to my team I'm leaving now like because I'm I'm a trained worker that's how I've been brought up I work my hours how do you start a brand shit do you know what but the brand it's such an interesting thing when you are that person that goes on a limb to start a brand it is personal it's an energy it's a feeling and to create context and feeling around product isn't as easy as it looks you've got to be really authentic and really believe it and you've got to live and breathe it and all of that and when you're so clear on who you are what energy is what your Vibe is the DNA it makes the whole process a lot easier so you know hey know who you are know what you're going for know what you stand for it's more of a marketing exercise really like why do you need the product or and how do you you know what problem is the product going to solve yeah you had worked within big Brands before well established Brands although subie wasn't that well established when you were in on the ground floor of subie weren you at the early early stages yeah I got to subie in early 2004 was that before or after the rats that was after they did the rats in 2001 when the rats came down the catwalk at Australian Fashion Week yeah and you know what subie is an anomaly like I learned a lot there from the boys club but they did not compromise on who they were they were controversial they were tongue and cheek they had crazy attitude they were cool you know they weren't how did that they wer they weren't the greatest in terms of like the business Acumen but it didn't really bother them because they were just so reckless with their Authority in in who they were that's a prime example of building a brand I mean they did they sold out I mean in those early days the demand was high because they created that demand and then they added to that with the whole music scene backing it up and the connections and the international like Network that they had and then you start to put the numbers and the science and the structure behind it and I mean that's really what it needed in those early days and then you were assassin bid and then General pants so you were within well established oh yeah and Global I mean you know subie was Global I mean I I left there in 2008 and I went to sass and bad straight away and I mean you know Mass sassin VI huge National retailer love them you know the girls such again such a different cre process going from men to women yeah Boys Club to Mom's Club yeah what was that like yeah it was amazing because you know you could see how much the care and the nurturing was there to staff but also seeing working moms do it you became a mom early I remember because I became a mom way before any of my peers at 25 how old were you I felt pregnant at 25 yeah so I remember reading an interview with you in those early days and I'd kind of done my partying and I was a Nana by the time I had a baby but I didn't get the sense that you were and you were living in subie land I was right in the epicenter of a crazy social movement you know like it was like the eye of the storm and everyone around us yeah it was very fluid music fashion party night life nightclubs it all my tense and it was a really hard time how did you manage that well enough I was so young too I mean I was oblivious again yeah like you said I didn't have many friends that had gone through the process it was quite lonely being pregnant to be honest and the whole body image around I think I might have been more on the skinny side of life prior given you know how busy we were and that whole body image change was quite confronting when you were surrounded by skinny models when I was pregnant I just yeah and and obviously working in the industry it's kind of hard to wrap your head around how drastically your body changes what did it do to your head space well at that time yeah there was a lot going on that I don't remember it being a great experience but I don't really remember I'm almost like blocked it out but Dan was traveling a lot subie was going through a lot of change there was you know potential investors from the US so I spent a lot of time kind of yeah dealing with that I had my parents though why did you decide to have that baby at that time cuz on paper it was a terrible time we did make a decision to have a baby like it was a conscious decision so Dan your partner at that time the father of your son we didn't realize I guess how quickly it would happen you'd been dating for a while you were working together yeah and i' you know you're on contraception for a long time prior to that why did you want to have a baby at that time cuz you were just madly in love I love Yeah Yeah seemed like in a big adventure well I think it just if anyone really thinks about having a baby are you really going to have one in a sense like if you really went through the nuts and boltes and the change and sorry I'm just like being honest it's like nothing's going to prepare you for what a baby brings but if the love and the energy and the passion and the excitement's there and you're swept up in it well there's no better time what did it do to your identity because I remember I was the editor of Cosmo at the time yeah I was going to say you were at Cosmo yeah and I didn't mention obviously the people around me I didn't hide that I had a baby but I never wrote about it so I was never publicly back then before social media you could do that so when I think about it now that's insane I was the editor of Cosmo for seven years what a perfect platform to talk about well I wrote a column every month but I didn't ever mention that I had a child and at the time I I told myself it was cuz I wanted him to have have privacy but I realize now it's my identity wasn't ready to kind of metabolize that idea of myself as a mother yeah I mean I'd never held a baby until I'd given birth to Justice same so I it was all very foreign I mean I was terrified to give him a bath I didn't even know what you know I didn't know what to do but how was Dan was he into it oh Dan was handson at the beginning yeah no he's he was a very excited like he he's a a little bit more um what's the word I don't know he he he can handle that kind of stuff I get I was a bit um freaked out freaked out but honestly having Justice at that time was a godsend for me why like at the time it was a lot of adjusting there was a lot of pressure I mean Dan and I split a year after the baby and you became a single M and I became a single mom so that's I mean that's a whole another story I remember reading an interview with your one stage and you said something about your mom looked after Justice either on the weekend or during the week I couldn't remember which one the week I'm an only child so my mom and dad were just so thrilled so they like co-parent with you pretty much I mean I was still learning in my mind I mean I was still a baby I'd go to all the mother's groups and you know all those things and it would be like I was quite significantly younger than a lot of the other moms but at the time I guess what I didn't realize was that Justice would become my stake in the ground you know he would be the grounding Force I needed because I lived such a whirlwind tornado kind of life my my general Pace in life is Turbo he just brings it home brings it in and if I didn't have him I don't think I would have connection to a greater purpose I just wouldn't he's why well he's made me find that in myself like the Bal the balance you know or the selflessness or the thought that you know life is bigger than what is in front of you or what's you know challenging you you know he's the North Star for sure so I I know exactly what you mean because I remember feeling so relieved at the time even though Parts it were hard that I wasn't the center of the universe anymore like there was a relief in that as well as a I don't know if I had a relief at the time but it's more of a hindsight yeah it's a hindsight relief at the time I mean I have spoken not obviously to the two people a lot of people but the pregnancy it was really hard for me because it's just the sleep deprivation the challenges around your body all of that and to be honest I had to get back to work and how was I going to manage because you had to earn money cuz you're a single mother and how did you manage that oh uh it was really hard there was a lot of tears there's a lot of leaning on my parents definitely for the first eight years there was a lot of adjustment and I think that's what almost conditioned me into this multitasking turbo freak that I am and when I mean freak is like I can manage a lot I can juggle a lot of things in the air and I think that's what kind of got me to do that having a child certainly makes you not waste time no no you are absolutely time poor and you know if you've got yeah like you said if you've got bills to pay there's a will there's a way I was literally fitting it in hence my even my schedule at the moment I don't waste any time I don't know whether that's good or bad because because it is running on a jaline it's when you're at work you feel like you're stealing time from your kid and when you're with your kid you feel like you're stealing time from work and then you're still the and then you're at work and you still got to deal with your kids admin and the school strule and the emails and this and then when you're at home when you need to focus on him and the homework you still got to do the research the this the that you know so it's just it's non-stop I want to ask you about him growing up yes single moms and their sons very special relationship yeah did he have to be the parent sometimes I will say I took a very different approach with parenting him to the way I was parented no disrespect mom or dad but you know my parents parents like Iron Fist very strong people had a very set way of how I was going to be brought up it was academic there were rules there were and I abided by them I had this moral compass towards my parents that you know require you didn't question their authority never questioned their Authority required their approval still to this day probably something why I'm in therapy but will um but Justice I because I had him so young and I think my parents were quite old when they had me so there there is an age Gap there's a cultural Gap and an age Gap my might I was always going to be a young mom and Justice and I were we were going to teach each other along the way and he 100% I've been blessed with a kid that just has a knowing he's sensitive he's been here a thousand times before and he can just strip everything right back to what really counts and he's phenomenal his mindset is I mean literally he gets up at 5:00 in the morning no I have not told him to do any of this by the way but he gets up at 5:00 in the morning does his yoga stretches meditates cold shower to the theme song of Rocky goes to basketball TR wait makes his bed then leaves I'm just like my room's a fucking like a been in tornado like literally but like I've never made my bed by the way some things you can and can't teach your children and they just either they know and you and it's how you kind of nurture that and allow them to flourish that way but I've leared so much from him just when I get a bit caught up in my passion I'd like to say or my emotion he can just go Mom it's actually not like that he can ground you and also call you on your shit calls me on my shit doesn't like it when I call him on his [Music] though after the break pip speaks about the hard parts and the incredible parts of being a single mom to her 16-year-old son Justice including what it's been like to co-parent with her ex Dan single and the Fallout of his catastrophic injury a few years ago one of the hardest times as a mother of a son is when they go into that tunnel that teen tunnel where they so I'm in that where they have to pull away and if they don't there's something not quite right if they haven't pulled away cuz either it means they don't feel secure enough or there's something going on but they need to and you're not the moon and the stars anymore yeah I've just I'm in that I'm in the middle of that how are you handling which has been really hard because I'm not good with onew answers and I'm a talker and he's expecting me to ask him certain questions in a certain way and I'm not doing it and so we've had a bit of a breakthrough actually on Sunday I sent him open he he wanted to go to see my therapist to start talking about some stuff because I'm like I really started this opening up and trying to process life too late in life you know and I need him when did you start going to therapy you know maybe 12 years ago but not intensely and I've tried different types of it and right now I'm really in the zone and I love where it's taking me and and what I'm learning but it's taken me to go through different types of therap to find one that I know agrees with what have you found now more energy based therap like more NLP neural Linguistics and stuff like that that's how I talk that's how I feel that's where I operate my best and I know that Justice is the same so I've almost suggested him to go down that road and he went for the first time on Sunday and he was meant to only be there for an hour and he was there for 2 hours came home with a just absolute Clarity Spirit really was like wanting to get to the bottom of why he's finding himself in these mind ruts like he you could just see him getting stuck in his head and I was like oh my God he's just I'm so happy that he wanted to do that because his 25y old self or his 30y old self is just going to be so and any woman that's out there is so fucking lucky to even have a relationship with my son do you know what I mean yeah you know do you find it's hard people say oh you shouldn't be friends with your kids kids you shouldn't try to be friends with your kids I've always found that very difficult like I just love talking to my kids I love hanging out with my kids why why do people say that well because it's that they've got friends what you're meant to be is boundaries and like a dictator good for them yeah well I guess you know rules and boundaries and sometimes you know a friend might not necessarily Point them in the right direction they sometimes have to not like you do you find that hard yeah well a single mom when there's not a second par a long time you know when in the early years I guess yeah when Dan spent a lot of time overseas I was pretty much trying to be that nurturing mom but trying to be trying to be disciplinary and and yeah I was very physical trying to in physical in the sense of like doing all the sport stuff like trying to be like sporty for him and then I found myself contradicting myself so trying to put in these boundaries and then going no I can't do that to kind of thing so yeah it's hard but for me you're living under the one roof we're growing up together I'm learning he's learning the dialogue is so open and honest I wouldn't want it any other way so of course he's my friend yeah he's my bestest friend he knows me best and you get they get to like nearly 17 and it's like he's my Confidant he's my roommate he's my son he's he's a great human I love talking to him I want him to talk more I mean yeah there's no right or wrong honestly does he have a relationship with his dad yeah they have really lately in the last couple of years blossomed and he does he he sees a lot of the beauty in his dad which I think's great and would wouldn't want it any other way tell me about co-parenting you split up when Justice was one you guys have been his parents or you will always his parents but that you've done 16 years almost of co-parenting tell me what that's been like as you know Dan's been married before you've had other partners different people have come in and out of your life I don't know if Dan's had any more children but how have you navigated the last 16 years as co-parents well it's been T his Justice is with me fulltime cuz Dan doesn't live in Sydney and he lived in America for a significant amount of time and then post his accident he came back to Australia and he lives in Byron so I definitely do the school terms and all the admin around that and the structure and that's why my mom and dad are so amazing with helping with keeping that on track cuz it's a lot and then in the holidays Dan we'll have a Justice half the time so co-parenting in physical terms maybe not So Co but co-parenting in no but co-parenting I mean in terms of not the logistics cuz he's been with you all his life but you know when there are big decisions to be made do you just you don't like no we have I do I've we do confir there's been you know love late there's been some where you know I guess this this move to send Justice to therapy was a big one and he was obviously all for it but so it's understood between you that you take all the decisions not all but definitely definitely most of them happen under my watch for sure but Dan's amazing in the sense that he's got quite a crazy Spirit to him and he's enthusiastic and he's a big thinker and I think he fills Justice with the hope of those dreams I'm more of a realist so I'm like you can dream big cuz I'm a big dreamer but we need to take actions and steps to get there to execute that's so that's the difference that Justice gets balance when you referred to Dan's accident he fell out of a hotel balcony in Paris did terrible damage broke yeah ConEd his body I think he died on impact he was in a coma for 3 or 4 months over there yeah how did you manag that with Justice and how old was Justice at the time Justice was 11 it was an awful experience especially cuz Justice and I were here and we couldn't get over there and I think Justice is still you know processing what that means to him which is also why the therapy was really important to go to but yeah I mean it's not not nice and it's not nice thinking about how that impacts Justice how that impacts Dan and we're still dealing I guess with the effects of that too is he recovering yeah I mean he's fully walking and functioning you know but there's elements that are obvious and you know there's physical elements and it's still there the remnants of it yeah you're talking about having to be Justice's mother and his father and I've heard you talking about the masculine and The Feminine in you in business and you know when you're running a company you have to be very you don't have to be a man but you have you are in your masculine you do not have a choice I've been put in situations that are a byproduct of a situation like I'm a single mom I'm also an only child a single mom Raising a Son trying to run a business run a household do it of course I'm in my masculine you have to be making ision all the time I'm only learning now how to be more soft and vulnerable in a space where I feel safe but it requires me to feel safe it's hard to switch cuz I know what you mean you're at work and you have to have armor and you have to do all of those things and then in a romantic relationship you have to feel safe in a romantic sense too and history would say I'm not sure if I've ever felt safe how good is she that actually isn't the end of our conversation the rest of our chat is available for Mama Mia subscribers and that's where we delve into her past relationships I think there's also a certain type of man who is very attracted to a very strong woman yeah then they like to change breaks you down her battle with early menopause and the effect on her fertility no one is talking about the fact that all these situ situations and Life Choices of Being Fit and busy and running a business impacts your reproductive health and being relentlessly pursued by the paparazzi what does that feel like I've worked out how to manage my Instagram posting to deflect them from where I am or what I'm doing post later post once I've left all this they still find me I don't know how that episode is available right now for Mama Mia subscribers and there's a link in the show notes if you want to listen or subscribe thank you so much to my guest pip Edwards check out her brand PE Nation it's awesome the producer of no filter is emiline Peterson our executive producer is Elijah Ratliff with sound production by meline Janu I'm mayia fredman and thanks for having me in your ears