david: this is my kitchen table and it's also my filing system. over much of the past three decades, i have been an investor. the highest calling of mankind i have often thought was private equity. [laughter] and then i started interviewing. i've learned from doing my interviews how leaders make it

to the top. jeff: i asked him what he wanted, he said $250. i said fine. i did not negotiate with him, i did not do any due diligence. david: i have something i would like to sell. [laughter] you don't feel inadequate being the second wealthiest man in the world, is that right? one of the most recognized names and faces in the world is kim kardashian. she has more than 365 million instagram followers. i don't have any instagram followers. she decided to get into private equity and is starting a fund with one of my former partners, jay sammons. i had a chance at a private equity conference to interview jay and kim and a chance to interview kim kardashian alone before the conference began. i have often said private equity is the highest calling of mankind. why did it take you so long to realize and join the private equity world? kim: i finally got talked into it, once i came to that realization. i've had a long-standing relationship with jay, who came

from the carlyle group, and i was close to doing a few deals with jay when he was at the carlyle group. for about 10 years, we had conversations, whether it was through something we were going to do or people close to us were going to do, and i was privy to all of those conversations. so we finally, you know, had the conversation that we should really get into business together. it has been a fascinating process. david: the name of your firm is skky partners. sky is usually spelled s-k-y. yours is s-k-k-y. how did you come up with that name? [laughter] kim: we had to have a little bit of influence, i thought. i thought the s for sammons and

kk for kim kardashian. it worked out, it made sense. david: you've been exposed to private equity for a little bit of time. you've met with investors here and around the world and so forth. what is your view of the private equity investment community? the most honest people you have ever met? kim: very, very nice people. [laughter] i actually have been introduced to the world. a lot of my friends growing up are in this space now, so i am on a group chat where i am being asked all the time about different companies and businesses, mostly tech that they invest in, if they are good companies, and i've even gotten on zooms with founders to hear their pitches on their businesses, as if i work with them already, so i felt like it would be a good next step to do it together. david: so, jay, how did the two

of you meet, and how did you get into private equity, and why do you specialize in consumer? jay: i started -- well, first of all, david, thank you for having us here. i started my career almost 23 years ago and had the privilege of spending the last 17 years working for you, as you know. i did not start investing in consumer businesses until i started at carlyle, but obviously spent the entirety of my time doing that and in particular spent my time trying to back high-growth consumer brands, and i have a passion for that. it's the best place to invest and the experiences i had at carlyle put us in a position to build something special. david: you have a clothing company which is called skims. kim: yes. david: and you have a skincare beauty company called skin by kim.

did you need help coming up with that name? probably not. ok, so to businesses is pretty big, those are big businesses. why did you think you have the time -- you have four children -- to do another business in the private equity world, how much time you have for something like this? kim: i feel like in life, you have to do things that challenge you and help you grow and evolve. this is a space that, after spending a lot of time with jay and with the knowledge i have learned studying businesses, taking investments from firms, and having great relationships and being on the other side, seeing relationships not work out if you do not know what the right investment person and team, i really felt like we could set ourselves apart by

really being that person that has been the founder, that believes in the founder, that wants to really help that company grow and thrive and really support them, because i have been there and seeing relationships work and not work. it was just something that i was really interested in and that i was willing to cut back on other things. david: ok, and so when you ask people to do meetings, do they say, "no," or is it hard to get a meeting with investors or not that hard? jay: the answer is no and i'm grateful for that. it is largely because i believe that what kim and i are building is unlike anything else being built in this space. it is a very intentional combination of complementary skill sets that other firms do not have. david: right now, the private equity world, it's tough to get

financing for deals and so forth. are you going to do buyouts that require financing or growth capital deals, which don't need as much or any? jay: our strategy is consistent with what i have done in the past, which was unreliant on leverage. it's about great execution on value, not the marginal leverage. in some instances, when the company is can use it, we will use a little bit, but it's about getting behind the right ideas. david: wheheal come along, i presume you are on the investment committee, is it a one-person veto if you don't like the deal? how does that work? kim: well, so far, we have not run into that issue. we respect each other's opinion and trust each other. i think culturally we have the same vision of what brands we think can grow and that we think can help make an impact.

we both really believe that our team being included in decisions is important, and we want everyone on our team to have a voice. david: what is it you are most looking forward to about private equity? is it coming to conferences like this, is that what you're looking forward to? [laughter] kim: absolutely. i am most looking forward to my relationships with the founders. i am really fascinated to hear their back story. i am a storyteller. i am so excited just to have the opportunity to help them win, and i love hearing people's stories and hearing what their magic sauce is behind their company and why they wanted to start the company that they did and what their vision is and hope i can help. i've always felt doubt and i've always just taken that as motivation to have me focus more and work harder. i felt like i had more to prove.

♪ david: so, you can be called one of the first influencers or maybe the first of the influencers.

did you know what an influencer was really going to lead to when you first became an "influencer"? kim: no, i really didn't. i knew social media was interesting in a way where where i personally, when i got on, i used it as a free focus group, when i had questions about launching my first product ever, which was a fragrance, and i needed opinions and i went to twitter. twitter was the first real platform besides myspace, which at that time, an influencer was not in the mindset. same with twitter really for a while. it was more, i think, a way to communicate with a fan base, but i did use it as a free focus group that i thought was fascinating, and i felt like the customer became more invested in the fragrance that i was launching, because they hold a part of it, and i thought that was interesting.

i did not quite, at that time, realize what a tool social media would be for business. david: you've built several businesses. while you were building them, people would say, well, she cannot build a fragrance business or a clothing business, because she does not have a background but they turned out successful, so did people not think you could do it urge you to make it more successful, or were you nervous they were right, and you could not build the businesses? kim: i definitely took the doubt as motivation. i still do. you always feel insecure about it. confident in the brand and launching a brand, the whole process of it. i always have those healthy nerves when you are launching something, especially on a product launch day, that i've

always felt the doubt, and i've always just taken that as motivation to have me focus more and work harder and felt like i had more to prove. david: no one can build or run a business by themselves, so you have to hire people and get people around you for your businesses. how do you select who you are going to hire, and do you ever have to fire anyone and say you are good but not quite good enough? kim: yes, i have a great team and a small team. firing is really difficult for me, so i always have someone else do it. it's really hard for me. unless it's someone who works in my household, and i have a personal relationship with them. i would give them the respect to do that, but i have a small team. when we started skims, my beauty business, everything that i do starts with a selective team, even from my business manager. everyone is just someone that i

have taken a lot of time to get to know, i trust, and a good community relationship within my office and within my house staff everywhere is the most important thing. david: you test the products yourself, whether it's a beauty product or something you always tested? kim: everything, yes, yes. i'm so involved. to this day, i am still our model, which we have like a group of fit models, and i will know the collection that i did not fit for, i'm very specific on how things fit. and i pick the fabrics, i come up with the marketing. so with my skims and my beauty brands, i do every last thing from packaging design to helping with the fonts and, you know, every campaign, every photographer, every formula of every product i have to be involved 100%. david: many people would say in one family, you cannot have too many talented business people.

in your family, you seem to have a lots, so is there a competition between you and your sisters? or you are so friendly, there is no competition? kim: you know, kylie and i are in the beauty business, and we do not compete. we have totally different brands and demographics, so i would say we do not compete in that way. if anything, we would motivate each other, and we work privately and do not really communicate with each other about what we are launching. if we're really excited about something, we will share the process, but it's really rare that we do that now. we don't compete like that, we all just focus and do our own thing. david: your mother has been involved with your career as well, and your mother is involved with your sisters'

careers as well, so is she a superstar business manager? an impresario? or how does she manage to keep all the children happy and have them each have their own career in businesses and still be so close to them? kim: she is definitely the smartest woman i know, and she was a housewife when she was married to my dad, and she raised the four of us. then when she married my stepdad, she became his agent and manager and got her license and figured it out. really helped that and it bled into wanting to help her children when the time was right, when our career started, so i ask her how she manages six kids, and we all have very similar lives, but i find it really interesting that a lot of people call her to want to get her to be their manager, and her heart is with her children. i think it is a different kind

of love and motivation, but she has helped us all figure it out. we come to her for every ounce of advice, and she has been great at managing all us, but she is also great at being the best mom and even maybe a manager would push for one decision, she will push for a mom decision first. david: your father passed away at a young age of cancer. he was a well-known lawyer. did that motivate you to want to become a lawyer yourself? kim: absolutely. just seeing him every day, would get up, be on his way to work, drop us off at school, we would see him go to work, come home for dinner. i saw how hard he worked, and i saw his work ethic that really drove me and especially his law studies i think really inspired me. we talked about it. he passed away when i was 22, so i was in college, and we talked about my path in college when he was really realistic.

i did not like school, and he said, you know, i just do not think you want to do this full time. i really want you to think about this. but if you stay in school, i will, you know, help with your apartment, and it was like a trade-off that he would help. i wanted to be independent and i wanted to not go down that journey at that time and -- but i do think that he would absolutely be proud of me. but the fact that i'm doing it now, he would be the best study buddy and help me study. david: to be a lawyer in california, you don't have to go to law school. abraham lincoln never went to school, but he passed the bar exam, and you're going to take

another one at some point in time, is that right? kim: in two years, i'll take the next one. since i passed the first one, i could practice under someone. but to be a lawyer on my own, i have to pass the second bar, so constitutional law is kicking my butt, and that is what i'm studying currently. and it is extremely time-consuming but so worth it. ♪ david: so as you've become

well-known, i think you have more twitter followers than probably almost anybody in the world. you have something like 350 million instagram followers, is that the right number? kim: 359 million. david: i have zero. i'm afraid to be on instagram, because i would not have any followers. when you go to a restaurant or you go out in the public anywhere, can you ever be not bothered by people who want to take your picture, want a selfie, want an autograph? how do you deal with all of that? kim: depending on where you go, you have to know where to go. you can get away with that sometimes, but you have to understand that when you go out in public, that is what comes along with the territory. i love to travel the world. if i go to japan, no one will ask. their culture is different.

different places all over the world just have different beliefs and cultures where it's just not as important to them to ask for photos, so it is fun to travel and get away sometimes from that, but i also know that that kind of comes along with the territory as well. david: how do you convince your children not every mother is as famous as you, because they see that you are well-known? how do you convince your children not every mother is that way, and they have to live life different than the one you're living? kim: i think that they do understand that every family is different, even within my sisters, other sisters have different rules, snacks they can eat, snacks we can eat. we talk about different families and different rules. i think that they grew up seeing a lot, and whether they were at

their dad's big events or filming with me and seeing stuff, i think they just have known, and we have been open and honest about our lives and how big it is and how different it is, and let's be positive and think of all the good, positive things and just try to give them amazing experiences, but they are so normal and well-grounded that i am so happy that they have a group of cousins that can all relate, and we all live in the same gated community, and they ride bikes to each other's houses and scooters. they are the most normal well-adjusted kids, and it just makes me so happy. as a mom, you just feel like you are doing something right when your kids are happy. david: when you were a little girl, the age of your children, could everyone pronounce the name kardashian then?

now it is a well-known name, but i imagine people pronounced it incorrectly, did you correct them? was everyone pronouncing it correctly? kim: no, i remember i would laugh with my dad about this, during the o.j. simpson trial, when reporters would say his name, they would get it wrong and say different versions of it, and my dad told me a story that when armenians came to america they took off the i-a-n, so they are armenian. our last name would be kardash, and he would say never take the i-a-n off your name. now it seems really simple. david: you and your mother and your sisters and family became famous initially, i think, with the tv show called "keeping up with the kardashians." is that what it's called? kim: yes. david: when you were approached

about that, did you roll your eyes and say i don't want to do a reality show, or did you say, "we are going to be famous because of this?" who came to you with the idea? did all of you want to do it unanimously, or did you say maybe not? kim: i remember being at my best friend's house, 1989, so i was 9, and the show "the real world" launched. i looked at my best friends and said, i have to be on a reality show. i go, that's what i want to do when i grow up. and she said when we are 18, we will make an audition tape for "the real world," and she goes, i don't want to be on, but i will be your manager and her dad was a manager. we laugh now at our conversation. the show came about because kathy lee gifford is one of my mom's closest friends, and when she would stay with us, she would just laugh and say, "you are a reality show." what you're talking about, fighting about, how you live your life, this has to be a reality show.

we called ryan seacrest, got connected to him. met with that network and our show was on the air. i think we were a filler show for a show that fell out of production, and they needed something quickly. we just started filming. we thought we would be on for one season or two seasons, and we did 20 seasons of "keeping up with the kardashians," 10 spinoffs, and now we are filming season number four of "the kardashians," which is basically the same thing just on a streaming. david: when i was nine years old, i wanted to be a major-league baseball player. that did not work out. usually when you want something when you're young, it doesn't work out, but i guess it worked out for you and your sisters. kim: they did not want to do it, but i talked them into it. i said this would be the best promotion for clothing store. we should consider this and that got them hooked.

david: it worked out. kim: it did. ♪

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