Episode Summary
Discover how a parliament worker turned into an amazon seller. In this Prime Talk Podcast Video Sponsored by GETIDA – Guy Heretz, the co-founder & CEO of a leading management agency for Amazon sellers called RPGECOM, shares his personal journey into eCommerce.
Have you ever wondered how people in e-commerce get involved in this world? What paths do people follow to end up where they are? Yoni Mazor from PrimeTalk learns about one man’s interesting life story and shares how this man can help those interested in the wide world of e-commerce.
Today, PrimeTalk teams up with Guy Heretz, the co-founder and CEO of RPGECOM, a leading Amazon Marketing Services Agency that prides itself in helping all sellers, big and small, with a variety of consulting, management, and assistance services. Referring to himself as a serial online entrepreneur, Heretz has also developed RGPESCHOOL, an online training platform for Amazon sellers with more than 500 graduates, and RGPECAP, a public venture fund for Amazon businesses.
Guy Heretz discusses his interesting childhood, his brief stint in Israeli politics, and myriad other experiences that have led him to where he is today. If you are a budding online entrepreneur but you don’t know where to start in the e-commerce world, or if you have a fledgling online business and don’t know which direction to head in next, then this episode is for you!
For more information on RPGECOM check out their website https://rpgecom.com/
Find more info about GETIDA’s Amazon FBA reimbursement solutions.
Find the full transcript below
Yoni Mazor 0:06
Hi, everybody, welcome to another episode of PrimeTalk. Today I’m really excited to have a special guest. Today I’m having Guy Heretz. Guy is the founder and CEO of RPGECOM, which is a leading Amazon Services Agency for sellers. Guy, welcome to the show.
Guy Heretz 0:22
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
Yoni Mazor 0:25
Our pleasure, really. So today’s show is going to be all about the Guy Heretz Story. So you’re gonna share with us? Who are you? Where are you from? Where were you born? Where’d you grow up? How’d you begin your professional career? So without further ado, let’s jump right into it.
Guy Heretz 0:42
Okay, so thanks. Thank you once again, for having me. I have a pretty interesting story because I was jumping from one country to another. So I will start with that. So I’m 33 years old right now based in Israel living next to Tel Aviv. But actually, I was born in the Soviet Union, in Moldova, when it still was Soviet Union, uh ‘87. But really, when I was really small, three and a half, we immigrated to Israel with all my family. I thought that this will be my final destination. But no, when I was eighth grade, my parents moved again, this time to Bulgaria to Eastern Europe,
Yoni Mazor 1:21
Hold on, when you moved from Moldova to Israel, what year was that? 1990?
Guy Heretz 1:27
It was ‘91.
Yoni Mazor 1:28
‘91. This is after the Soviet Union basically dissolved?
Guy Heretz 1:32
Exactly just after. Actually, my family even moved before my grandparents, even one year before, but we were just waiting for my father to graduate from there, from college. And then we moved. I grew up in the northern of Israel, until…
Yoni Mazor 1:48
Which part? What’s the name of the city in the north?
Guy Heretz 1:50
Karmiel.
Yoni Mazor 1:52
Karmiel. I think there’s a few interesting factories over there and they make weapons.
Guy Heretz 1:58
Yes. You’re absolutely right. And there is also textiles there. And my father was working in one of the textile, leading Delta company.
Yoni Mazor 2:08
Delta textiles, they do actually, I don’t know if anybody knows this, but they actually manufacture for Victoria’s Secrets. They manufacture, you know, you know, garments like bras, brassieres, uh…
Guy Heretz 2:18
Not only, actually their biggest client, which takes 97% of the share of the production of the socks, for example, is NIke.
Yoni Mazor 2:25
Nike, wow!
Guy Heretz 2:26
Yeah. Nike, I was laughing with my father that if Nike will just, you know, withdraw their contracts, well Delta Socks, is collapse, will definitely collapse. But nope, they’re still there. And so we moved to Bulgaria following my father. He just moved there to be the general manager of Delta in Bulgaria. And I found myself in ninth grade in a country in Eastern Europe, knowing nothing.
Yoni Mazor 2:48
Where in Bulgaria? In the capital city, in Sofia?
Guy Heretz 2:50
No, no, actually, when I was in the fifth city, I think called Russa and it was on the border with Romania on the Danube River. And it was like something like two hours from Varna, two hours from Bucharest. And I think my entrepreneurial journey started there, because I already, you know, find myself at 15 years old, trying to manipulate my way with people, with new school where, you know,
Yoni Mazor 3:18
Yeah adapting for the second time, yeah think about it for a second, you’re adapting for the second time with the new culture, new language, new mentality, new everything for the second time. So you have to, you know, quickly adapt and evolve and find your position and find success within that sphere.
Guy Heretz 3:33
Yeah, and actually, I needed to be there only three years before the initial contract, my parents were for three years. So I needed to come back into the last year, my 12th grade, to Israel, but it didn’t happen. They stayed there for 20 years. Actually they’re still there. They’re still there. Yeah.
Yoni Mazor 3:49
So, a three, a three year event became, you know, a more than 20 year and still going event for your parents. But for yourself, you left? When did you leave Bulgaria? After three years? Or?
Guy Heretz 4:01
Yeah I graduated from an English Language School in Bulgaria. We started at 50/50 in Bulgarian and in English, right.
Yoni Mazor 4:09
And you graduated school there, right?
Guy Heretz 4:10
Yes, high school. And I thought I’m going to pursue my education in Germany, actually, a lot of Bulgarians are going to be studying actually abroad. I wanted to go on the same path. But as you know, in Israel, we have the mandatory army and military service. And I actually could, you know, postpone it a little bit, but I did want to go and study business administration, but then something happened with my patriotic feelings, and I decided to come back to Israel. Actually, it was 2002. And I just left. My parents unfortunately couldn’t come with me because there was a contract, but I just came back and I was a lone soldier, soldier. And this is was like further adaptation to this situation. I’m coming back to Israel after four years, right away to the army and military service with this… It was really crazy. It was the…
Yoni Mazor 5:05
So you did 4 years in the IDF, the Israeli Defense Forces,
Guy Heretz 5:07
Yeah, it was actually more, it was five years. I signed up for more. I was an officer, I’m a Captain in the Reserve. And I just handled rookies. And we did like basic training for non combat soldiers in Israel. So this was my second stage where I felt a little bit that education, training, and all of this is part of, also of me. And then, after graduation, I know I’m going into politics, I really, really was into politics.
Yoni Mazor 5:40
So after you finish the military service, let’s put some years on this, which year did you finish your service, the five year service?
Guy Heretz 5:47
In 2012.
Yoni Mazor 5:48
2012? About ten years ago, and the five years in the military, you took the heavy load of becoming an officer and you know, raising generations of, you know, new soldiers. So thank you for that for that service. Alright, so 2012, somehow leaving the, you know, the Army or at least army organizations are known to be non political. Nevertheless, after you graduate from there, you feel like, you know, I want to dive into all the politics. What was that? Where did that come from?
Guy Heretz 6:19
I think in the four years I was abroad, I had these patriotic feelings for Israel, and I was really missing everything that was connected to Israel, and I really wanted to do something about it. I was full of ideology, and wanted to change things. And…
Yoni Mazor 6:33
Yeah, what would you… if you had to touch where that’s coming from, your ideology, would it just be because, you know, you were born and raised in Soviet Union and your parents felt the need to go to Israel because they feel, you know, this is your land or mobile economic opportunity, what was uh,
Guy Heretz 6:50
I think Zionism was the main motivator for me.
Yoni Mazor 6:55
That was in your family, or you found that at some point over time.
Guy Heretz 6:58
Nope, that was only mine. I think, also, the five years in the Army did itself, you know, added into the recipe, and all the challenges and of course, Israel is a very challenging country from all the aspects and when combining all of this, I really wanted to change things. And of course, it was not only about politics, economy and culture and everything. And I pursued the same, I had a BA in diplomacy and strategy and political science..
Yoni Mazor 7:28
Oh so in 2012 you went to school I said, if I want to enter into politics, actually, let me go to university and learn in a Political Studies.
Guy Heretz 7:37
Yes, yes, right away. I jumped into college, three years, graduated with distinction by the way with diplomacy. I was traveling in my last year doing diplomacy, public relations for Israel, and that was my passion. I was…
Yoni Mazor 7:53
What year was that? 2015? 2016?
Guy Heretz 7:55
Yeah 2015 I graduated and jumped into politics right away, to one of the parties in Israel, if you know Lieberman, and
Yoni Mazor 8:05
What’s the name of the party? Uh Lieberman’s party?
Guy Heretz 8:08
Israel Our Home. Yisrael Beiteinu.
Yoni Mazor 8:10
Yisrael Beiteinu, Israel Our Home
Guy Heretz 8:13
So it’s a right wing party. Yes.
Yoni Mazor 8:16
Very patriotic party. More on the right wing side of the map, in Israel a political map. So how’d you roll into that organization, I mean, into that party?
Guy Heretz 8:26
Uh I had a friend in college that was participating in some field work in the party and they started to take me with him and I fell in love with the action, with emotions, with everything. I was, you know, across roads, yelling in uh demonstrations and everything. One of those and I started my actual mentorship already during the second year of my work and after that in the third year, and after I graduated, I jumped in the parliament, into the Knesset. So I went working as a parliamentary assistant to one of the MPs.
Yoni Mazor 9:04
And you were going daily to work in the Israeli parliament?
Guy Heretz 9:06
Yeah, I thought this was going to be my path, definitely. I always like had this kind of, you know, the entrepreneurial business mindset behind it, but when in the college years, it was put aside for a new passion. And when going into, inside the parliament, then something happened. Okay. Yes, because there, suddenly there was a huge gap between the ideology that I came with, and to the practice that is going on, you know, in the corridors of the Parliament, and I figured out two things. First is that to be a public servant for the public, you need to kind of sign a contract, a public contract with them, and it’s just getting worse. I say it like this because you start from the bottom and every time you, you know, raise yourself or become a, you know, member of Knesset or minister of Parliament or a minister or something like that you just, the responsibility, the time consuming, is much more and I am a family guy. And this was like a first stop mark for me, a sign for me to stop and think. And also I figured out that I’m, I think I’m too good as a person to be, you know, you need to be a little bit dirty politics, you can that you can not…
Yoni Mazor 10:24
You can’t avoid the dirty politics that are in politics. So the two components that shifted your mindset: One is when you realize how demanding, right, the roles are to be a public servant and it’s ruthless. And it’s brutal. And it’s not stopping, ever. It’s just you know, when you, once you’re in the mix, it’s high pressure constantly, right? And then the second component to add to that is that sometimes you have to, you know, get yourself in dirty politics and tricks and sticks to stay, to keep a position or stay alive. And that’s really the nature of politics. And it’s not so simple for ethical people to fully immerse themselves in, and feel comfortable in that position. So you threw yourself to the water, you tested it, and you realized “I can swim here but I’d rather not, you know, swimming in a dirty swamp. I’ll find cleaner waters, where I can, you know, a clean and ethical way and you know I put all my energy and passion into something that it’s clean, it has a lot of potential of helping others and hopefully makes a good income.
Guy Heretz 11:26
Yes. And there the shift happened just before I left the parliament with a friend that was doing, uh engaging with drop shipping. This was the era of drop shipping from Amazon to eBay.
Yoni Mazor 11:38
What year was that? The year of drop shipping?
Guy Heretz 11:39
2015, 16, 17, before eBay started to close accounts for people who are doing drop shipping. But this was the first time I heard about e-commerce, about online entrepreneurship, about online business. And I started with that. I took a course and I established my first business in eBay. And the work was interesting but too much work for little margins. And also there was some changes in eBay and the policy and
Yoni Mazor 12:12
But explain to us for just a short moment. What is the business model of droppings? You know, so anybody in the audience who’s not familiar, drop shipping from Amazon to eBay, what does this all mean?
Guy Heretz 12:24
Well, just finding a product on Amazon, selling the same product on eBay, with a little bit of margin for me, let’s say for $1 more. And whenever somebody buys from me on eBay, I just fulfill the order from Amazon to his…
Yoni Mazor 12:41
So once you order from Amazon, you buy it, and you put the address of the customer from eBay, you ship it there. But how do you find those products where there’s a price gap yourself with tools?
Guy Heretz 12:52
Well, there are some tools and methods. I was studying some strategies. There were some really cool tools in that time so monitors, that monitors also the prices, changes everything. And it was pretty easy, but you needed to really invest in it and to scale it to a big amount of products in order to see significant margins and then I heard about Amazon FBA, this was really the entrance of FBA to Israel. 2016, the first course made it into Israel. And I just jumped over also on this and I said, “Okay, let’s figure out, maybe it will be much more suitable for me”. Actually, I entered it with my girlfriend, now today is my wife, and I even I was reminding her that we did it, we split even the course 50/50 it was that moment…
Yoni Mazor 13:49
Instead of going on a date, let’s go to a course, split the bill and keep it romantic but also a business.
Guy Heretz 13:55
It was really funny but yeah, we were living together, starting, you know, working in some work just to hold up the house and the home, and in the night, in the evening starting an Amazon and it was really cool. It took me seven months to launch my first product on Amazon and I did all the opposite things from what was learned. Like the course said no technological products, no you know complicated, no expensive products first time and I had a really good feeling about Bluetooth headphones. It was the year that Apple released their phones with no you know, connection, it all went to Bluetooth, and it was a really good actually product. And I brought it just before Q4 and…
Yoni Mazor 14:43
It was the fall of 2017 or 16?
Guy Heretz 14:46
16 I think yes, and it was really hit. I bought 1000 pieces, sold everything in one, in 45 days. And I thought hey, hell this is Amazon. So I didn’t figure out this is Q4. And it’s happening only in December, and I really freaked out. And I ordered a double amount of 2000 earbuds and it was like 30k, thirty thousand dollars, it was all my money. And then, and then, you know, January came, and silence, silence and huge amounts of, you know, feedbacks and bad reviews game. And I didn’t, you know, they didn’t do an inspection in China, and all the lessons that I had to learn, I learned in this way, the bad way. And it took me after that almost a year to sell off, you know, all the stock that was stuck there. And this is actually where 95-90% of you know, nine out of 10 sellers are pulling back their business. And yeah…
Yoni Mazor 15:58
I took a hit. I know, it started as a wonderful promise. I took a few punches, a few hits, and I think, you know, I’ll try to look for something else.
Guy Heretz 16:08
Yeah, but I thought to myself, what? Should I go back to Parliament? What do I do? Like I was really passionate about that, I was studying non stop. And I really wanted to do it like second round, and to do it better. And actually, this moment, it was a really hard moment. Because you know, as an entrepreneur, you need to have your surroundings, a very supportive environment. And I didn’t have this one from my own family. And you know, what? Yeah.
Yoni Mazor 16:42
So you mean, your family that says, you know, keep doing this entrepreneurial stuff, you know, stay in business, you look ahead, keep going. And they, they were more in the impression of, you know, you get a professional to get a job, maybe be a company or maybe in politics, the government job, stuff like that. That was kind of the discussions?
Guy Heretz 16:58
Yeah, stop playing with your PC. That was the phrase and go get a real job. You started as the most expensive private college in Israel for what, and this was the sayings and it was really hard. But I really, really felt that first of all, this is the future like e-commerce, I felt this is the future. Now we know it’s the future, this is actually the present, but it’s already also the future still. And I really also learned from my lessons, from my mistakes. And I knew that in order to be better, I need to just do the same, but not, you know, going and falling in the same holes. And I took actually a loan, a little bit from the bank, later from my parents, and I said, Okay…
Yoni Mazor 17:48
I mean, that’s impressive, even though they were not really supportive, on a discussion level, on a financial level, they said here’s some, here’s our money. Do we believe in you?
Guy Heretz 17:56
They actually saw how hard I’m working…really hard, like for 20 hours per day, it was all about either working in a physical work to get the money to invest in Amazon or live, or just working on my business. And yeah, they support it, they support it. And the second round, in the second product, it was a whole different thing.
Yoni Mazor 18:21
I think this is already 2018 right. 2018 you started right in late 2016. You started with, you know, good momentum because it was you know, Christmas Q4, then 2017 you’re stuck throughout the year with inventory. You’re, you know, picking up the pieces together trying to get out of that situation. But 2018 hopefully,
Guy Heretz 18:41
Actually, I didn’t wait for one year with the Bluetooth. I started right away with a new brand. Just in between, I had to, you know, get rid of the earbuds. But I jumped in really quick afterward, like the second quarter after Christmas. And I started from scratch. But that’s this time, with like a brand started in really, like no branding. invested a lot of it. And it was arts and crafts, things like office supplies, call it arty, lots of. Actually, this was the idea of my wife. She saw that you guys in the States really like the baby shower, and the gender reveal party is something that we don’t have here. But she saw that people are selling you know, the parts by themselves like the “mommy to be” sash and everything. And we just bundled everything. And we were one of the first ones…
Yoni Mazor 19:30
So you guys are saying that you identified a cultural thing inside the United States where many couples you know, married couples, they are expecting a baby. So even before the baby is born, they have this you know, baby shower, where there are gifts, there are decorations, and then maybe a ceremony to name the baby or expose the name of the baby. Stuff like that, something that is not really too familiar, I guess in the Middle East, to say the least. But in Israel as well. But nevertheless, your wife was able to identify that. That’s super interesting.
Guy Heretz 19:57
Yes, and we were the from among the first on Amazon selling and providing bundles, just the bundles, and sets for like five, six decorations in one set. And it was a really good business for one year. After like we’re, we were implementing everything by the book and it really went well. Until the Chinese made the jump in. the jump in, you know, in 2018, late 2018, and this is like paper products This is like the butter and bread of Chinese factory…
Yoni Mazor 20:30
Yeah made out of paper, the cost of production is very low and for them, it’s a bonanza because it can put all their manufacturing muscle into penetrating.
Guy Heretz 20:38
Exactly and they did penetrate the niche and the category. And slowly by slowly it was just not profitable. And but I still had the chance to even duplicate my business into the EU and even to Australia. I was one of the first I think in Israel that was selling arts and crafts in Australia. And it was really great, good lesson, made some money, got my investment back and started you know to launch other products I started to think about different, other different brands, and but at that time I already knew the game. Like I felt like okay, I can first live on that, you know, and this living…
Yoni Mazor 21:24
Make an income, economically you can actually rely on, you know, find this as a reliable source of income for yourself because, you know, to find the opportunity, build it, create it, make it you know, launch it in the market and make a profit out of it, see where the trend is going, if you can stay, or maybe need to leave, and maybe even develop another layer and another layer. So it makes it, you know, much more in terms of confidence you feel much more confidence financially and professionally.
Guy Heretz 21:49
And also I did a huge step now because I was able to leave my kind of student work or student job. I was working in a very fancy high-class restaurant when I did the minimum work and had a maximum salary. This was all about making money and had a type for Amazon. But then I could really leave that job and work 24 hours on Amazon.
Yoni Mazor 22:13
And where were you living or where are you living now in Israel? Are you still in the North? Karmeil?
Guy Heretz 22:17
No, no, I’m in the center, in Ramat Gan. And this was a huge shift in my time. Well you know, today that time is more expensive than anything, and suddenly I had lots, much more time, and that’s it. And we started to, then we decided to go, with my wife, already then my wife, abroad. Like, if you heard about digital nomading a little bit…
Yoni Mazor 22:48
So you decided, you both decide to become a digital nomad. But let’s touch your wife’s position for a moment. So she was there with you as an entrepreneur working with you or she had a different track?
Guy Heretz 22:57
No she did. She was with me like 80% because all the technical side, you think it’s, you know, Amazon and building brands and everything. It sounds sexy,
