Wild Company

The Untold Story of Banana Republic

By: Mel Ziegler, Patricia Ziegler

Narrated by: George Newbern, Elisabeth Rodgers

Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins

Publisher's summary

With $1,500 and no business experience, Mel and Patricia Ziegler turned a wild idea into a company that would become the international retail colossus Banana Republic. Reimagining military surplus as safari and expedition wear, the former journalist and artist created a world that captured the zeitgeist for a generation and spoke to the creativity, adventure, and independence in everyone.

In a book that's honest, funny, and charming, Mel and Patricia tell in alternating voices how they upended business conventions and survived on their wits and imagination. Many retail and fashion merchants still consider Banana Republic's early heyday to be one of the most remarkable stories in fashion and business history. The couple detail how, as "professional amateurs", they developed the wildly original merchandise and marketing innovations that broke all retail records and produced what has been acclaimed by industry professionals to be "the best catalog of all time".

A love story wrapped in a business adventure, Wild Company is a soulful, inspiring tale for listeners determined to create their own destinies with passion for life, work, and fun.

©2016 Mel and Patricia Ziegler (P)2016 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Well-written and narrated.

Enjoyed the account of how Mel and Patricia left their jobs and got Banana Republic going.

A Real Blast

I listened to this twice in a row, really blown away for their story.
Pure Genius!!!!!!!! I love it when you can keep the creative alive cause the numbers don’t lie.
Now I want mini series! Ticks off all my boxes, art, writing, fashion, and how things go from concept to garment. Really enjoyed each speaking their roles.
Many congratulations for enthusiasm to live so Large.

Wow

I’m really glad I listened to this book. I loved banana republic back in the day…before they got all dance and overpriced, and wondered what happened

Surprisingly Great!

A compelling and interesting story. Read by my absolute favorite narrator: George Newburn. Highly Recommended!

Always a big fan of Banana

And, wow. Knowing all this I'm a bigger devotee to the backstory and awkward about the current business. Regardless, congratulations to the authors for an excellent book and a perfect business reality.

Wildly inspiring and entertaining!

Easily one of the most inspirational and best books I've read in months. This book has given me so much inspiration for my own business and the story of this husband and wife is so crazy.

Wether your in business or not you'll be entertained and inspired by this book!

One of my new favorite books, I hope to meet these two one day!

Loved this story!

This book was very well written. I loved hearing the backstory to the company Banana republic. I enjoyed both the male and female narrator and thought it worked well with the two points of view in the book.

just listen...

A great story that was totally unexpected. I highly recommend that you listen to this audiobook. I was pleasantly surprised at the pace, tone and tenor of the story. A great light car listen that makes you think about the gift of creativity and the bane of it being constrained by business...not for the good of the customers but for the good of profits.

The whole story!

As a lover of the original store, this story has the same thrill and richness. Never boring and very inspiring!

Inspiring story

I was surprised at how interesting I found this memoir. The book reads like fiction. I could hardly put it down, of course, it helped that the area and people in the story were familiar to me.

This is the memoir of the store founders Mel and Patricia Ziegler. Mel was journalist at the Hearst owned San Francisco Chronicle and Patricia was an artist/illustrator also working for the Chronicle. Patricia had just finished covering the Patty Hearst trial as the court illustrator when they both decided to quit their jobs and try something else. They ended up deciding to create a store to sell military surplus clothing. They had no retail or business expertise. They tell of their success and the failures in building their business. Mel was the strategist and business manager and Patricia had a talent for styling merchandise, decorating the stores and creating the Banana Republic aesthetics. Mel also wrote the whimsical copy for their catalog and Patricia did the illustrations. They eventually sold out to the Gap stores but stayed on to manage the company. They eventually clashed with the heads of The Gap management and quit just as Patricia had given birth to their first child.

The memoir is well written and almost reads like a fiction story. There were two narrators George Newbern and Elizabeth Rodgers as the memoir was divided between Mel and Patricia’s viewpoints. The reader can learn some of the do’s and don’ts for starting a business as Mel and Patricia learned from the school of hard knocks. They did have great and usual talent and worked well together to create a unique company. The narrators did a good job.