Dani Reiss was 27 when he took over his grandfather’s cold-weather clothing company, Canada Goose, in 2001.
Much like the heirs of Arnault and Murdoch, Reiss assumed leadership of the $1.6 billion business decades ahead of the average worker.
Such “nepo babies” or “nepo CEOs” are often underestimated when handed top jobs, a sentiment Reiss told Fortune he knows all too well.
“It wasn’t for another good 10 years, until my mid-thirties or so, when I realized that I was a good leader,” he admits.
Having just graduated from the University of Toronto with an English literature and philosophy degree, Reiss wanted a career in writing—far away from the family business, a company called Snow Goose that brought in a couple of million dollars per year in revenue.
“The truth is I really, really did not plan to stick around,” he recalls. “I was just doing this as a temporary thing for a year before I was going to go traveling…I was going to write short stories.”
Less than four years later, he was running the company: “My father [David Reiss] was so happy to just retire and let me give it a shot.”
Of course, since then, Canada Goose has exploded from relative obscurity into a billion-dollar brand.
No longer are its $1,200-plus parkas just for Canadians braving the blistering cold. With 68 stores around the world, Canada Goose merch is now being stocked even in sweltering spots like Miami and Australia, and worn as streetwear by celebrities and Gen Zers alike.
But stepping into the company’s top role when he didn’t really want it did little to convince him or others that he was deserving of the job.
“Once I decided to stick around, the people in the company that had started to become more successful self-selected out, and a lot of people that were there in the early days left,” he admits, before adding: “To be clear, there weren’t that many people to begin with; we had four employees at the front office.”
Reiss couldn’t even bring himself to print his shiny new CEO title on paper.
“I had two or three business cards,” the now 51-year-old exec remembers. “One was blank, one said ‘marketing manager,’ and one said ‘international sales manager.’
“I didn’t have a card that says CEO, and I didn’t have a card like that for many years. I didn’t want one. I just didn’t feel that that was appropriate, actually.”
Once the brand got “bigger and more important,” he felt like he had finally earned that right.
“I was meeting with bankers and people who needed to understand that they were talking to the person who made the decisions,” he said.
Prove yourself for the C-suite
Despite having built Canada Goose into the empire it is today, Reiss doesn’t plan on following tradition and handing the helm to one of his two children—at least, not anytime soon.
First, he says, they’re too young.
But more important, the business is a far cry from the scrappy company he joined in the late ’90s, with shareholders, a global footprint, and much higher expectations.
“Our company was tiny, and I would say most people were betting against our survival,” he explains. “It wasn’t like a child joining a large established corporation, that often happens these days.”
But either way, looking back, his advice to anyone who wants to inherit the throne at their parent’s company is to prove to themselves and others that they deserve that spot first.
“In hindsight, if hypothetically, I did think I was going stay there [for more than one year] and did want to be the CEO, I think you have to be the hardest working person there,” Reiss reflects.
“I have children. I don’t imagine them in the business. But if they ever were to come into the business, they’d have to be smart enough,” he says, laughing.
“But then, assuming you have the intellect, you also have to work harder than anybody else.”
A version of this story originally published on Fortune.com on July 28, 2024.
More on nepo CEOs:
- Welcome to the era of the ‘nepo CEO’: David Ellison’s Paramount victory cements a new kind of corporate leader
- Welcome to the age of ultra nepo babies: Every billionaire under the age of 30 inherited their fortune, new report finds
- Gen Z nepo babies are bragging about their generational wealth on TikTok—but there’s a major catch