Phil Covitz: Co-Founder of andSons Chocolates
Introduction
Phil Covitz is currently the co-owner and founder of andSons Chocolatiers, which he started in 2019 with his brother. andSons Chocolatiers is a second generation fine chocolatier which combines the Covitz family’s European heritage and the culture and creativity of Los Angeles. After working through their mom’s business for five years, they realized that they needed to change/rebrand the chocolatier and decided to create andSons as a homage to their mom’s former business. Covitz and his brother are in the process of pivoting so the family business will be more sustainable in today’s world. Covitz is responsible for the creative aspects of andSons, whereas his brother manages the finances.
The Past
Phil has had two stages of his professional careers. Prior to owning andSons, Phil had a career in sales and marketing. Following high school, Covitz attended the University of Pennsylvania where he received a Bachelor's degree in Communications and Marketing from Annenberg School for Communication. Upon graduating, Phil moved to San Francisco to work in account management at Goodby, Silverstein & Partners which is an advertising agency. Phil guided clients through the process by outlining goals, brainstorming strategic initiatives, and plotting these points along with other internal parts of the agency. During this time, Phil realized the creative side of these advertising agencies were way more interesting and engaging. Knowing he lacked an artsy/creative background, Phill attended the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland to build a repertoire of skills. This education was helpful when creating a portfolio to transfer into the creative side of the agency. Phil describes his job as “concepting marketing ideas and campaigns for agencies.” Although digital advertising was starting to grow, there was still a large focus on broadcast television, print in newspaper/magazines, and radio spots.
Once in the industry, Phil knew he wanted to work for small boutique agencies rather than agencies owned by large corporations. He enjoyed how these small boutique agencies specialized in creative executions and producing excellent work. In comparison, traditional agencies focused on building long term relationships for prominent clients. Phil also compared working for a creative agency similar to playing on a sports team. These agencies had no loyalty or respect for how long you have been there, they just want talent. They are always looking for people who can do interesting things or bring something new to the table so these agencies can add to their well of expertise. In many ways, the advertising industry is a river that is constantly ebbing and flowing.
For almost 20 years, Phil jumped between a multitude of different creative shops after moving to the creative side of Goodby, Silverstein & Partners. After living in San Francisco for almost 6 years, Phil wanted a change and decided to work for an agency named Arnold in Boston. Wanting another change, Phil decided to move to New York City to work at a new agency called Chiat/Day where he worked on campaigns for Starbusrts, Snickers, and Skittles. He then worked for another agency called TAXI where his work focused on leveraging the culture and name of New York City for different campaigns. Eventually, Phil decided to become a freelancer because it gave him more flexibility. Wanting to move back to the west coast, Covitz moved to an advertising agency named David&Goliath in Los Angeles to be an Associate Creative Director. His work included creating a brand update for Carl’s Jr. and helped support the creative aspect of KIA’s 2013 Super Bowl commercial. He then decided to leave the world of advertising agencies to be a freelancer. As a freelancer, Covitz collaborated with advertising agencies to develop ideas for a multitude of different brands.
From a very young age, he always imagined having a business. Covitz’s parents both were entrepreneurs and owned businesses. He and his brother had thought and talked about starting other businesses for many years prior to taking over their mom’s shop. The timing was never right, until it was. Their mom had always offered them her business, but it was never feasible because they were living across the country. However, in 2013, she was ready to move on and offered the business to them one last time. They were both living in LA at the time and had always helped with the business so they decided to do it. In addition, it made sense because they also had very complementary skill sets that were needed for running a business. Covitz’s background is in marketing and advertising whereas his brother came from finance where he had banking and consulting experience. Covitz mainly manages the front side of the business and his brother handles the backside.
The most important skill Covitz learned in his marketing/advertising career was striving to do good work and then just keep producing work. He believes that great work either sells and the client is excited because the work performs or that this project is not a good fit for us. One of the hardest things is reaching a point where both the client and the agency are on the same page. As a whole, the work amount was also the hardest part of his career. He notes, “There is always sort of a constant, you know, amount of creation that's going out there. You're working all the time. You're out there to do the best.” Phil shares how one can come up with the best, most interesting ideas for your clients and still not land the deal. There is an aspect of the industry where you always have to be on and try to constantly work towards greatness.
In comparison, the most important skill in his business owning career is being flexible and knowing when to pivot. Covitz says, “as a new business, there are a number of variables that affect what we do. It could be a person, it could be a place, it could be a time, it could be the weather, or it could be a health inspector. There’s a thousand different things that could come into play. So if we’re not flexible and agile about how we run our business, we’re not going to succeed.” He currently struggles with balancing. In general, andSons is still a baby company which needs money, people, space, storage, planes, etc. and the Covitz brothers are working towards being able to effectively operate andSons in a sustainable manner.
There is irony in the difference between his former career and his current one in the way that his responsibilities are practically the same, yet his approach is so different. At a high level, the first part of his career was focused on not being flexible because he was hired to do a specific job. Now his whole job is being as flexible as possible when still trying to accomplish that same job. Covitz had to change his mindset. Instead of thinking that there is one specific solution and you need to work as hard as possible to get there, he now views his position as leaving things in a way where there are still other options and ideas that could work while still having a sense of completeness. He is aware that he needs the ability to constantly adapt. As a young business, andSons solves problems by having multiple solutions, seeing which one works the best and then implementing it.
Even though his approach to marketing is very different for andSons compared to his former clients, he still uses skills he learned from his first career. He mentioned how social media is a large channel for customers currently. If he did not have a background in creating media for TV commercials, radio spots, or print ads, Covitz admits he would be completely lost today. These skills are transferable because the content that you consume on social media/TV still has to be created by someone with thoughtfulness and care. Instead of purely focusing on the advertising, Covitz also creates creative products and manages product development. He’s constantly thinking about what products would be interesting and how do we bring them to life.
Mentorship
Covitz described the first time his mom came to the andSons warehouse as surreal. He noted, “It was pretty amazing to say this is what we’re doing now. Her business was confined to a store location and three employees.” Now andSons is a whole operation with a 6000 square foot facility with chefs, corporate salesmen, warehouse managers, logistic managers, ships, packers, etc. For the past five years, andSons has been working on establishing themselves as a fine chocolatier. They are finally at the place where they are actively looking for a mentor to guide them into the next stage.
In Covitz’s advertising career, he found mentorship all around him. He bonded with a number of people inside and outside of his agencies. In general, Covitz mentioned how the creative world has mentorship built into it. There is a little bit of apprenticeship happening between people and everyone is always learning new skills or getting information/ideas from each other. Part of the value from working on a team is understanding what these people do and how they work/think/do it. Covitz says that in certain situations, this type of learning is more effective than traditional school. Traditional school will not give you the experience of creation all the time and learning how to implement that creation.
Future
In the future, Covitz’s goal is for andSons to be a stable, functioning and self-sustaining business. He notes that most businesses need 10 years before they are fully formed. Part of this is figuring out how to increase andSons manufacturing volume. At the moment, the limited amount they are able to produce is one of their biggest challenges. andSons is constantly fulfilling orders and selling out in the store. He is also hoping to continue focusing on the ecommerce aspect of their business. They work to find people and companies around the country who are interested in their products. This is difficult though because their customers all require a different approach. A company who wants to partner for an event is very different from someone who lives in Minneapolis who wants to buy chocolate for Mother’s Day. Although they are both buying chocolate, they have different needs, budgets, expectations, etc. So they are working towards creating better systems to cater to both a corporate and individual customer.
