Rapper and entrepreneur Travis Scott visited the university on Thursday as part of a three-stop college tour promoting a new collaboration between his Cactus Jack brand and multibillion-dollar merchandise company Fanatics. visited.
The collaboration includes merchandise from 28 universities, including UT. After announcing his appearance less than 24 hours later, all tickets for the event at Hogg Auditorium at noon Wednesday were claimed within four minutes. His visit was part of a panel discussion on business and entrepreneurship fundamentals with Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin and Texas Athletics Director Chris Del Conte.
More than a thousand students packed the auditorium, eagerly awaiting Scott’s appearance after visiting the Longhorn football team earlier in the day. The panel was led by Melissa Murphy, director of undergraduate entrepreneurship at McCombs College. Scott and Rubin discussed their careers and motivations behind pursuing greatness in the music, business, and creative industries.
“I had known (Scott) socially for a long time, but I really thought of him as an artist. That wasn’t the right way to think about him,” Rubin said. “I would describe him as the most relevant person in the world to products. It’s not just because of how culturally relevant he is, he designs watches, he designs cars, he creates art. Because of his ability to design, to design merchandise, to create something that is very differentiated.”
The rapper spoke about the importance of maintaining artistic integrity when working with big companies.
“I don’t like the corporate stuff because sometimes it loses a lot of the atmosphere and you lose a lot of the connection,” Scott said. “I always told Rubin that if you make something, as long as it feels natural, it might be great,” he said.
Scott said Texas remains a special place for him as a former UTSA CAP student and West Campus resident.
“I really like UT. I saw UT beat USC and it was a transition so I thought I’d go here,” Scott said. “It was crazy because this school from Texas ended up beating out a very popular school from California.”
The panel discussed how failure is often an important part of success. Scott shared his own experience when first entering his music industry.
“Nothing works right away,” Scott said. “I thought I was going to win a couple of times. … That perseverance ended up getting me in front of Kanye[West]eating Taco Bell and shit, (and) working on music. It became.”
Additionally, Rubin shared his own experience of bouncing back from failure after many attempts at a startup.
“Every day we got a W. Every day we got an L,” Rubin said. “You have to accept it and turn it into your next success. …That’s what makes a great entrepreneur. Someone who accepts failure and finds a way to learn from it. They’re also relentless. , never quit. They never give up.”
