#103 - Entrepreneurship for Women as a Second Act

Show Notes

For female entrepreneurs, it can be challenging to find trainers, leaders or mentors who understand the unique challenges faced by women in the business world. Yet, learning from other women, women like themselves, is key to becoming a successful entrepreneur. 
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In this episode, Lori Vajda and Nola Boea talk to two entrepreneurial partners, Kate Nowlan and Kimberly Caccavo, co-founders of Face Your Grace, an entrepreneurial program designed to teach women how to start a side gig or small business  - all it takes is a little grit and determination.

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In This Episode You’ll Learn 

• The key way successful women entrepreneurs are more effective at mentoring female business owners.
• Why women entrepreneurs don’t have the same access to resources for managing and scaling a successful business.
• How matching the skills to the needs of female small business owners benefits them, their families, their businesses and their communities.

Key points Lori and Nola are sharing in this episode:
(04:02:66) The one thing Face Your Grace (the online learning platform for women entrepreneurs in midlife), does that other programs don’t teach. 
(06:02.88) Four areas of business that side hustlers need to know to create a business plan prior to starting their small business.
(11:21:80) The importance of developing a business name and how to identify what resonates with your ideal customer.
(14:51:89) The pros and cons of having a friend as your business partner.

Resources 

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Nola: It takes a kind of grit to start and grow a business. And that's especially true for women. Who've been in the workforce for a while. From cultural barriers to securing financial capital, aspiring female entrepreneurs, often face barriers to launching their business, that their male counterparts and the same holds true for women who've started a business and are trying to scale their companies. Research shows that if young girls don't know or interact with female entrepreneurs, they're less likely to see themselves as one. Which is why it's so important for women of all ages to seek out and learn from entrepreneurs who represent them.
Stay tuned friends, because we are excited to introduce you to two such professionals. And like many career-driven, multi-talented, multi hyphenated women, their diversified career paths, friendship, and drive led them to start, not just one, but two different companies. You could say they're graced with grit and determination.

[00:00:51] Announcer: You're listening to the Sticky Brand Lab podcast, where time strapped professionals like you learn how to create a business you'd love in as little as three hours a week.

[00:01:02] Lori: Gender inequality is real and it's resulted in women being underestimated and underrepresented in the business world. According to the American Express 2017 State of Women Owned Businesses Report, women owned an estimated 11.6 million businesses in the United States, employing nearly 9 million people and generating more than 1.7 trillion in revenue.

While those numbers may sound encouraging, they tell only half the story. Current research shows that women entrepreneurs account for about one third of all privately held US firms. And perhaps not so surprising, women own businesses suffered far more than their counterparts during COVID. How to empower more women to become entrepreneurs? For that, we turned to two entrepreneurial partners, Kate Nolan, and Kimberly Caccavo, co-founders of the women's athletic apparel company, Graced by Grit, authors of the bestselling book by the same name, and co-creators of the newest business venture, Face Your Grace, where they are sharing their success and providing guidance in hopes of helping more women become entrepreneurs.

[00:02:15] Nola: Meet Kate Nolan. Prior to co-founding Graced by Grit and Face Your Grace, Kate had a very diversified career portfolio with experiences that include running the office of a nonprofit aquatic center. Co-owning Absolutely Organized, a home and office organizational business, and working with primarily female athletes as a triathlon coach. An entrepreneur, author, and trainer, Kate makes the time to inspire others as a board member to several organizations. She is engaged to the love of her life and has two incredible daughters that inspire her daily.

[00:02:49] Lori: And meet Kimberly Caccavo, a serial entrepreneur who has a passion for inspiring women. With an equally diversified career portfolio, the co-founder of Grace by Grit and Face Your Grace has a non-traditional background. And by that, we mean she has worked in fields that are traditionally male dominated. Kimberly used her bachelor degree in chemical engineering and her MBA background to design metals that were used in the space shuttle's main engine (oh wow.), ran a telephone directory business for a big telephone company, helped privatize a Latin American phone company, and worked in Hollywood. Now you're going to have to tell us more about that. And served as an executive to a Fortune 20 company. An entrepreneur, author, and board member to several organizations, Kimberly is married to the love of her life and has a son in college and a teenage daughter. Welcome Kimberly and Kate.

[00:03:48] Kate: Thank you. Thanks for having us. We're excited to be here.

[00:03:51] Nola: We're so glad to have you here. Can you give us just a big picture understanding of your new company? What exactly is Face Your Grace?

[00:04:01] Kimberly: Absolutely. Face Your Grace is an online learning platform that gives midlife women the tools, confidence, and skills that they need to start their own businesses.

Kate and I talk to so many women that want to start a business, but don't know the difference between the different types of organizations and how to structure it. And after having so many of these conversations, we decided to start one, to give women the tools that they need to start these businesses. Our program is fun because it begins with a motivational video and there is a workbook that you download from the computer, but it is an interactive program. And at the end of it, you have a full business plan.

[00:04:48] Lori: Oh, cool. Starting an on-demand business to teach aspiring entrepreneurs is a great way to take a person's depth of knowledge and years of experience and turn that into a business. So how did your previous career and entrepreneurial experience as co-founders of a woman's athletic apparel company lead you to collaborate on this new business venture?

[00:05:10] Kate: When we started Graced by Grit, we knew a lot about this space in the context of having worn athletic apparel. But for me personally, I didn't consider myself an entrepreneur. Kimberly does have a background of helping businesses write their business plans for funding, so she had this expertise that she brought to the table. Whereas I brought that athletic sort of mindset to the table in terms of what women wanted to wear it. So it was a great combination. And what we learned over that five-year journey was that we made a lot of mistakes and we wished we had maybe gone back and done some things differently. And we also had a lot of women asking us, What was it that not only excited you about starting something so much that you were willing to take the risk and do it, but how did you actually do it? And that's really what started the Face Your Grace program was that we wished we had had this step-by-step guide to really creating that business plan, creating what that business looked like, putting the roadmap together and really understanding how to go about it and so we were really just paying it forward to these women that were asking, Tell me how to do it. I have this idea now, how do I take that idea and turn it into something?

[00:06:18] Kimberly: Just to add to that. I mean, one of the great things about our business was we created this group of very engaged, motivated women. And a lot of them were at a midpoint in their life. They, like us, had kids. Some of them were staying at home, but in their previous incarnation, they had been physicians, lawyers, accountants, and they wanted to know, What can I do and how can I start my own business? And so our business, while we were selling athletic apparel, we created such an engaged community of women that they felt comfortable asking us. So our first response was, oh, we'll write a book. And in it, we highlighted stories of our customers. But after the book they were saying, Okay, the book was great. It motivated me to start my business, but what's the difference between a sole proprietorship or a C corporation? And those are the answers we give in this program.

[00:07:15] Nola: So that's great. You had actually drawn from your experience running that athletic apparel company. And can you tell us how and why you decided to co-found Graced by Grit?

[00:07:26] Kimberly: Kate mentioned that, you know, she gave her skills as having done these things, but not really being an entrepreneur. But what Kate did have was she was a coach. She was so tough. Well, I could create the business. She's the one that I guess I wouldn't say had the whip, but she had us going, we had a very tight schedule, and it was great for us because we were able to combine our skills and create this business that was difficult, fun, exciting, horrible, amazing, and involve our kids in it. So for us, it was really just a fantastic mix of everything to create this athletic apparel company. And we drew upon skills we had in all parts of our lives.

[00:08:18] Nola: Why athletic apparel?

[00:08:19] Kate: To go a little bit, even further back. Kimberly's son swam in the program in which I was running the aquatics office. I was also a coach that was on deck. So I coached her son as well as master swimmers. Then my own side hustle was these women's running groups that I would run myself and then also coach women for triathlon. So Kimberly came to the office, I think you had a billing problem and I had to take care of that, was really why you were, we were talking.

She said, oh, and by the way, do you know a triathlon coach? Cuz I've just signed up to do a triathlon. And I said, actually, that's what I do. So very serendipitous in that moment. What I didn't know was that she was doing the triathlon in three weeks’ time. You know, normally people like 3, 6, 9 months to train for something. Not Kimberly Caccavo. It was a crash course into getting ready for a sprint triathlon. And for us that's really what the start of the friendship and the business partnership, that's where it all began. So we would be out on the road and what I described as a distraction tactic because I was probably pushing her a little harder than she wanted to be pushed, she described as what percolated a lot of the business ideas for us. So she would slow us down and she'd say, Look at what that woman is wearing. Gosh, how interesting that she chose that outfit versus something that had more compression. And so what we realized within each other was that we had a very similar aesthetic view on what we like to see that women were wearing. And Kimberly being an engineer and myself being an athlete, we also had technical features of products and fabrics that really mattered to us because we knew that we wanted to be able to perform, we wanted to look really good when we're performing, and we understood the psychology behind, if you look great, you actually feel better, so you're willing to go out and do more. What was interesting is Kimberly for our very first training, she went out and she bought a brand-new outfit at a very popular company at the time. What she didn't do was buy new running shoes. And I thought that was so interesting that it mattered to her more about how she looked on the, you know, most of her body versus the shoes that she was wearing. She pulled out these old shoes. And I think that spoke to both of us at the time. Are you laughing at me, Kimberly?

[00:10:26] Kimberly: Yeah. Cause the running was only one third of it, right? So if I'm looking at where I'm doing it, yeah.

[00:10:32] Kate: That felt very logical to her. Meanwhile, I'm going, you know, that that's like probably the hardest part. I'd invest in the shoes. You know, that really was what sparked the moment for us. And she even said, Gosh, we should start an athletic apparel company. And I'm like, I know nothing about starting businesses. Well, fast forward a few years later was when we actually went for it. So I was in between jobs. I had left my job at the aquatic center and I called her up and I said, remember, we had talked about doing that. And she said, let's sit down and actually write a business plan. So we spent about five months writing our business plan, looking at the market, talking to experts within this space, and we invested within our branding first and foremost. So the name and what that represented to us, because we knew at the end of the day, yes, we could create great product, but it was going to be a branding game. That time period of writing that business plan and figuring out what it was that drew us to each other, but also drew us to the space, was really telling, because it actually brought all of our customers in, was the name itself. It was Graced by Grit and that represented women in general. Women have these gritty moments in their life that define them and show them what they're made of. And that becomes your grace. And that's what created such a wonderful community. That was the Grace by Grit community.

[00:11:49] Lori: I find it so fascinating in general, when women start a business and they don't have a background in the business they're starting. So you didn't have this background in apparel. What was that experience like? And most importantly, do you feel that your, for a better way to say this, your ignorance because you didn't know what you didn't know, wasn't an obstacle for you?

[00:12:16] Kimberly: First of all, we had each had experiences starting businesses, her organizing business, and I'd started several businesses and helped people make business plans. So the mechanics of starting the business we had down. My husband was chairman of an athletic apparel company at the time. And when we first had our idea, we gave it to him and said, you guys should make this.

They were in the process of selling that company to Columbia, not the country, and by the way, the people almost everywhere, if we called a woman in business and said, Hey, we need a pattern maker. Where should we go? The great thing about women, starting a business for women is that women want to help you.

And we got our pattern maker, we found the best fabric. For us, we just drew upon our resources that we had, friends and friends. One of the difficult things though, was that the people giving us advice had been in this field forever. And so when we said, well, where should we manufacture? They all recommended companies where the big people were doing it. Lululemon, Reebok, Under Armor. And so we went to those fabrics. Our orders were for a hundred pieces. The other companies, you know, Nike, would put in an order for a million pieces. Well, who's the factory going to deal with?

Ultimately, we also didn't like manufacturing overseas. We brought all our manufacturing to the US. So, it wasn't really that we were going into a business where we had no experience or no ability to gain that experience. We worked off the experience of friends and family.

[00:13:54] Lori: That's awesome. Hearing you say that really, I think gives listeners more of an idea of the knowledge and experience that you are bringing to your on-demand platform. Because where else would you get that mentorship?

[00:14:11] Kate: Absolutely. I mean, I think a big piece of it, especially as we were designing and developing the program, was looking back on that time and recognizing how much experience we actually had, how much we could lend to other people in the context of figuring things out. And so if we can help other female entrepreneurs to navigate what their businesses are in a way that's more efficient and more productive, we're all for it.

[00:14:34] Nola: I love that attitude.

[00:14:35] Lori: I love that.

[00:14:36] Kimberly: Oh, thank you.

[00:14:37] Nola: You know, a lot of people think it would be really fun working with a friend on a business venture. With that idea in mind, we do have a two-part question. First, what would you say to them? And second, what has been the biggest reward and the biggest challenge of working with a friend?

[00:14:56] Kimberly: Why don't I start with the second question, second part. Which is, the biggest challenge I think was we were friends and we had kids the same age who were friends, and who were at the same parties together when we had a meeting at 7:00 AM the next day. So I think that was one of the biggest challenges because we were close both personally and professionally, as were our children. Okay, Kate, you take the rest.

[00:15:25] Kate: That benefit. Yeah. You know, I think it's interesting people always, they ask us because we do have a nice dynamic with each other. And I think oftentimes you hear about people that have been in business partnerships where their friendship is totally gone. And now it's just a business partnership. And I think we were able to maintain a nice friendship because I think Kimberly and I have similar values. We love each other's children, so that friendship piece was able to be maintained and really the thread that came through. And we also, I mean, I don't know anybody else that finds the same things as funny as I do. So humor being a key part of our friendship and I think a key part of successful relationships in general, no matter what type of relationship it is, is really important. And what we have found for our businesses that we've run is by having that business partner, it really helps you because women have so many other things going on in their lives. You can really figure out what each other's strengths are and play up to that. So, Kimberly could focus on writing and organizing the business plan, whereas, maybe I could focus on the technical pieces of a garment to say, okay, this is what we're going to need in terms of if I want to fit my phone in it, etcetera. And we just balanced each other really well that way. And so the exercises actually in our program help you understand what are each other's strengths? How will you work together? We even ask like the hard conversations in terms of, when you're angry, how do you react? It's the whole name, Grace by Grit, right? How we handle those gritty moments define us.

[00:16:54] Kimberly: We're also good at recognizing where either of us have the skills, right, to do something. And where neither of us have those skills.

[00:17:03] Lori: From your experience, can you give any advice to listeners out there who might be thinking about a partnership with a friend, giving them some feedback on what to look for, that wouldn't be a good fit?

[00:17:17] Kate: What wouldn't be a good fit. I think communication, like how do you communicate with each other? And I think if there's unhealthy habits that have already been created or that you recognize in the other person, that to me, is something to really look at. And we had actually a woman that was a friend of mine considering going into business with a friend of hers, for interior design. And so building a 50-50 partnership. And what she recognized is, that it was not something she wanted to do because their time and their work ethic was very different in terms of how much they wanted to spend on it. And so that was a piece that she thought, you know what, that's not going to change. And I don't want to always be frustrated that I'm working harder and working more. I need to find somebody that's willing to put in the same amount of time so that it does actually feel equal.

[00:18:03] Lori: That's a really good tip.

[00:18:04] Kimberly: It is. And I think the other thing that we've become really good at is pinch hitting, right? We each had two kids, so there were times when one of us could not do anything, but the other one was there to pick things up and take care of it, often without even asking, right. It was a good give and take. And that is part of the beauty of a partnership, right?

[00:18:27] Lori: So knowing what you know now, is there anything you would have done or would do differently when starting either of those businesses?

[00:18:35] Kate: I think for Graced by Grit, for the athletic apparel, I think we would've invested in marketing, you know, out of the gate and made that a major investment because we had such an incredible product and the timing of hitting the market was so spot on.

For this business, what I personally wish is we had gone to market faster with it, because like you mentioned at the beginning of this podcast, so many women were impacted by the pandemic and left the workforce and had to figure out, I don't want to actually go back. I realized how incredibly valuable spending time with my family is, I don't want to work in this conventional way. And I think we maybe could have capitalized on that differently, had we hit the market faster.

[00:19:14] Nola: That's really insightful. It's really great to be able to reflect back. And I know that our listeners who are starting businesses can really benefit from that advice. In fact, women learning from women is really important, especially learning from seasoned professional women like you. What is it about helping women start their businesses that inspired you to create the on-demand program?

[00:19:37] Kimberly: We're not exactly the same age. I mean, she could probably be my daughter, but now we're in the same age group, right? 40 -to 60-year-old women who aren't done. There's a second act. And I know during the pandemic, a lot of women retired or quit their job and. What we want to do is help those women as they start the second act. And make it faster for them. We should have gone to market faster. Well, now that's something we can share with our clients, our customers, and our friends.

[00:20:07] Kate: Just to add to that. What we also see is the excitement that we experience. Like for me personally, when I see a woman, like the wheels turning and all those pieces starting to come into place and they, like, can't not think about it, right, where it's all of a sudden, it's all consuming. It's all hours of the day. They're constantly thinking. You see that drive. You see that motivation. I remember that moment for us, where it was like all of a sudden, things were clicking into place. That little amount that you could do every hour of every day was starting to actually add up to the big moments in the business. And for me, that's what I want every woman to feel. And the empowerment that it personally gave me, I mean, I didn't believe I could start a business, and build a business in the same capacity that Kimberly believed we could, because she had those years of experience that I didn't have. And so once I recognized like, wow, we did this. How empowering that was for me in terms of other aspects of my life as well. I was a single mom raising two girls, but now on the other side of it, my girls are 19 and 21 and they say to me, in all their wonderful cards that they write for my birthday or Mother's Day is, What an inspiration. Because you started Grace by Grit, I believe I can do anything I want.

[00:21:19] Lori: That's amazing. And kind of goes back to the beginning when we were talking about that young women who don't know, or don't have mentors that are women, how they're less likely to become entrepreneurs. And the research has shown that that's the same for older women or more seasoned professionals who might think about starting a business. That if they don't know somebody who's doing that or done that, that they're less likely to go forward. Because there's definitely a very big difference between starting a business in your mind and starting a business in life.

[00:21:55] Kimberly: That's why we started this, right?

[00:21:57] Lori: One of the challenges that is out there, especially for women, is around funding. And I know that's a module in your program, and I know that you have had real experience with that challenge as well. Can you share anything about that, and why you found that that was so important to put into your program to help women understand that process?

[00:22:22] Kate: Well, Kimberly certainly had a bit of a background in terms of understanding that world and having been out there. And I think this was the first real experience that she had of trying to actually raise money as a female founded business. So we both were shocked, I think in terms of the lack of funding that women were receiving as female founded companies. That being said, we entered what we thought would be a really successful incubator program, where we had the ability to pitch our business, and then we had a room full of potential angel investors that could give us feedback, ask us questions and maybe even wanted to invest. And we had, I think, 33 people in the room and 32 of them were men. Yeah. We had one woman. So when it came down to the Q and A, and the feedback portion, we received very specific feedback that I should stand in front of the podium and not behind it cuz I had nice legs. So, and they told Kimberly that she should smile more because that would be better for our overall pitch. So I think those two comments, while they were quite shocking, they weren't really surprising at the end of the day for us.

[00:23:31] Kimberly: The third comment from that day was, one is, do women really need more athletic apparel? And then, your name Graced by Grit. It makes no sense. It won't resonate.

[00:23:43] Kate: So we had opened up a storefront in Solana Beach, California, which if, you know, Solana Beach, it's is perfect as it gets. And when we did our grand opening for that, we had a huge party and a ton of press there, and we had two of the gentlemen, maybe three, that came to the opening and said, We are wrong. We were wrong. And our wives love your product, and they love your brand, the name resonates with them, they love the actual product. So there was point three and point four and you know, wow. We really apologize. I don't know that we ever got the full apology from the gentleman that told us about the aesthetic pieces that they wished we had done differently. That being said, I think it was very telling, you know, that these other gentlemen came along and realized that they were looking at it through their perspective and not through who our customer was going to be. And I think that was, for us, one of the mistakes we also made was that we thought women would be great investors for our business. We thought high net worth women would love to invest. And the reality is, high net worth women tend to not make those financial decisions for their families. They tend to make the day-to-day decisions for their families while the men in those relationships are making the investment decisions. And so we were going after the wrong people as well. While we do see that that's shifting, I mean, you see the venture capital funds that are now being started. I think Serena Williams just started one. I think Kim Kardashian just started one, right? So there's these venture capital or private equity groups that are popping up, and they're recognizing that we only want to invest in women and underrepresented founders. Gosh, if that had been there, when we were starting, what a difference it could have made for us, right? Instead, what we were doing was we were fighting the fight and we were out there knowing the statistics of 4% of female founded companies were actually gaining investment dollars. I mean, those are hard numbers to go up against when you're trying to raise significant capital to grow a business that you've proven can be very successful too.

[00:25:34] Lori: My mind is blown by your experience because no one should have that. Yet, all the research shows exactly what your real life experience is, which is why representation is so important. And normally, what you shared is things that people read about. So they can't really, they're like, oh, that's somebody else's story. I'm reading it in an article. But here you are sharing it. And I'm thinking, is that even possible that somebody could tell you, you should smile more or you should show off your legs more, or any of the things that you're talking about? I'm so like angry and mind blown at the same time.

[00:26:14] Kimberly: By the way we did it.

[00:26:16] Kate: And Lori, you know what? What's interesting to that point is, I feel like Kimberly and I are bold enough to say things like that's what makes us really attracted to each other and work so well together is we're not afraid to say the hard things. We're not unafraid to talk about the hard stuff, because that's how change happens. And we both know that.

[00:26:33] Lori: Well, that is perfect because it leads me to ask our final question today. What is the lasting impact you hope to make in the world?

[00:26:43] Kimberly: More women entrepreneurs. We want women to be unafraid to start whatever business they want, whether it is writing legal briefs on the side, there are opportunities. Women need to seize these opportunities. And what we want to do is give women the tools, skills, and confidence that they need to make that happen.

[00:27:04] Kate: Yeah, more women entrepreneurs and less conversations about the gender bias that we all know exist because we're actually making the change. I think that's what I'd love to see. And I will say that, Kimberly has one daughter, I have two daughters. And when you ask them, do they experience that same bias? All three of them, I think, will say that they haven't. And I think that speaks to this next generation that's coming up because they genuinely feel, and maybe it's the examples that we've set and the examples, like you said, if they've seen it modeled now so much, and they hear so much about it, that they genuinely believe that they're capable.

[00:27:37] Lori: Agreed.

[00:27:38] Nola: That is so encouraging. Thank you, Kimberly and Kate for being our guests. If someone wants to learn more about you or your book or your entrepreneurship program, where should they go or how can they connect with you?

[00:27:50] Kate: Faceyourgrace.com is where they can go and they can also find us on Instagram that way, but faceyourgrace.com and we've got a Contact Us button and you'll get right to us as well.

[00:27:59] Nola: Perfect. Well friends, thank you so much for listening to this episode. We hope it makes all the difference in you getting started on your business so you can create your best and most exciting life. If you found the information shared here today helpful, let us know by posting here where you're listening or on our Facebook page.

[00:28:16] Lori: Not sure how to turn your idea into a profitable side business? Contact us at stickybrandlab.com/contact. We'd be happy to help you.

[00:28:26] Nola: Be sure to come back next Tuesday and every Tuesday for another informative, inspiring and motivating episode. And remember. Action creates results. So tap into your desire to create a business and brand you love by taking 1% action every day. Small steps, big effects.

[OUT-TAKE]
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[00:28:45] Kate: And Kimberly should smile more because she might get, you know, that might be sorry.

[00:28:54] Lori: My partner,

[00:28:54] Kate: He agrees the way he's mad. He's really mad about

[00:29:03] Lori: funny.

[00:29:03] Kate: My life partner just walked in the door. Um, so anyway,