My first post in 5 years: Why I’m stepping away from the company I built, Part 1
What a way to dip my toes back into writing after a 5-year hiatus.
Between the black hole that was Covid, the birth of my 2nd daughter, growing and scaling Her Brand & Co. and general life — needless to say, it’s been a minute.
And well, I have some news. After many months of investigating why I was feeling so burnt out, a family trip to the Netherlands and finding some time in Italy to get back into my body — I’ve decided, along with my co-founder, to step away from growing our company.
It’s hard to synthesize every step that’s gotten us here, and like most big decisions, it isn’t one big reason. It’s a collection of events, timelines, and circumstances that have delivered us on this path. And so, in true fashion, my co-founder Mari and I created a heartfelt video explaining our collective “why” and how we plan to move forward.
Grab your favorite mug, and have a listen.
“The business you start will not be the business that you run.”
A wise mentor said this to me in passing a decade ago and it has stuck with me ever since. While there are certainly exceptions to this theory, it is ever-the-case with Her Brand & Co. I truly feel like over the past 8 years the business has lived very different lives. From the early days of Sohuis (what it was called before I met Mari) when I had 3 customers and a collective network of 7 people, to what the brand has evolved into now — the business has morphed into a living, breathing organism I never could have dreamt up almost a decade ago.
And here’s the thing — I love what the business has become!
Can you believe this impact? We’ve….
Educated over 10K founders with our classes
Built an educational platform, made it FREE to access, and house over 100 hours of marketing-specific classes, templates and resources for women-owned brands
Have over 200 graduates from our programs
Never invested in digital media and have grown organically, while doubling our revenue year over year
Activated partnerships with organizations and brands like Amazon Small Business Academy, Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC), Hey Mama, Luminary, Black Women Talk Tech, Target’s Retail Accelerator, NYNOW, Goodtype, The Female Founder Collective, and countless others
And we’ve done all this while being bootstrapped and profitable. Yes, I’m flexing. Yes, we deserve it. Yes, we’ve earned it. To say that I’m so freaking proud of us is an unfair understatement.
And yet — then why, at the precipice of our growth am I choosing to walk away?
Because my mind, body, and soul are begging for a break.
Because I’ve worked non-stop since I was 14 years old (cue flashback: me as a bagger at a grocery store).
Because this is my 2nd business I helped build from nothing and I’ve been doing some version of this work for 12 years.
Because being an attentive, thoughtful parent that’s focused on healing and breaking generational trauma is hard.
Because being a working parent in the U.S. feels impossible sometimes.
Because I love what we’ve created, and I recognize that I don’t have the gas in the tank to give our metaphorical garden the nurturing it requires to bare new fruit.
Because I’ve had to make hard decisions on what I can prioritize, and my personal health took the biggest hit.
Because, it’s time.
My favorite sunset from our HBC Business Retreat in Italy this past summer. <3
Mari and I felt a shift in the sand about 18-months ago.
We shared how we were feeling with our trusted friends and advisors, and with their help, decided to embark on how we could potentially exit the business. We wanted to ensure the integrity of the brand was maintained, and most importantly, our customers were taken care of and could still receive value and educational resources.
So we set ourselves on a path for a merger or acquisition with another brand (wow that is so much f* work) and I’ll tell you more about that later and where we’ve landed with these opportunities once they shake out. ;-)
Overall, the big picture we came to uncover about the business over the last 18-months was:
Our customers were needing and wanting higher-touch, more 1:1 support. While Mari loves and thrives in this type of engagement, this is something I couldn’t personally do with my general availability and interests. I have been a consultant before in this type of capacity for many years, and honestly, have grown out of having the energetic well to emotionally support 1:1 clients.
We needed to double-down on B2B growth and multi-year contracts to hit our revenue goals, something that falls mostly in my wheelhouse.
We were inching closer and closer to needing capital to unlock and turn on high-growth marketing channels to really start scaling in its truest form (whether through debt, fundraising or otherwise). After getting out of debt myself several times, and Mari being a level-10 saver, this was a non-option for us.
This led us down a rabbit hole of many months of honest conversations with ourselves and each other about what the business really needed in order to usher in its next era of growth.
Mari and I meandering through Italy contemplating HBC and all of life's existence.
I looked at her with tears in my eyes and told her, “I don’t have it in me.” And she said, “Me either.”
Tears because there was a real grieving process I had to go through once coming to the acceptance that I didn’t have it in me to keep pushing, to keep building. Tears because I know how important this work means to us and I didn’t want to let ourselves, customers, and partners down. Tears because you have a vision for what you’re building, you know how to get there, but that means continuing to de-prioritize other areas of yourself you want (and need) to develop and are being called to. Tears because entrepreneurship is not for the faint of heart and sometimes you just gotta cry with your co-founder in Italy with wine and pasta to figure it all out!
And figure it out we did.
What has made our partnership magical since the beginning is our commitment to our relationship, communication, and wellbeing. We agreed at the very beginning that we would raise our hands when we needed help, and truly like a marriage, would always put our relationship first above the business.
So when Mari tip-toed towards going out on her own and building her own consultancy where she could work 1:1 with clients, I enthusiastically pushed her off the proverbial cliff. She thrives in the weeds with our founders, and they absolutely need a Mari in their corner to help them execute these bigger marketing strategies (especially as it relates to operations, systems, and technologies).
I am elated to share that she’s offering 1:1 consulting services for women founders, and if you’re reading this and fit this criteria, I highly recommend you get on her list and learn more.
As for me, I’ve got quite a few things up my sleeve that I’ll share in due time when they take more shape.
Jupiter is my ruling planet (the planet of luck and fortune), and while that doesn’t mean things are easy for me (certainly not the case!), I always end up in the perfect place. :-)
As for Her Brand & Co., as of today — our platform will remain available and free, as we continue to stand behind our mission to democratize access to life-changing marketing education for women-owned brands. Founders who are currently on our platform will maintain access to all of our foundational classes and resources, and even new founders can sign up and take advantage! We will finish some awesome partner programs this fall, and as we finalize some things down the pipeline as to how HBC will take shape in its next iteration, I’ll be sure to share them.
In the meantime, have a listen to our video, and thank you for making it to the bottom of my debut post!
