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Speaker 6: Pinky Cole, founder and CEO of the world famous Sledty
Speaker 6: Vegan Ato and you're now tuned into She Pivots.
Speaker 4: Welcome back to She Pivots, the podcast where we talk
Speaker 4: with women who have dared to pivot out of one
Speaker 4: career and into something new and explore how their personal
Speaker 4: lives impacted these decisions. I'm your host, Emily Tish Sussman.
Speaker 4: Today I'm sitting down with a legend who's just getting started,
Speaker 4: Pinky Coal, founder and CEO of Slutty Vegan. Slutty Vegan
Speaker 4: is one of the fastest growing chain restaurants. In just
Speaker 4: five years, she has gone from a food truck in
Speaker 4: Atlanta to now operating more than ten locations across the country.
Speaker 4: Pinky has been featured in publications like Essence, The Washington Post,
Speaker 4: the cover of Ink and more. Her savvy business methods
Speaker 4: have landed her partnerships with some of the biggest brands
Speaker 4: in the world, like Steve Madden and Shakeshack, and with
Speaker 4: every success, Pinky has continued to give back to her
Speaker 4: community through her Pinky Coal Foundation True Force. I am
Speaker 4: honored to sit down with Pinky to learn more about
Speaker 4: what brought her from teacher to television producer to now
Speaker 4: owning and operating her Slutty Vecan Empire.
Speaker 6: Have you always gone by Pinky since the day that
Speaker 6: I came out of the womb? I'll tell you a
Speaker 6: story about that. So my godmother, her name is Yvonne.
Speaker 6: My father he got sentenced to thirty five years in
Speaker 6: prison on the day that I was born. So she
Speaker 6: was in the hospital with my mother and I was
Speaker 6: super super pink, right, don't X But I was pink,
Speaker 6: very pink. So she says she is pink. We're gonna
Speaker 6: call her Pinky. My mother laughed at her, but do
Speaker 6: you know that name's Duck. Since the day that I
Speaker 6: was born, everybody knows me as Pinky, which is full
Speaker 6: circle to me because I named my daughter D just
Speaker 6: the letter D.
Speaker 5: Just the letter you know you've never heard that. Really.
Speaker 6: Reason why I did that is because growing up I
Speaker 6: knew that I was extra special. Because people were so
Speaker 6: interested in wondering why the hell my name was pinky? Right,
Speaker 6: So because of that, they were so intrigued by it,
Speaker 6: and they wanted to get to know me because her
Speaker 6: name is not normal, like, her name is not similar
Speaker 6: to what we typically hear on a day to day basis.
Speaker 6: So growing up, all through my life, I was always
Speaker 6: very popular. Everybody always knew me, but I really believed
Speaker 6: that there was power in my name.
Speaker 4: What did you think you were going to be when
Speaker 4: you grew up?
Speaker 6: When I was a kid, my grandmother used to watch
Speaker 6: Golden Girls, Okay every single day, days of our lives
Speaker 6: and as the world turns, So I was not watching cartoons.
Speaker 6: I didn't grow up watching cartoons. So I always had
Speaker 6: a mature state of mind. So when I was a kid,
Speaker 6: when everybody was playing with dolls and I wasn't, I said,
Speaker 6: I'm going to be a star. I'm going to be
Speaker 6: a billionaire. I used to say it every single day
Speaker 6: and people would laugh at me, like pinky crazy. But
Speaker 6: we believe her, but she's crazy. And I knew in
Speaker 6: my heart that I had something special because I just
Speaker 6: felt like I was wired differently. I'm like nobody in
Speaker 6: the world thinks like me, Like I was thirteen years
Speaker 6: old and fourteen having parties selling candies, selling frozen cups,
Speaker 6: like I was a hustler at a very young age,
Speaker 6: Like where did I get I'm like hustle man?
Speaker 5: Like how?
Speaker 6: And I realized that I wanted to be more than regular.
Speaker 6: I saw extraordinary people doing regular things, and one of
Speaker 6: those biggest examples was my mother. My mother is my
Speaker 6: favorite person in the world. I love her to death,
Speaker 6: and she's so talented. But I saw her work at
Speaker 6: the same company for the last what thirty six years now,
Speaker 6: and while it's a great company that she works for,
Speaker 6: I realized that she worked so hard all of her
Speaker 6: life for someone else. So in my mind, I said, Okay,
Speaker 6: I'm gonna make it. I'm gonna be a star so
Speaker 6: that my mother does not have to work for somebody
Speaker 6: for the rest of her life.
Speaker 5: So when you asked me.
Speaker 6: What did I think I was going to be, I
Speaker 6: didn't know it was gonna be flipping burgers and shaking fries. However,
Speaker 6: I knew that I had something to offer the world,
Speaker 6: and it just took for me to unlock that potential.
Speaker 5: And that was slutty begin.
Speaker 4: What were those steps did you feel like along the
Speaker 4: way to unlock the potential? Like, I feel like if
Speaker 4: you had it in you that you were going to
Speaker 4: be successful, and you had it in you, it sounds
Speaker 4: like that you were going to be entrepreneurial to some degree,
Speaker 4: there must have been some fits and starts.
Speaker 5: I always felt like the underdog.
Speaker 6: I always felt like the girl in a room that
Speaker 6: had to overly prove myself. But that was the best
Speaker 6: thing that could have happened to me, because always having
Speaker 6: to prove yourself means that you never get comfortable. So
Speaker 6: throughout the years, I'm always proving myself. But in proving myself,
Speaker 6: it made me always be on my toes. And because
Speaker 6: I was always on my toes, it made me realize that, like, okay,
Speaker 6: I gotta get it, like I got to figure out
Speaker 6: ways to get it. I don't know at the time
Speaker 6: what I was chasing, but I was chasing something, and
Speaker 6: I realized that entrepreneurship was something that I was really
Speaker 6: good at and I like to talk to people, and
Speaker 6: in talking to people, I knew that, like, if I
Speaker 6: continue to do this and be consistent at it, I
Speaker 6: can build something really great and something really big. What
Speaker 6: did you do right out of college? So I got
Speaker 6: a job working at Teach for America. So I did
Speaker 6: not want to be a teacher and shout out to
Speaker 6: all the teachers, but that is not my ministry.
Speaker 4: And by the way, I feel like their whole model
Speaker 4: is to take college graduates who are stars.
Speaker 5: That's exactly we put it in a classroom.
Speaker 4: Who don't necessarily want to be teachers, but then get
Speaker 4: them the experience and they.
Speaker 6: Go on to do incredible things, exactly, and they only
Speaker 6: want the best. I was the queen of my school,
Speaker 6: so like how they have homecoming Queen. So I was
Speaker 6: Miss clark Land University shout out to CiU and that
Speaker 6: is like Miss America at an HBCU.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 6: So I was a queen of the school and I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 6: I don't want to be a teacher. But I was
Speaker 6: one of the most popular girls on campus, but I
Speaker 6: could not find a job. So I took the job.
Speaker 6: My mother was like, just take it. It was in
Speaker 6: the heart of a recession. They were paying me forty
Speaker 6: five thousand dollars a year, and I'm like, okay.
Speaker 5: Cool, this is a lot of money at the time.
Speaker 6: So I went to Houston after graduating, and in five
Speaker 6: days of being there, I'm like, I.
Speaker 5: Can't do this.
Speaker 6: And my friend gave me forty dollars and I went
Speaker 6: to the airport with my dog, Rudy, and while I
Speaker 6: was at the airport, there was this guy from Southwest.
Speaker 6: She gave me two hundred and forty dollars to get home.
Speaker 6: I was dead broke. I didn't have any money. So
Speaker 6: that's what I did after college.
Speaker 4: Not sure if her next move, but knowing it wasn't
Speaker 4: home or to Texas, she packed her bags and flew
Speaker 4: to LA without a plan.
Speaker 6: Two hundred and fifty dollars, a Duffel bag and a
Speaker 6: suitcase and thirty resumes that my mom printed out at
Speaker 6: her job. And I went to LA and in six
Speaker 6: days I got two jobs, one working for the Census,
Speaker 6: one working at DSW.
Speaker 5: But I had no plan. I just had confidence.
Speaker 4: Broke in a new city and without a job, Pinky
Speaker 4: hustled and applied to Central Michigan University just to get
Speaker 4: a refund to make ends meet. It was then an
Speaker 4: old sorority sister gave her an opportunity to work as
Speaker 4: a production assistant for six hundred and fifty dollars a week.
Speaker 6: So I took the job as a production assistant, and
Speaker 6: at about two to three months I moved up and
Speaker 6: I became a producer.
Speaker 5: I was really good at it.
Speaker 6: And I was in LA and got a call from
Speaker 6: New York saying that they wanted me to come to
Speaker 6: New York to work on a TV show. And that's
Speaker 6: how I ended up in New York started working on
Speaker 6: a show.
Speaker 4: That show was none other than The Maury Show from
Speaker 4: New York.
Speaker 6: I opened up my first restaurant called Pinkies Jamaican, an
Speaker 6: American restaurant.
Speaker 4: I mean, opening a restaurant is a big deal. Were
Speaker 4: you doing it as your side hustle while being a producer?
Speaker 5: The restaurant was the side hustle.
Speaker 4: How did you know how to open? I would not
Speaker 4: begin to know how to open a restaurant if it
Speaker 4: was my full time job today.
Speaker 5: So I went to the school called Google.
Speaker 6: Okay, Google and YouTube really hopped me out a lot,
Speaker 6: which I think a lot of people underestimate those resources.
Speaker 6: And I had my four to one K saved up,
Speaker 6: and as a twenty six year old woman, a black
Speaker 6: woman who did not learn about financial literacy, like you
Speaker 6: know what I'm saying, I'm doing great. I got a
Speaker 6: seven hundred almost eight hundred credit score, I got a
Speaker 6: four to one K.
Speaker 5: I'm doing a thing.
Speaker 6: And then I opened up my restaurant based on what
Speaker 6: I learned online.
Speaker 5: I didn't know what I was doing then. I still
Speaker 5: don't know what I'm doing now.
Speaker 4: Pinky dove headfirst into the restaurant. Although the school of
Speaker 4: Google took her far, it was really her family and
Speaker 4: roots and cooking that carried her through.
Speaker 6: I know how to cook it because growing up in
Speaker 6: a Jamaican household, my grandmother would cook some of that food.
Speaker 6: My mother is a Rastafarian, so my mother's been a
Speaker 6: vegetarian all of my life. I've never seen her eat meat.
Speaker 6: She's never wore makeup, never seen it with air rings,
Speaker 6: she never shaved. She's just a very natural woman. So
Speaker 6: I ate when my mother ate, and my grandmother would
Speaker 6: sneak in and try to give us chicken here and there.
Speaker 5: My mother would get mad sometimes, you know.
Speaker 6: But I was ninety percent vegetarian growing up, and then
Speaker 6: in two thousand and seven, I went fully vegetarian. I
Speaker 6: decided to eliminate all meat and I was only eating fish,
Speaker 6: and then almost nine years ago, I went completely vegan.
Speaker 4: Okay, so you're a producer now on Maury and you
Speaker 4: have your restaurant.
Speaker 6: Is the restaurant successful, well, I was grossing like thirty
Speaker 6: three thousand dollars a month. I was also making at
Speaker 6: the time eighty five thousand dollars a year as a
Speaker 6: producer at the time, which again at that time was
Speaker 6: a lot of money.
Speaker 4: So it wasn't enough of me to leave.
Speaker 6: But I eventually left because I couldn't juggle the three
Speaker 6: because I ended up opening a juice bar right down
Speaker 6: the street, and I sold juice out the juice bar.
Speaker 6: So I had the juice bar, the restaurant, and I
Speaker 6: was a producer. I'm like, I'm an octopus. I have
Speaker 6: to figure out how to make this make sense. At
Speaker 6: this time, I was no longer working at the moriy
Speaker 6: Show because I'm like, okay, bye, I'm going to run
Speaker 6: my business. You know what I'm saying, Like, I'm going
Speaker 6: to grow my brain. I believe in my vision.
Speaker 4: What happened next was not in Pinky's grand plan to
Speaker 4: become a billionaire, and in fact forced her to pivot.
Speaker 6: I had a grease fire, and I remember it like
Speaker 6: it was yesterday. I closed up the restund I was
Speaker 6: about eleven o'clock. I went home and I got a
Speaker 6: call from I think it was a fire department of
Speaker 6: police department, but I think it was fire department. And
Speaker 6: they called me and they told me that the restaurant
Speaker 6: was on fire, that I need to come down. So
Speaker 6: I lived about ten blocks from the restaurant. When I came,
Speaker 6: they had just gotten all the It was very smoky.
Speaker 6: They just like put the fire out. Windows was busted,
Speaker 6: everything like everything in there was not salvageable. So I
Speaker 6: had just enough money to pay the bills to keep
Speaker 6: up some When I lost their revenue, I was only
Speaker 6: relying on the revenue for my juice bar, so all
Speaker 6: of that money diminished really really fast. So then my
Speaker 6: car got repulled, and then I got kicked out.
Speaker 5: Of my apartment. So there was like a domino effect
Speaker 5: of all of these things.
Speaker 6: But it's such a beautiful feeling to talk about it now,
Speaker 6: because that was really just God taking those things away
Speaker 6: from me. I needed that to happen so that I
Speaker 6: can shift and adjust and do something new. And sometimes
Speaker 6: we go through difficulties in our personal and professional lives
Speaker 6: so that we could see a different light. Right, Like
Speaker 6: the light that I was looking at was dim. The
Speaker 6: light that I was supposed to be looking at was
Speaker 6: a lot brighter. But it took for me to remove
Speaker 6: that dim light to get to that brighter light.
Speaker 4: How quickly was that mental transition for you to go?
Speaker 4: I mean, I have to imagine that was a real
Speaker 4: low point. It was a very low point for me.
Speaker 4: I was a pageant girl. I'm a sorority girl.
Speaker 6: So like anything that I've ever done has turned to
Speaker 6: go growing up, like I was just always the girl,
Speaker 6: like that vibrant energy personality. So this was the first
Speaker 6: time in my life that I've experienced tribulation.
Speaker 5: Where it was just like, Okay, this is a moment.
Speaker 6: You can either change the course of the circumstance or
Speaker 6: you can sit and dwell in it and like become
Speaker 6: a victim of that circumstance.
Speaker 5: And I wasn't willing to be a victim.
Speaker 6: I almost they almost got me, but I wasn't willing
Speaker 6: to stay a victim of that circumstance, so to lose
Speaker 6: the thing that you live in and breathe in every
Speaker 6: single day, and you've created a pattern for yourself and
Speaker 6: then you lose it and then you go broke.
Speaker 5: At the same time, it was very difficult, but.
Speaker 4: Then she had the stroke of luck. She needed a
Speaker 4: job in La back on Oprah's network own as a
Speaker 4: casting director for the show Eanla fixed my life.
Speaker 6: When they offered me the job, it was a no brainer.
Speaker 6: I said yes, I moved to La as a casting director.
Speaker 4: Did you feel like you had failed because you had
Speaker 4: tried the restaurant and then couldn't revive it?
Speaker 5: I feel like I failed.
Speaker 6: But what revived my feeling of failure and not feeling
Speaker 6: like a failure is when I got the opportunity to
Speaker 6: work on the show. And the best thing about working
Speaker 6: on the show that I was working on is it
Speaker 6: was a show about therapy right and helping people like
Speaker 6: unlock their trauma so that they can heal. This is
Speaker 6: like for me, like I am a casting director for
Speaker 6: a show that provides healing for people who needs it
Speaker 6: all the while I need a god dag on healing
Speaker 6: and I'm getting the healing all the same time while
Speaker 6: still getting paid.
Speaker 5: It was just a win win for me.
Speaker 6: So I didn't even have enough time to really think,
Speaker 6: because once I started working, I was helping people unlock
Speaker 6: their trauma while healing mine.
Speaker 4: Were you thinking that you would get back into restaurants?
Speaker 4: That this was just no? No, you was done.
Speaker 6: I was done because I realized in that moment when
Speaker 6: I lost the restaurant, a lot of people that I
Speaker 6: thought would be there for me were not. And I
Speaker 6: also realized that some people just don't have the capacity
Speaker 6: to be there for you like you need to.
Speaker 5: And that's okay, it's life.
Speaker 4: While on hiatus, brian La fixed my life. She did
Speaker 4: what she did best. She hustled. I'm not prideful.
Speaker 6: So I started doing door Dash and like grub hub, right,
Speaker 6: so I was delivering food for mind you, I was
Speaker 6: making money. So I was delivering for door Dash and
Speaker 6: one day I found.
Speaker 5: This facility that was a shared kitchen.
Speaker 6: And it had like six different restaurants but it was
Speaker 6: just delivery only.
Speaker 5: So I'm like, damn, that's a really cool idea.
Speaker 6: So registered that and then the job was like okay, Pinky,
Speaker 6: we need you to go to Atlanta to be on
Speaker 6: the ground with the shelf in just about three months.
Speaker 4: That's it.
Speaker 6: I picked up all of my bags and I put
Speaker 6: it in a storage right And that was four years
Speaker 6: ago in July. And then I moved temporarily to Atlanta.
Speaker 6: And when I moved to Atlanta, that's when I came
Speaker 6: up with Slutty Vegan.
Speaker 5: And the rest is history.
Speaker 4: From Sludy Vegan, what started as a food truck is
Speaker 4: now a multi million dollar brand with billion dollar dreams
Speaker 4: in our business.
Speaker 6: Reformerlitionize the cuisine of Veganism down South.
Speaker 4: Welcome.
Speaker 6: I love the name of your restaurant, Floody Vegans, Slutty Vegan.
Speaker 2: Her name is Pinky Cold, Pinky s Imagination.
Speaker 6: Thank you so much.
Speaker 4: Hello.
Speaker 6: If you have not gotten Slutterfied, come on down. We
Speaker 6: are here at Sellaberria is trying to.
Speaker 5: Get you slutterfied.
Speaker 6: We promise you it's working your way. But let me
Speaker 6: tell you something spiritual that happened to me. So about
Speaker 6: four weeks before I came up with Sluddy Vegan, I said,
Speaker 6: I'm gonna start running every day, five miles a day.
Speaker 6: I'm gonna read a book to day don't ask me why,
Speaker 6: crazy right, And I can't even believe I did.
Speaker 5: It, but I did it, and I lost a lot
Speaker 5: of weight.
Speaker 6: I was reading all types of books like I just
Speaker 6: got super smart, real fast.
Speaker 5: I don't know what I was preparing for.
Speaker 4: That's what I know.
Speaker 6: Like, I realize now the moment that you tap into
Speaker 6: your purpose, something really really big happens, whether it's really
Speaker 6: good or whether it's really bad. Something happens before you
Speaker 6: unlock that key to your purpose. And what happened for
Speaker 6: me is I started running. It was like I was
Speaker 6: training for the Olympics. Floody Vegan is the Olympics that
Speaker 6: I've been training for, and I opened Fludy Vegan in
Speaker 6: the share kitchen.
Speaker 4: So it's just digital first.
Speaker 6: But I was basically mimicking what I saw when I
Speaker 6: was working door Dash and full circle moment again. Now
Speaker 6: I'm the chief restaurant advisor for DoorDash.
Speaker 4: Between door Dash and her clever use of social media,
Speaker 4: Slutty Vegan began to gather a dedicated following.
Speaker 6: It got so crazy people started ordering their food on Instagram.
Speaker 6: They would DM me their order and pick up their food.
Speaker 6: So I realized that I'm like Okay, I got something here.
Speaker 6: So the first week was like four, the second week
Speaker 6: was like fifty, and then after that it was like
Speaker 6: they were coming in by the hundreds the facility and
Speaker 6: shout out to PREP like PREP is in Atlanta. But
Speaker 6: they told me like, ah, you gotta go, like you
Speaker 6: are disrupting like everything that's happening here. But you can
Speaker 6: serve in the parking lot, but you're gonna have to
Speaker 6: get a food truck or something. So they kind of
Speaker 6: like gave me the inspiration in the most uncomfortable way.
Speaker 4: At this point, it was just Pinky, four employees and
Speaker 4: three volunteers just trying to keep up with demand.
Speaker 6: But then I got the food truck and built this
Speaker 6: food truck culture and really made a thing of food trucks.
Speaker 5: I just want to brag about my business a little bit.
Speaker 6: In the last four years, I have been able to
Speaker 6: open up seven locations. I have four food trucks. I
Speaker 6: opened up a sister concept called bar Vegan in Atlanta,
Speaker 6: and we were voted one of the top bar restaurants
Speaker 6: in the city. I did a partnership with se Madten
Speaker 6: and we sold out in forty eight hours.
Speaker 5: Signed a deal with Simon and Schuster.
Speaker 6: I have a cookbook, I graced the cover of Essence magazine,
Speaker 6: Quick Service Restaurant Magazine, a whole bunch of to trade
Speaker 6: publications like I have been consistently in the media for
Speaker 6: the last four years. I've been fortunate enough to grow
Speaker 6: a business that's irresistible.
Speaker 4: People want to be a part.
Speaker 5: Of my brand.
Speaker 6: They want to wear the merch, they want to say
Speaker 6: that they are affiliated with the brand. They're willing to
Speaker 6: stand in line for our Do you know these people
Speaker 6: were standing in line for at least four hours at
Speaker 6: my grand opening. Let's flood the internet and show people
Speaker 6: with black excellence looks like. Let's show people what a
Speaker 6: looks like when you can come from home beginnings and
Speaker 6: create opportunities for other people.
Speaker 5: Let's show people that this will be a.
Speaker 6: Billion dollar brand but the help of the people came
Speaker 6: in and support it.
Speaker 5: On a counter of three, we don't want to.
Speaker 6: Cut this rope, and we want to open the doors
Speaker 6: to the world famous Brooklyn Vocational.
Speaker 3: One flooding.
Speaker 4: Money.
Speaker 6: So I'm sitting back and I'm like, damn, one day,
Speaker 6: my children and their children and your children are going
Speaker 6: to be reading about the story of Slutty Vegan. How
Speaker 6: this organization was able to build an ecosystem by helping
Speaker 6: people reimagine food and provide them safe spaces to build
Speaker 6: generational wealth for themselves.
Speaker 4: This is going to be a book.
Speaker 6: You're going to learn about American history, then you're going
Speaker 6: to learn about Sludy Vegan history. So what we're building
Speaker 6: is historic, is monumental, and people want to be a
Speaker 6: part of that history.
Speaker 4: So how did you think about your business growth? Like,
Speaker 4: at what point did you become profitable and then feel
Speaker 4: comfortable or were you profitable before you expanded with brick
Speaker 4: and mortar.
Speaker 6: I'll be honest, for the first two years, I didn't
Speaker 6: know nothing about business. I'm telling the truth. I just
Speaker 6: had a business that was making a lot of money,
Speaker 6: and I had a good accountant and a good attorney.
Speaker 6: Like I just had really good people that were really
Speaker 6: really smart, smarter than me.
Speaker 5: And then I had to learn about business in a
Speaker 5: new way.
Speaker 6: I knew basic business, but like now you're having conversations
Speaker 6: about equity and safe notes and like making sure like
Speaker 6: returns and like all the things that truth sophisticated business
Speaker 6: people know.
Speaker 5: I didn't know at first, so I had to learn.
Speaker 6: It along the way. So yes, I was profitable in
Speaker 6: the very beginning.
Speaker 4: Remarkably, Pinky's success was not hindered by the pandemic. Over
Speaker 4: the past four years, she has expanded her business to
Speaker 4: multiple businesses, using the pandemic as momentum.
Speaker 6: Well, I'm working on Slutty Vegan documentary right now and
Speaker 6: it's called Slutified, and it's about the meteorocre rise of
Speaker 6: Slutty Vegan in the midst of a pandemic. Like you said,
Speaker 6: we've grown tremendously in the pandemic. I've opened several locations.
Speaker 6: So while the world was falling apart on this side,
Speaker 6: Slutty Vegan was putting the pieces back together on this side,
Speaker 6: and we were opening locations. And it's unfortunate because there
Speaker 6: were many businesses that can't say the same thing. So
Speaker 6: I don't take that for granted. I'm very humble by that,
Speaker 6: and that's what keeps me on my toes. So I
Speaker 6: want to go back to one of the first questions
Speaker 6: you asked me, what I thought I was going to
Speaker 6: be When I grew up, everything that I thought that
Speaker 6: I was going to be unbecoming. So it was the
Speaker 6: biggest full circle moment that anybody could ever have. My
Speaker 6: wildest dream of being a star and being a billionaire
Speaker 6: has come true. And although the billions are not in
Speaker 6: the bank account yet, I got a billion dollar mindset.
Speaker 6: So as long as I got the mindset, it's going
Speaker 6: to come, you.
Speaker 4: Know what I mean. So it's just a beautiful feeling.
Speaker 4: How have you been handling that? Mentally? The massive growth,
Speaker 4: the influx of you know, becoming the entrepreneur on the
Speaker 4: business side, having to learn how to raise money, create equity,
Speaker 4: all of that, and at the same time, while having
Speaker 4: the two fastest children in family growth I've ever seen,
Speaker 4: Like I thought my kids were close together.
Speaker 6: Believe I've been in the kitchen twice.
Speaker 5: But it has not been easy. I gotta be honest.
Speaker 6: But I'm a warrior, right and if you know anything
Speaker 6: about being a warrior, like you are relentless and you
Speaker 6: don't stop. So I had to start treating my household
Speaker 6: like a business. So while business is good on this side,
Speaker 6: and it's growing, and I'm building a team and I'm
Speaker 6: hiring people that are smarter than me, and I have
Speaker 6: a great wingman, my president.
Speaker 5: His name is Jason.
Speaker 6: So on the family side, what I realized is is
Speaker 6: I had to treat my household like a business because
Speaker 6: if I didn't, I was going to lose my mind.
Speaker 6: And you're a mother, so you're a mother with kids
Speaker 6: that are close in age. So now I have help.
Speaker 6: I have hired help because there's no way that I
Speaker 6: can build this billion dollar brand without people supporting me
Speaker 6: and being a village to my children, people that I
Speaker 6: trust especially, and I make sure that I make time
Speaker 6: for my children. So I want to be the entrepreneur
Speaker 6: that can equally give my children the time that they
Speaker 6: need and my business the time that it needs.
Speaker 5: So today I run my business from the outside.
Speaker 6: Now I have hired people that are just as smart
Speaker 6: as me, if not smarter than me, to help me
Speaker 6: grow my company. But it is not easy. I work
Speaker 6: around the clock. But what is easy is the fact
Speaker 6: that it's my dream. So this does not feel like
Speaker 6: work because.
Speaker 5: I really love what I do.
Speaker 6: I really love the fact that people love something that
Speaker 6: I created. Little old me, a girl from around the
Speaker 6: way from East Baltimore, who has Jamaican parents, a father
Speaker 6: who did twenty two years in prison, and a mother
Speaker 6: who has always worked all my life and lived the
Speaker 6: middle class life like the world loves something that I
Speaker 6: came up with in my brain. So that's what keeps
Speaker 6: me going as a hard get It's hall right, but
Speaker 6: it's worth it.
Speaker 4: I feel like you're articulating what a lot of I
Speaker 4: think women, and particularly women entrepreneurs, are trying to figure
Speaker 4: out which is your best and highest use and making
Speaker 4: sure that you're preserving your time, your energy, your bandwidth,
Speaker 4: your passion for your best and highest use.
Speaker 6: For me, what I'm doing is not about money. It
Speaker 6: has never been about money. Because I start my company
Speaker 6: to make money, money will come to me. What I
Speaker 6: realize is the two most important things for me is
Speaker 6: time and energy. I value my time and anytime I
Speaker 6: make use of my time, it has to be intentional.
Speaker 6: I only do things that make my energy feel good.
Speaker 6: So time and energy are very very important to me
Speaker 6: because if I manage my time properly, then my energy
Speaker 6: is good. If I give my time to the wrong energy,
Speaker 6: then my energy is bad. So those are the things
Speaker 6: that are important to me, giving time to my kids,
Speaker 6: giving good energy to my business and the people who
Speaker 6: love my business. So my thought process is very clear
Speaker 6: on the things that I'm interested in. Because I have
Speaker 6: built my own table like, I'm not asking for permission
Speaker 6: to like sit can I meet with if you can?
Speaker 5: No, I'm not doing that.
Speaker 6: This is my table. You want to sit with me,
Speaker 6: Let's go listen. We all have choices in life, right,
Speaker 6: So why would I choose to surround myself with a
Speaker 6: toxic negative energy? So if they're an don't feel right,
Speaker 6: then it bothers me and I can't sit with it
Speaker 6: and it messes up my whole day and I'm not focused.
Speaker 6: I got to be around people that are going to
Speaker 6: charge my battery, that are going to keep me all green.
Speaker 6: If you sucking me dry and I see the little
Speaker 6: ten percent left, then I gotta go. You know what
Speaker 6: I'm saying, Like, I gotta be around people that's going
Speaker 6: to allow me to be my best version of myself
Speaker 6: that will be an asset to me and not a liability.
Speaker 4: I want to talk about your financial and philanthropic model
Speaker 4: that you've grown with the business.
Speaker 6: I saw an unofficial foundation business way before Slutty began,
Speaker 6: And how I got there is my mother. A Jamaican
Speaker 6: woman is a type of the woman who will help
Speaker 6: anybody right. She will take the clothes off her back
Speaker 6: to help somebody else. So growing up, I used to
Speaker 6: be upset because my mother helped everybody, and as a kid,
Speaker 6: I didn't understand it. But as adult, I realized that
Speaker 6: I literally became my mother. So it brings me joy
Speaker 6: to help people because I just my heart can't take
Speaker 6: seeing somebody suffer, seeing somebody needed opportunity. I don't know
Speaker 6: how I say no to a fault. Some people take
Speaker 6: advantage of it. That's the one piece that I'm working
Speaker 6: on to be totally honest with you. But I feel
Speaker 6: good knowing that I can help somebody because I know
Speaker 6: that the universe has given me all of these blessings
Speaker 6: and it's not mine to keep. So twenty nineteen is
Speaker 6: when I started the Pinky Coot Foundation as a way
Speaker 6: to bridge that generational wealth gap. And We've done so
Speaker 6: much through the foundation, and I'm so proud of it
Speaker 6: because what I realize is they go hand in hand.
Speaker 6: You cannot build a business in twenty twenty two without
Speaker 6: having a true ethost without having a true mission statement
Speaker 6: outside of the product and service that you offer. I
Speaker 6: don't want to patronize a business that just want to
Speaker 6: sell me a product.
Speaker 5: What do you stand for?
Speaker 4: What do you believe?
Speaker 6: In those are the businesses that people want to support,
Speaker 6: but I wanted to specifically give opportunity to other people
Speaker 6: to make money, to learn about financial literacy, and to
Speaker 6: provide a safe space to build community.
Speaker 4: Can you describe some of the initiatives that you've done.
Speaker 4: I love them so much. The way that you think
Speaker 4: about financial literacy and building generational wealth alongside with building
Speaker 4: your business is really unlike anything I've ever seen, So
Speaker 4: tell us more about the initiatives.
Speaker 5: Thank you.
Speaker 6: So. We paid the rents to college students so that
Speaker 6: they can graduate.
Speaker 5: Thirty college students.
Speaker 6: I've partner with Steve Harvey and the Margie Harvey Foundation
Speaker 6: to provide lights for families. Every black man in Atlanta
Speaker 6: that makes thirty thousand dollars less has access to a
Speaker 6: program that myself and my fiance created through the foundation
Speaker 6: with Prudential to provide life insurance for them that we
Speaker 6: pay for that they don't have to pay for. I
Speaker 6: partner with the Department of Juvenile Justice to provide opportunities
Speaker 6: to second chances to work as slutty vegan. I've donated
Speaker 6: fruits and vegetables to people in the community. I've paid
Speaker 6: the local rents of businesses when you know, businesses were
Speaker 6: closing down in the middle of the pandemic, so that
Speaker 6: they didn't have to close. When rasha O Brooks was
Speaker 6: murdered in that Wendy's parking lot, we provided life insurance
Speaker 6: for the family, a brand new car for the family,
Speaker 6: and scholarships for the children to go to school. We've
Speaker 6: done so much, Like it's so beautiful to know that
Speaker 6: people are tapped into my organization because they get to
Speaker 6: get really, really good quality resources. I have something called
Speaker 6: entrepreneurs Anonymous, and I do it once a month where
Speaker 6: you can go and you can learn about the ebbs.
Speaker 5: And flows of businesses. This is the place where you vent.
Speaker 6: This is the place where you can cry and learn
Speaker 6: about business and get resources and hear from a person
Speaker 6: that has scaled and grown a business. But we've done
Speaker 6: a lot through the foundation, and this is only the beginning.
Speaker 4: You also had the opening the ll seeds.
Speaker 6: Yes, I became the commencement speaker for Clark Atlanta University
Speaker 6: as the youngest commencement speaker, which was a big deal.
Speaker 6: Right when I did this speech, there were eight hundred
Speaker 6: and twenty four students I believe who graduated, and I
Speaker 6: partner with Varrobank to provide all of those graduates with
Speaker 6: ll seeds. So what that meant is, if you were
Speaker 6: graduating from Clark Atlanding Universe, you have access to a
Speaker 6: free LLC that I'm paying for. All you gotta do
Speaker 6: is type into information and tell us the name that
Speaker 6: you want to and we're giving you a EI in
Speaker 6: and registering your company with the Secretary of State. And
Speaker 6: the reason why I did that is because I wanted
Speaker 6: people to unlock their potential upon graduation. When I graduated,
Speaker 6: I told you I ain't had no plan. I didn't
Speaker 6: want to be a teacher, right again, no offense. I
Speaker 6: just did not want to be a teacher. I knew
Speaker 6: that I was a teacher outside of the classroom, but
Speaker 6: I wanted them to at least have a plan, even
Speaker 6: if they didn't have one on their own. So, out
Speaker 6: of all eight hundred and twenty four, I think about
Speaker 6: like seven sixty got their LLCs, which is a big deal, right,
Speaker 6: that's like almost all of them. Yeah, every single graduate
Speaker 6: in this audience will leave this stadium as a business owner.
Speaker 5: It felt so good to be able to provide these cs.
Speaker 6: And I'm praying that out of the at least seven
Speaker 6: sixty or however much it was, they'll be at least
Speaker 6: one hundred people that build billion dollar companies and they
Speaker 6: can come back compare it forward.
Speaker 4: So where do you want to take it? Both on
Speaker 4: the philanthropic side and on the business side.
Speaker 5: There are no limits. You know.
Speaker 6: People used to tell me when I was growing up,
Speaker 6: the sky is the limit, Pinky, the sky is not
Speaker 6: the limit. There's so much above what the sky can offer.
Speaker 6: When I think about my success and where I want
Speaker 6: to go in my career. Metaphorically speaking, the oven is
Speaker 6: on broil starts from zero to burial twenty two fifty
Speaker 6: to three point fifty to now we're moving past four
Speaker 6: fifty and we're going into burial.
Speaker 5: So that means that.
Speaker 6: The oven is hot, we are cooking, and we're going
Speaker 6: to continue to cook until the food is ready.
Speaker 5: Floody Vegan is not a restaurant.
Speaker 6: We just so happen to have restaurants and places where
Speaker 6: people can go. In fellowship, we are building a movement,
Speaker 6: and that movement consists of movies, scripted series, restaurants, obviously, partnerships, collaborations.
Speaker 6: On the philanthropic side, providing scholarships and opportunities and resources.
Speaker 6: There is so much potential to grow this business beyond
Speaker 6: what any I could imagine. I'm just going burial all
Speaker 6: the way and I'm cooking till it's chrispy.
Speaker 4: Pinky, thank you so much for joining us. It has
Speaker 4: been so incredible to learn from you today. Thank you,
Speaker 4: Thank you. From producer to restaurant owner to franchise owner
Speaker 4: and philanthropist, Pinky has turned every opportunity to pivot into
Speaker 4: a success. Slutty Vegan is rapidly growing and might soon
Speaker 4: be in a city near you. She just opened up
Speaker 4: her Brooklyn location in the fall of twenty twenty two,
Speaker 4: and plans to open ten more locations by the end
Speaker 4: of time twenty twenty three. Pinky lives in Atlanta with
Speaker 4: her partner and two kids, who are unbelievably both under two.
Speaker 4: Constantly juggling a multimillion dollar business and two babies is
Speaker 4: no easy task, but Pinky faces it head on with
Speaker 4: grit and determination to build her legacy. I'm so excited
Speaker 4: to share that we're teaming up with Social Goods to
Speaker 4: launch our new she Pivots merch. You probably remember their
Speaker 4: nineteen seventy three shirts from when Amy Schumer wore it
Speaker 4: on SNL and everywhere else. This is a perfect partnership
Speaker 4: because we are so aligned. Look, I come from politics,
Speaker 4: they come from politics, and now we're both in a
Speaker 4: place that we're trying to change culture through conversation. They're
Speaker 4: doing it through their merch. I'm doing it through this podcast.
Speaker 4: Our She Works Hard for the Pivot merch is inspired
Speaker 4: by the iconic Donna summer hit She Works Hard for
Speaker 4: the Money, and it honors all the ways women overcome
Speaker 4: life's challenges and to find their own success. For every
Speaker 4: item sold, a donation is made to Bottomless Closet, a
Speaker 4: nonprofit that helps disadvantage New York City women enter the
Speaker 4: workforce and achieve success. Shop the collection now at social
Speaker 4: dash gooods dot com slash she Pivots. Thank you for
Speaker 4: listening to this episode of She Pivots, where I talk
Speaker 4: with women about how their experiences and significant personal events
Speaker 4: led to their pivot and eventually their success. You can
Speaker 4: keep up with Pinky on Instagram at Pinky nine zero seven.
Speaker 4: Leave a rating and comment if you enjoyed this episode
Speaker 4: to help others learn about it. A special thank you
Speaker 4: to our partner Marie Clair and the team that made
Speaker 4: this episode possible. Talk to you next week. She Pivots
Speaker 4: is hosted by me Emily Tish Sussman, produced by Emily
Speaker 4: eda Veloshik, with sound editing and mixing from Nina Pollock
Speaker 4: and research and planning from Christine Dickinson and Hannah Cousins.
Speaker 4: I'm yours tepis.
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