Speaker 1: Welcome to Made by Women, a new podcast by the
Speaker 1: Seneca Women Podcast Network and I Heart Radio. At a
Speaker 1: moment when businesses face some of the biggest challenges in
Speaker 1: recent history, we bring you inspiring stories, practical insights, and
Speaker 1: shared learnings to help you successfully navigate in today's environment.
Speaker 1: Every Thursday, Made by Women will showcase the experiences of
Speaker 1: legendary women, entrepreneurs, fierce up and comers, and everyday women
Speaker 1: who found success their own way. Consider this your Real
Speaker 1: World n b A designed for the new Now. I'm
Speaker 1: Kim Azzarelli and thanks so much for joining us today.
Speaker 1: Jane Moss Backer Morris wants the world to think differently
Speaker 1: about the way our goods are, men factored, where they
Speaker 1: come from, and who makes them. Jane's company, To the
Speaker 1: Market connects retailers to ethical sources for apparel, accessories, and
Speaker 1: home goods. The products sourced by to the Market are
Speaker 1: sold by Fortune five companies and manufactured by hundreds of
Speaker 1: small suppliers from around the world. Now, Jane's background is
Speaker 1: not what you might expect. She worked in the U.
Speaker 1: S Department of States Bureau of counter Terrorism and in
Speaker 1: the Secretary's Office of Global Women's Issues. She also worked
Speaker 1: at the McCain Institute for International Leadership as their Director
Speaker 1: of Humanitarian Action. So how did Jane's path lead to
Speaker 1: entrepreneurship and founding to the Market Today I talked to
Speaker 1: Jane about her company, her deep belief that consumers can
Speaker 1: create positive change through their purchases, and why in business
Speaker 1: it's possible both to do well and do good. I
Speaker 1: also spoke to Jane about what gives her strength and
Speaker 1: what makes her sweat about running her own business. Enjoy
Speaker 1: our Converse station. Jane, thanks so much for joining us.
Speaker 1: We are thrilled to have you on Maade by Women.
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. So you run an unbelievable
Speaker 1: organization that the whole world should know about. So for
Speaker 1: our listeners, what is to the Market? So to the
Speaker 1: Market is a business with the mission of changing the
Speaker 1: way that retail manufacturing is done to empower people and
Speaker 1: protect the planet. And what that means in practice is
Speaker 1: we are literally trying to make retail products more ethically
Speaker 1: and more sustainably. That's an awesome mission. And you didn't
Speaker 1: choose a small goal. So you started this um when
Speaker 1: when did you start the business? So we became a
Speaker 1: corporation in six But I had been working on the business,
Speaker 1: I mean, gosh for years and years, really just trying
Speaker 1: to understand where there was opportunity pity to create and
Speaker 1: sustain jobs, and how I could particularly focus on employing
Speaker 1: women and our supply chain in an ethical and scalable way.
Speaker 1: But spent many a year working on it before we
Speaker 1: really started to launch and scale. And did you always
Speaker 1: want to be an entrepreneur or was this something that
Speaker 1: came to you later in life. I think I always
Speaker 1: had sort of an entrepreneurial bug. I mean, I thinking
Speaker 1: back as like a girl, I was always really into
Speaker 1: girl scout cookie selling that, you know, I had sort
Speaker 1: of that that desire to to hustle. But I would say, um,
Speaker 1: as I became a professional adult, I absolutely did not
Speaker 1: anticipating starting a business. I mean, as you know, I
Speaker 1: started my career in counter terrorism at the U. S.
Speaker 1: Department of State, and UM was focused on women in
Speaker 1: national security, but thought I would a in national security
Speaker 1: for years and years to come. So you so you're
Speaker 1: at the State Department, you're doing counter terrorism, you have
Speaker 1: this kind of entrepreneurial bug in you. Did you have
Speaker 1: any experience from retail? So I worked retail in high school,
Speaker 1: and honestly, I didn't love it. I thought it was
Speaker 1: really tough. You know, little did I know that I
Speaker 1: would be starting a retail based business. So, so tell
Speaker 1: us about the trip you took to India and what
Speaker 1: inspired to the market. So you know, I was out state,
Speaker 1: I was focused on women in national security. I started
Speaker 1: focusing on broader issues of women and human security, and
Speaker 1: um I ended up after I left the State department
Speaker 1: going to work on labor exploitation, and I ended up
Speaker 1: in Calcutta, India and visited these two cooperatives that were
Speaker 1: employing both survivors of human trafficking as well as employing
Speaker 1: persons that were vulnerable to trafficking. And I remember being
Speaker 1: so blown away by the business model because they were
Speaker 1: employing these women in a dignified way to produce products
Speaker 1: that I thought were beautiful products. But I also loved
Speaker 1: the approach of I'm going to address a social justice issue,
Speaker 1: this idea of fair labor through a business approach, And
Speaker 1: so it planted the seed of like, well, how would
Speaker 1: we leverage retail and all of the buying power that
Speaker 1: women have around the world to create a more ethical
Speaker 1: supply chain and to create and sustain jobs for communities
Speaker 1: like these women who have consistently been overlooked, under represented,
Speaker 1: and not you know, taken seriously in the global market.
Speaker 1: That's an amazing idea and a big idea which could
Speaker 1: solve so many problems. So what were the first steps
Speaker 1: to launching something so impactful like that. Well, I had,
Speaker 1: you know, these initial cooperatives that I had visited, and
Speaker 1: then I began to think about, well, how many other
Speaker 1: ethical suppliers exists like this around the world and how
Speaker 1: scalable is this concept of working with these ethical suppliers
Speaker 1: and having them replace the work that's being done by
Speaker 1: factories that have questionable environmental and social footprints with these
Speaker 1: ethical suppliers. So I did a lot of research, a
Speaker 1: lot of interviewing both buyers in the United States who
Speaker 1: are making purchasing decisions, as well as traveling and spending
Speaker 1: time with these different ethical suppliers and better understanding what
Speaker 1: are their constraints to scaling, why are they strugg willing
Speaker 1: to reach you know, national sales or international sales, and
Speaker 1: what value add can I provide? So what was it
Speaker 1: like to start something like that and what setbacks did
Speaker 1: you face, was there anything that really made you sweat Well.
Speaker 1: One of the initial challenges we had was a people
Speaker 1: asked me, well, why are you not a nonprofit? And
Speaker 1: my response to them was, this is about creating and
Speaker 1: sustaining dignified work, and this is about changing the way
Speaker 1: that consumers and businesses are sourcing their products. This isn't
Speaker 1: about pity purchases until really having like helping people reframe
Speaker 1: the way they thought about these suppliers, because there was
Speaker 1: also these biases that somehow these suppliers because they weren't
Speaker 1: brading in the massive traditional factories that we as Americans
Speaker 1: tend to think of now as it relates to me manufacturing,
Speaker 1: there were these biases that, oh, well, the product surely
Speaker 1: can't be as well made or you must have really
Speaker 1: low production capacity. And so I had, you know, this
Speaker 1: uphill battle of having to prove them wrong because they
Speaker 1: were looking for, you know, quality issues or expecting us
Speaker 1: not to be able to hit certain delivery by dates.
Speaker 1: And so just changing the way people think about how
Speaker 1: products are made and who they're made by so that
Speaker 1: they feel comfortable with the idea that, of course you
Speaker 1: can source ethically and sustainably and have just as good,
Speaker 1: if not better, of a product than these traditional, massive,
Speaker 1: massive factories that we have sadly become so reliant on.
Speaker 1: So changing people's mindsets is a really big thing. Uh,
Speaker 1: And know, only step one in your business was changing
Speaker 1: people's mindsets. So how did you approach that? I think
Speaker 1: it's through just education and then proof of concept, so,
Speaker 1: you know, telling them the production capacity that exists. And
Speaker 1: one of the big sort of revelations for me when
Speaker 1: I was trying to decide how I was going to
Speaker 1: engage in job creation and job sustainment was this realization
Speaker 1: that retail production is the second largest economy in the
Speaker 1: developing world. Agriculture is one artisan or retail production is too,
Speaker 1: and so this is a multibillion dollar business. And so
Speaker 1: helping folks understand that the scale of the opportunity was important,
Speaker 1: But then just as important, if not more important, was
Speaker 1: then showing them through delivery of the goods, how great
Speaker 1: it looked, and how great the service and the experience was,
Speaker 1: and how much more impactful their dollar was by by
Speaker 1: making purchases that were better aligned with all of the
Speaker 1: you know, value commitments that they make publicly. When you're
Speaker 1: actually aligning your dollar with your values right right now?
Speaker 1: That's that's key. I mean, and it's so true. There's
Speaker 1: so much out there publicly, but are people really really
Speaker 1: taking it to heart, really doing it. I want to
Speaker 1: get into the operations of everything, because what you're doing
Speaker 1: is a really complicated logistics issue, and it's a serious
Speaker 1: logistics puzzle. So how did you do it? Well? Um,
Speaker 1: Luckily I grew up with an extremely organized mother to
Speaker 1: me really uh create very very detailed sort of ways
Speaker 1: of systematizing my work and my thinking. And so it
Speaker 1: was really a function of creating structure, like what was
Speaker 1: our strategy and our structure for identifying these makers? What
Speaker 1: was our strategy and structure for vetting these makers? What
Speaker 1: was going to be the process through which we started
Speaker 1: sending purchase orders to these makers? So I think, you know,
Speaker 1: creating this strategy and the structure was hard, but then
Speaker 1: once we have created it, it's it's actually quite smooth.
Speaker 1: We have a maker that gets identified, and that could
Speaker 1: be a small artisan group up to a large scale
Speaker 1: fair Trade certified or God's Organic certified factory. If they
Speaker 1: pass our vetting, they then become a part of to
Speaker 1: the market's supplier base and We then tap into that
Speaker 1: supplier base when clients come to us with specific needs,
Speaker 1: and these suppliers then bid on these opportunities to produce
Speaker 1: for our clients, whether that be a large retailer like
Speaker 1: a Target, a brand um like a Madewell, or you know,
Speaker 1: even nonprofits like Every Mother Counts. All of these organizations
Speaker 1: are interested more and more in sustainability and in ethical manufacturing,
Speaker 1: and they're looking for ways to um leverage their supply
Speaker 1: chain to do good and we are trying to make
Speaker 1: it as easy as possible for them to do so.
Speaker 1: That's incredible if you just think about the kind of
Speaker 1: reach you could have by partnering with those organizations, It's
Speaker 1: it's such a powerful concept. So how did you get
Speaker 1: people to understand the power of their purchases and to
Speaker 1: connect with the people who made these products. This is
Speaker 1: an evolving sort of process and we're constantly learning on
Speaker 1: how to best articulate the impact. I think originally I
Speaker 1: probably was a lot more descriptive around of policy and
Speaker 1: like community impact, and that was really I think a
Speaker 1: reflection of my time having worked in the government and
Speaker 1: in the offer profit space, where I felt like I
Speaker 1: wanted to really help people understand the issues in depth.
Speaker 1: And what I came to better understand is that actually
Speaker 1: I needed to really simplify it for people to be
Speaker 1: able to convey, to to easily process it and convert
Speaker 1: into making change. Otherwise the information was just too overwhelming.
Speaker 1: So we've really tried to simplify our messaging around even
Speaker 1: saying empower people and protect the planet. I mean that is,
Speaker 1: you know, a handful of words, but its years to
Speaker 1: get there. And I always think of Churchill saying, you know,
Speaker 1: I wish I had written a and I'm paraphrasing, but
Speaker 1: I think he said something like I wish I had
Speaker 1: written a shorter letter, but I didn't have enough time.
Speaker 1: But you did it so well in your book. You know,
Speaker 1: the title of your book by the Change you want
Speaker 1: to see? I mean that really, that really says it all, um,
Speaker 1: and I think that's really powerful. Did you write the
Speaker 1: book with the goal of trying to educate consumers as
Speaker 1: well as uh the suppliers? Totally? I mean, I think
Speaker 1: that the book was an opportunity for me to put
Speaker 1: down so many thoughts that I had around why I
Speaker 1: think conscious consumerism can be simplified and how I hope
Speaker 1: people think about it, which is this idea of values
Speaker 1: alignment with your purchasing power. And I also really wanted
Speaker 1: people to realize that conscious consumerism doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: elitist or only for a specific type of person, or
Speaker 1: that you land on one one place in the political spectrum.
Speaker 1: The idea was that you know, regardless of your values,
Speaker 1: um you spend money, and through the money that you spend,
Speaker 1: you have an opportunity to advance your values by supporting
Speaker 1: businesses that are aligned with those values. So that could
Speaker 1: be everything from you know, I want to support black
Speaker 1: owned businesses too, I'm specifically interested in only buying fair
Speaker 1: trade certified products. I mean, everybody has, you know, things
Speaker 1: that are more important to them than others. It's not
Speaker 1: just for one sort of value set. The intent is
Speaker 1: for everybody to say, well, what's really important to me.
Speaker 1: How can I be a part of making change through
Speaker 1: my purchasing power? Because the one thing we all do
Speaker 1: have in common is purchasing. Yeah, right, so I mean
Speaker 1: everybody can make a difference with their with their purchasing power.
Speaker 1: I think that's really an important message that you bring
Speaker 1: to the world. But just back to this point that
Speaker 1: your social business. I mean, I guess a lot of
Speaker 1: people would say, why don't you want to be a nonprofit?
Speaker 1: And I think you made that point earlier or about
Speaker 1: making the case for doing well and doing good. Uh,
Speaker 1: do you think more people are starting to understand the
Speaker 1: value of social businesses totally? I mean, even in like
Speaker 1: the last three years, I've seen such a shift in
Speaker 1: the way that people think about social good within the
Speaker 1: business where even you know, several years ago, I think
Speaker 1: people thought that it was a luxury, and more and
Speaker 1: more they're realizing it is a necessity if you want
Speaker 1: to survive and engage with the millennial and Gen Z
Speaker 1: population as well as the broader population. As we collectively
Speaker 1: think differently about the role of the private sector in
Speaker 1: leading and um, you know, having an impact on social good.
Speaker 1: That you will be a dying brand if you do
Speaker 1: not consider how your values are intertwined with your operations.
Speaker 1: Not that long ago businesses kind of had purpose on
Speaker 1: one side and profit somewhere else. And this idea that
Speaker 1: you could integrate purpose into your value proposition. And I
Speaker 1: think companies are right that will succeed long term will
Speaker 1: be the ones that really know how to give as
Speaker 1: part of their business strategy and and be part of solutions.
Speaker 1: You work with probably thousands of women entrepreneurs around the world,
Speaker 1: so you kind of are an expert. You're an entrepreneur yourself,
Speaker 1: and you work with thousands of women entrepreneurs around the
Speaker 1: world helping them, uh, you know, create a market for
Speaker 1: their for their products. What did nobody tell you about
Speaker 1: running a business or starting a business that you wish
Speaker 1: you had known? Oh? So many things. Probably, I mean
Speaker 1: for women in particular, I think we tend to be
Speaker 1: a bit more risk averse. And because we tend to
Speaker 1: be more risk averse, I think we tend to react
Speaker 1: differently to rejection, meaning that I had I would say,
Speaker 1: pretty thin skin on sort of the rejection test. And
Speaker 1: what I wish someone had told me is that I
Speaker 1: will be rejected on a daily basis. You know, for
Speaker 1: anyone who is even starting a nonprofit, you are constantly
Speaker 1: pitching and selling your idea to employees, to investors, to donors,
Speaker 1: to the broader public, and you are likely going to
Speaker 1: face pretty consistent rejection if you're doing as much outreach
Speaker 1: as you should be doing. And so that was a
Speaker 1: big lesson for me because to be totally Frank, I
Speaker 1: was used to this sort of formula of if I
Speaker 1: work really really hard and I input X, then why
Speaker 1: will be the output? You know, that's so true, and
Speaker 1: part of being an entrepreneur is kind of getting comfortable
Speaker 1: with the word no and not taking as rejection, right,
Speaker 1: and you know, recognizing that that's kind of part of
Speaker 1: everyday life and it's kind of not necessarily personal. I
Speaker 1: guess sometimes personal, but most of the time it's just
Speaker 1: like you said, it's just the nature of of business
Speaker 1: and and starting something, especially when you're starting something like
Speaker 1: you you did, which is really changing the world and
Speaker 1: hasn't been done before in the way you're envisioning it.
Speaker 1: So you know, you have to educate people on so
Speaker 1: many levels, and then at the same time you have
Speaker 1: to go through the whole pitch process on every level.
Speaker 1: So when you're in that situation and you're getting you know,
Speaker 1: as you said, like no, after no, after no, after no,
Speaker 1: what gives you strength in that moment? I think still
Speaker 1: believing in what I'm doing, which is also why I
Speaker 1: recommend anybody who is thinking about starting a business, a nonprofit,
Speaker 1: a project within an organization, that you have to be
Speaker 1: deeply passionate and convicted about what you're doing for it
Speaker 1: to be sustainable and not not sort of environmentally sustainable,
Speaker 1: I mean like sustainable in your life because it is very,
Speaker 1: very challenging emotionally, mentally, spiritually, physically, Like it is truly
Speaker 1: um will test you in ways that you likely have
Speaker 1: never been tested. And when everybody's telling you that your
Speaker 1: idea is crummy as heck, it is that commitment, in
Speaker 1: that passion for addressing the problem you're trying to address,
Speaker 1: that will, you know, keep you sort of slugging forward.
Speaker 1: I couldn't agree more. But it's worth it. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's just so worth it to see your vision comes
Speaker 1: to come to life. I mean, have you felt that
Speaker 1: as you've kind of developed this over the past several years.
Speaker 1: I mean, really, the world that's kind of coming in
Speaker 1: your direction, you probably have a lot to do with that. Well, gosh,
Speaker 1: I mean, there have been so many loads over the
Speaker 1: course of this business and journey. I mean, I actually
Speaker 1: one of my my next book is I want to
Speaker 1: compile like the most hilarious founder fails that I've identified,
Speaker 1: because I've had is like massive fails, and I feel
Speaker 1: like it's so important to share these stories of like
Speaker 1: here's what happened, and you know, and it doesn't have
Speaker 1: to be like my business failed. It can be like
Speaker 1: you know, I have these like epic experiences of like,
Speaker 1: you know, delivering goods and just like the worst thing
Speaker 1: on the planet happening. I mean, I remember we were
Speaker 1: delivering hearst and I was, um, They're like delivery went
Speaker 1: to the wrong location, and so I had like a
Speaker 1: courier common deliver it and I was helping the courier
Speaker 1: deliver it and literally like the box that was carrying
Speaker 1: their product exploded on the street in New York, like
Speaker 1: near their office. And I remember being like, ah, like
Speaker 1: this is this is um, this is the glamor of
Speaker 1: being an entrepreneur. You just gosh, you luck love the
Speaker 1: heck out of what you're doing because the failure is
Speaker 1: real and it's inevitable, and it's also important, like it's
Speaker 1: an important part of that process. So so UH, and
Speaker 1: there's a lot of pivots. You know, we're in this
Speaker 1: very difficult moment in our country's history and the world's history. Frankly,
Speaker 1: and Uh, I had spoken with you a few months back,
Speaker 1: um as COVID was becoming a reality of all of
Speaker 1: our lives. How did that impact your business model and operations? Well,
Speaker 1: when when COVID became as real as it is, it
Speaker 1: was clear to my team that there was a PPE
Speaker 1: shortage in the United States. So this is personal protective equipment,
Speaker 1: and so I in the team decided that we wanted
Speaker 1: to go out to our suppliers because we have these
Speaker 1: hundreds of suppliers around the world, and wanted to engage
Speaker 1: to see who is capable of making masks and gowns
Speaker 1: because we had expertise in importing, in production UM. And
Speaker 1: so I thought, well, gosh, maybe we can be helpful.
Speaker 1: And it turned out that our suppliers were capable of
Speaker 1: making a lot of this product. And so we started
Speaker 1: pitching this PPE product to hospitals and you know, to
Speaker 1: date have delivered over three million units of PPE. That's
Speaker 1: incredible three million, did you say, yes? Three million? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And how many businesses are involved with that? Like how
Speaker 1: many suppliers? Oh tends? I mean, um, all over the world.
Speaker 1: I mean We've sourced from the United States. We have
Speaker 1: Union production, which I'm so proud of UM in New Jersey.
Speaker 1: We have makers in Ghana, in Kenya, in West Bank,
Speaker 1: in Bangladesh, in Hong Kong, I mean just really India,
Speaker 1: truly all over. And I'm delighted because it's important that
Speaker 1: we have a syndicated supply chain, meaning that we have
Speaker 1: diversity and our suppliers from a risk mitigation and standpoint,
Speaker 1: because as everyone I'm sure is familiar with, we've had
Speaker 1: these waves of country closures. But I'm also so grateful
Speaker 1: that we were able to carry on the mission of
Speaker 1: the business which is too in to partner with UM
Speaker 1: suppliers that are are respectful of their employees and UM
Speaker 1: are operating in a better way for for the planet
Speaker 1: and have so much of the money that is being
Speaker 1: spent in this country on this product be channeled to
Speaker 1: job creation and job sustainment for these makers. Well, it's
Speaker 1: so incredible that you're able to take your Brownie spark
Speaker 1: and then your state department experience and build something that
Speaker 1: could just impact so many people. It all comes back
Speaker 1: to the Brownies. I'm positive that like that that like
Speaker 1: catalog of like the bike, I could win if I
Speaker 1: sold enough boxes. Like It's very ingrained in my head
Speaker 1: and I think it's so important for women in particular
Speaker 1: to learn sales yeah, because this is like really the
Speaker 1: chance that we get an opportunity to pitch and to
Speaker 1: like have that experience of feeling comfortable like asking of people. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's so true. I think it kind of ties back
Speaker 1: to what you're saying earlier about about you know, getting
Speaker 1: comfortable with rejection and being comfortable with the world now
Speaker 1: because if you can't take no, you won't ask. So
Speaker 1: I think if you can just get comfortable with no,
Speaker 1: then you can kind of ask for anything. Totally. Yes.
Speaker 1: So now, how do you envision your business moving forward, UM,
Speaker 1: in a world that hopefully is going to be healing
Speaker 1: from COVID nineteen. Well, we are planning to continue to
Speaker 1: provide PPE as long as it's needed, and I'm happy
Speaker 1: that we're also distributing product in countries where we're having
Speaker 1: the product be made as well. So we are distributing
Speaker 1: masks in Kenya, in Ghana. UM. We're also doing sort
Speaker 1: of starting to do some donations of masks. We're partnering
Speaker 1: with the I r C to to donate masks M
Speaker 1: two refugees in Texas. So there is UM certainly a
Speaker 1: long tail where even if the hospitals are in a
Speaker 1: good place, right now, there's still a general public, both
Speaker 1: in the United States and abroad, who may be needing
Speaker 1: basic things like a mask, which is sort of a
Speaker 1: basic necessity now. But I'm happy that, you know, retail
Speaker 1: is also picking up, which is great, And I think
Speaker 1: retailers and corporations are beginning to really understand how critical
Speaker 1: it is to have a syndicated supply chain, meaning to
Speaker 1: have multiple suppliers being capable of producing a product for
Speaker 1: them in case the country shuts down or their geopolitical
Speaker 1: dynamics that make it difficult. And I think they're also
Speaker 1: really thinking about how they spend their money now that
Speaker 1: there's such a focus on conscious consumerism more than ever.
Speaker 1: I mean, people are really just asking themselves like why
Speaker 1: on Earth? Like does my business exist? Why do I exist?
Speaker 1: Like what am I doing to make this world better?
Speaker 1: What is what is the role that I play here?
Speaker 1: And I'm hoping that that reflection leads us collectively to
Speaker 1: a place where we realize how powerful the spend that
Speaker 1: we make control can be and really is, and it's
Speaker 1: just a function of us getting organized and leveraging it.
Speaker 1: What is the one thing that you might tell someone
Speaker 1: who wants to start a business that has impact. Is
Speaker 1: there some piece of advice that you've gotten or some
Speaker 1: experience that you've had where you feel like, really, if
Speaker 1: I could just help the next generation or even people
Speaker 1: of your own generation or older, what what what would
Speaker 1: you tell them about starting a social impact business. I
Speaker 1: would say that the fundamentals of the business have to
Speaker 1: be sound for the social business to work, meaning that
Speaker 1: the social element cannot carry the business and it cannot
Speaker 1: save the business if the economics of the business do
Speaker 1: not work. That's a great piece of advice. Um, but
Speaker 1: that probably is the most important piece of advice. So
Speaker 1: I think obviously what what you do is just, uh,
Speaker 1: just so incredible and so motivating. Are there people that
Speaker 1: you've met along the way, women owned businesses in particular,
Speaker 1: stick with you that in those difficult, difficult moments, you
Speaker 1: think of them and you're like, I'm doing this for
Speaker 1: her totally. Yeah. I mean I think I think of
Speaker 1: those two groups that I visited in Calcutta that I
Speaker 1: wrote about and by the Change, where you know it's
Speaker 1: mostly survivors of of sex trafficking, and the idea that
Speaker 1: you can be a small part of helping to change
Speaker 1: the trajectory of their life because they are to work
Speaker 1: in a thriving business with orders, and that then means
Speaker 1: that hopefully the trajectory of her children's lives is impacted.
Speaker 1: UM continues to be a sort of strength for me,
Speaker 1: because even if you know, the business doesn't become as
Speaker 1: big as I believe it can be, the bottom line
Speaker 1: is is if I'm driving economic opportunity to the suppliers
Speaker 1: that we've partnered with, then I feel like we're making
Speaker 1: a difference, even if it's even if it's small. Well, Jane,
Speaker 1: I am so inspired by what you do and congratulations
Speaker 1: on everything you've accomplished. You You've already made such a
Speaker 1: big impact, and I know there's so much more to come.
Speaker 1: So Jane, thanks so much for joining us Unmade by Women.
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. I want to thank Jane
Speaker 1: for sharing her story with us and for sharing with
Speaker 1: us what gives her strength and what makes her sweat
Speaker 1: about running her own business us. Here are a few
Speaker 1: important points that I took away from the conversation. First,
Speaker 1: one key lesson that every entrepreneur needs to learn is
Speaker 1: to get comfortable with the word no. You will hear
Speaker 1: it over and over again. As Jane says As an entrepreneur,
Speaker 1: you are constantly pitching and trying to sell your idea,
Speaker 1: and you will hear no more often than yes. If
Speaker 1: you take Noah's rejection, it will be difficult to ask
Speaker 1: for what you need. Instead, reframe that no as being
Speaker 1: just one step closer to yes, and it may even
Speaker 1: provide an opportunity to find a better partner and to
Speaker 1: assess what your company really needs most. I love that
Speaker 1: Jane's approach to dealing with no is to refocus on
Speaker 1: her passion for her work and the company's mission, the
Speaker 1: one that centered down the founder's path in the first place. Second,
Speaker 1: we need to get used to the failures too. There'll
Speaker 1: be plenty of them, says Jane. Talk about them, embrace them,
Speaker 1: and learn from them. And as they say, in the
Speaker 1: tech world, it's important to fail fast and failful word. Finally,
Speaker 1: Jane shows us that no matter what your business model,
Speaker 1: for profit or nonprofit, there's an opportunity to make positive
Speaker 1: change in the world. To the market is transforming the
Speaker 1: retail industry from the inside out. They're working with huge
Speaker 1: companies to change the supply chain and in turn are
Speaker 1: giving economic opportunities to vulnerable people. And we can each
Speaker 1: support Jane's work through our purchases, so make sure to
Speaker 1: check out Jane's book, By the change you want to see.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for joining us on Made by Women,
Speaker 1: and have a great week. Made by Women is brought
Speaker 1: to you by the Seneca Women Podcast Network and I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, with support from founding partner PNG