Speaker 1: Okay, now hold on, now, I don't even know. I
Speaker 1: ain't gonna have y'all edited that out. I'm just not answering.
Speaker 1: Now you're asking a lot. Now you're digging into something.
Speaker 1: People going to jail. Welcome to another episode of Eating
Speaker 1: While Broke. I'm your host, Colleen Wit and today we
Speaker 1: have special guests Mandy b who was a podcaster and
Speaker 1: content creator focusing on women's empowerment, sexual liberation, and body positivity.
Speaker 1: She recently launched a subscription box for women called Official
Speaker 1: Box Owner, focused on feminine hygiene, sexual health, and normalizing
Speaker 1: conversations about womanhood. And I can definitely speak from personal experience.
Speaker 1: I definitely appreciate everything that you do for women and
Speaker 1: and the movement of conversating because I still get nervous,
Speaker 1: you know, buying tampons, and like I literally will go
Speaker 1: to the register that has maybe a woman or try
Speaker 1: and pile on a bunch of stuff. It's for a tampons.
Speaker 1: It's crazy that I have this now because I'm also
Speaker 1: someone that hid my pure from my mom for the
Speaker 1: first year. So I am now learning the conversations and
Speaker 1: how important it is, especially like you know, I went
Speaker 1: through my little home phase with with my partners, and
Speaker 1: I thought I thought it was just also very important
Speaker 1: to know the smells. Um, what tracking your own ovulation.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's a lot of women now, of course
Speaker 1: I'm in my thirties, so planning on on being a mother,
Speaker 1: what that looks like, what's the best time of the
Speaker 1: month should be? Um? And then also just normalizing the
Speaker 1: conversations with the partners you have about what pleasures you,
Speaker 1: what doesn't pleasure you. Those are all conversations I think
Speaker 1: we should be having now. So um, that's kind of
Speaker 1: how my box came about. So what I like about
Speaker 1: you is that you have the podcast, you have your box,
Speaker 1: and not only are you a personality, but you're an entrepreneur.
Speaker 1: Oh god yeah. And I came from corporate, so I'll
Speaker 1: be honest with you too as this entrepreneur thing. Um,
Speaker 1: first off, I used to work like seventy eight hours
Speaker 1: as a tax accountant, and I was like, I just
Speaker 1: want my own business, so I don't have to work
Speaker 1: as much. Now, you work more, No one told entrepreneurs,
Speaker 1: and no, you're just not gonna sleep Like I've literally
Speaker 1: gone through therapy and had to set my boundaries to
Speaker 1: let my team. Know, hey, nine to nine after nine pm,
Speaker 1: can you please like, that's still a twelve hour day.
Speaker 1: It's still a swem our day. I love how you
Speaker 1: admit that to people are always fool Like, I can't
Speaker 1: wait to work for myself because then I'll be my
Speaker 1: own boss. And like, there's no such thing as your
Speaker 1: own boss, either your customers or your boss, your vendors
Speaker 1: or your boss, some und your boss. So I had
Speaker 1: a baby in my fourteen pound baby is my boss?
Speaker 1: Now I was like, how did that happen? For sure?
Speaker 1: And I mean that's the thing too. I still wake
Speaker 1: up at like seven, so I really have like fourteen
Speaker 1: hour days to be real. Um and then, unfortunately, to
Speaker 1: so many if you're an entrepreneur, social media is a
Speaker 1: large part of that. We're on our phones all day long.
Speaker 1: So if you really want to include social media, you
Speaker 1: probably realistically are working. I agree. So what did do
Speaker 1: you have us eating today? All right? So the dish
Speaker 1: um that I brought for you today is one that
Speaker 1: got me through many, many, many times. So it's just
Speaker 1: white rice, um, an egg over easy and then catch up. Okay, Okay,
Speaker 1: you could also do hot sauce if you want salt
Speaker 1: pepper for some season as well. Um, and that's the dish.
Speaker 1: This looks like a definite broke dish. I never had this.
Speaker 1: I'm really excited because I like seeing the different broke dishes,
Speaker 1: and I've been lucky and fortunate enough to not have
Speaker 1: had the same dish twice. I get to get find
Speaker 1: out where the root of this dish came from. So
Speaker 1: what was the last time you ate this? Okay, first,
Speaker 1: I guess I'll start by at least putting. Um. Now
Speaker 1: we can say and put the rice down. Thank thankfully
Speaker 1: you cook that for me already. Um. So the rice
Speaker 1: is already cooked. Rice is just something you always have around. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you put it with every meal, and you have to.
Speaker 1: It's a good filler. It's a good filler. Um. And
Speaker 1: then eggs. Everyone also always has eggs. Um. So the
Speaker 1: last time I have this dish, I would say, can
Speaker 1: I go to get this is going in? You don't
Speaker 1: if you don't feel okay, I'm staying up. I'm probably
Speaker 1: gonna be the same height standing up, so you want
Speaker 1: have to change any cameras. Um. The last time I
Speaker 1: had this dish, I would say was probably why right,
Speaker 1: I was still in college. I was still in college
Speaker 1: because I thought I made it big once I made
Speaker 1: it to corporate. Once I made it to corporate, I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, I'm making sixty one dollars. I'm so
Speaker 1: rich now, you know. You know I don't have kids.
Speaker 1: So I was, but I wasn't living off of Sally
Speaker 1: May anymore. Um so, I would say this was probably
Speaker 1: the last time with two thousand eighteen non traditional college students.
Speaker 1: So I graduated college in Um. Yes, so I graduated.
Speaker 1: I was supposed to be a tax accountant. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: let this get a little hot before I put the
Speaker 1: butter on it. Um numbers, Yes, I love numbers. So
Speaker 1: I was in school. You couldn't tell me I wasn't
Speaker 1: gonna be a c p A. So I did a
Speaker 1: hundred of fifty one credits in four years and got
Speaker 1: my b s and accounting and a another bachelor's in
Speaker 1: Business administration. Want to focus on marketing because in New
Speaker 1: York to get you to sit for the CPO, you
Speaker 1: have to have a hundred and fifty credits. I wasn't
Speaker 1: gonna pay for a master's. That's coming out of pocket.
Speaker 1: That's too expensive. Um so yeah, So I ended up
Speaker 1: leaving my first job at Goldman Sachs and going to
Speaker 1: earn Sina, and then I left that ship after one
Speaker 1: year to the podcast. So that's that's amazing. Uh So
Speaker 1: when you were in school, were you working? When I
Speaker 1: was in school, I did some internships, um, and then
Speaker 1: I bartended maybe the first two years. I also studied abroad.
Speaker 1: I was living off scholarships and can I say these
Speaker 1: uh how I'm just saying? Oh? No, I had quite
Speaker 1: a few men on the docket helping me pay because,
Speaker 1: like my initially covered regular tuition, but in order to
Speaker 1: graduate fast, I had to take winter and summer courses.
Speaker 1: So I had one guy paid for those. Another guy
Speaker 1: had me as a fake employee on his business. Yeah
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna say who that was. I don't know,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I was getting a check every two weeks
Speaker 1: from him. Um. So that's how I was able to really,
Speaker 1: like you know, get through school without having to work.
Speaker 1: Are you still cool with these people that? Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: they're still friends friends today? You guys ever group chat? Like,
Speaker 1: can you believe this group group chat with my lovers? No? Girl? UM,
Speaker 1: I mean to be fair, they all knew about each
Speaker 1: other because I'm a very honest person. Um but yeah, no,
Speaker 1: so what was the last question? Look now now I'm
Speaker 1: trying to focus here. Yeah, I don't want to get
Speaker 1: too off, but how do you how do you go
Speaker 1: from c p A to all about women empowerment? Um? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean I'm a girl's girl on my and like
Speaker 1: I like girl trips. I love being around my friends.
Speaker 1: That was probably one of the reasons for my recent
Speaker 1: breakup too, is my friends come before everybody. Really, my
Speaker 1: friends come before you tell guys that. Yeah, yeah, yeah?
Speaker 1: And what slocks too is my friends also come before
Speaker 1: my family, which is very different for most people. My family,
Speaker 1: I feel like I grew up with Osbourne's so it's
Speaker 1: just like we needed a television show because it was
Speaker 1: so toxic. So once I moved out, I moved out
Speaker 1: of eighteen, I was like, my friends have always wrote
Speaker 1: for me if I ever needed anything, my friends always
Speaker 1: had me. So yeah, I tell them that, And um,
Speaker 1: is that gonna okay? They know it's a cooking show,
Speaker 1: all of you. Listener, she's cracking an egg. I'm cracking
Speaker 1: an egg and I haven't worked on an electric top
Speaker 1: in a while. I probably should have let it get
Speaker 1: more hotter. More hotter is not a word, by the way,
Speaker 1: I will make up boards, this entire fun this fine? Okay? Um,
Speaker 1: so where where are we with with with the journey?
Speaker 1: How did I get to podcasting? What's crazy is my
Speaker 1: co host Squeezy came to me. This was my last
Speaker 1: year of college, um, and I was like, girl, I'm
Speaker 1: I'm about to be studying for the c p A.
Speaker 1: It's about to be busy. And she was like, I
Speaker 1: just went on this other podcast and I did so
Speaker 1: great and they said I should have a podcast. It
Speaker 1: was so cool and we were talking about dating and
Speaker 1: sex and you know, I was thinking, who else would
Speaker 1: talk dating and sex? And it's just as big as
Speaker 1: oh as I am like many, let me see if
Speaker 1: Many wants to. And we had actually just rekindled a
Speaker 1: friendship we hadn't spoken for maybe five years, um, and
Speaker 1: we literally got into the podcasting for what girl, I
Speaker 1: had a Twitter. There was nothing worse than I could
Speaker 1: have said on a podcast that I didn't tweet about,
Speaker 1: which min you I just had to go through and
Speaker 1: delete a hole. Have you went back to your Twitter? Girl?
Speaker 1: Do you know they look at your tweets and background
Speaker 1: checks now just letting you know. Oh yes, ma'am. I
Speaker 1: think personality you're you're more nervous right because because they
Speaker 1: it's cancel culture right now. I looked at them tweets,
Speaker 1: I said, what personalities? That That ain't me? I was.
Speaker 1: I was like, I was imparrased. Oh my god, no
Speaker 1: one was. Let me see. One was really bad. One
Speaker 1: was like, I don't sell drugs or pimpos? What is
Speaker 1: rap music? Girl? I love rap music. I was like,
Speaker 1: I tweet, um, but yeah, So she came to me.
Speaker 1: It was like, we should do a podcast. By episode three,
Speaker 1: UM shout out to a King A King from Law
Speaker 1: Speaker Network. UM reached out and at the time Charlemagne
Speaker 1: was a part of that as well. UM and a
Speaker 1: year later they brought us on board and we just
Speaker 1: like full sale went and and we like we went
Speaker 1: on Brilliant Idiots again. Shout out to to Charlemagne and
Speaker 1: Andrew Chultz for that opportunity, just that one feature. How
Speaker 1: did you get to Charlotman? Did I miss that? King?
Speaker 1: So A King introduced us to Chris Morrow, who also
Speaker 1: worked with Charlomagne. Who that's where Brilliant Idiots the read
Speaker 1: friend Zone all the Top Black Black podcast. We're a
Speaker 1: part of a lot of speaker network and so we
Speaker 1: got introduced and we're able to kind of be a
Speaker 1: part of it. So we signed on and it was
Speaker 1: like that's all she wrote, That's all she wrote, and
Speaker 1: like again, probably just being in New York too, right,
Speaker 1: I don't want to say that there's any one way
Speaker 1: to be a successful podcaster. Right. So growing up or
Speaker 1: being around New York, we saw Disamaro brilliant idiots. They
Speaker 1: were having live shows the read so we were like
Speaker 1: the next step of the live show, we had to
Speaker 1: do a live show. So we self funded our own
Speaker 1: live show, sold out. Next thing you know, we're looking
Speaker 1: at our analytics on SoundCloud, looked at our major cities,
Speaker 1: and we're googling theaters, event spaces, renting them out ourselves
Speaker 1: and putting tickets on event right, and we put ourselves
Speaker 1: on an a city tour wow where we profited every
Speaker 1: show because we sold out every while. And where you
Speaker 1: any part of you guys doubting yourself during the journey,
Speaker 1: and then are you making two eggs. I'm gonna make
Speaker 1: two I'm gonna make tours. I'm gonna make it quick.
Speaker 1: I didn't. You're just trying not to. Yeah, I didn't
Speaker 1: want to have to. I need space. Normally I do
Speaker 1: a little pile on a micromanager. Listen, Normally I do
Speaker 1: the little fans. This is a big old fan. I'm
Speaker 1: trying to make sure I don't work the yoke here
Speaker 1: and if y'all are looking at s where I know
Speaker 1: how to cook. But I wasn't gonna come on here
Speaker 1: and say we're gonna look what you did it. So
Speaker 1: were you nervous at all during any of this experience?
Speaker 1: Did you have any like see things of doubt? Because
Speaker 1: I know even me starting this, I always have the
Speaker 1: little devil on one shoulder that's like questioning the ability
Speaker 1: or whether it's going to be successful. Did you have
Speaker 1: any of that? I'll be honest with you and again
Speaker 1: through therapy, Girl, I just got told I live in fear.
Speaker 1: So every day I woke up, I said, there's no
Speaker 1: way I'm making this much money. It's gonna end. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna have to go back to work. And so a
Speaker 1: lot of like what I did was just like I
Speaker 1: have to stay working, which is probably why I have
Speaker 1: thirty jobs. Now, Um, you do you do? I live
Speaker 1: in full fear. That's how I live. And it's not healthy.
Speaker 1: It is not it is not healthy, it's it's not
Speaker 1: something to do. And what's crazy is I live in
Speaker 1: in the fear firm like almost where I want to
Speaker 1: disconnect from the past. I'm scared of the present, and
Speaker 1: I looked to the future, and the future scares me.
Speaker 1: So the fact that there's the future scared you. Um,
Speaker 1: the future scares me because that we just had a pandemic.
Speaker 1: You would have told me we were about to live
Speaker 1: through and now we're about to live through a world war.
Speaker 1: So to me, the future scares me because I'm I
Speaker 1: don't want to call myself with my manager, but my
Speaker 1: team has been letting me know on such Um. I
Speaker 1: hate to not feel like I'm in control of things,
Speaker 1: and so doesn't matter what my goals are, it doesn't
Speaker 1: matter how hard I work towards them. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of uh variables that are out of my control. And
Speaker 1: so that's what scares me is that all of this
Speaker 1: hard work could end who knows, with a fucking nuclear
Speaker 1: bomb at this point, So you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And so that's what what scares me is, Like what
Speaker 1: am I working towards and so now I'm just like
Speaker 1: trying to live in the moment. That's what I'm working
Speaker 1: on a therapy now is just like enjoying my successes
Speaker 1: as they come and not looking for the next high
Speaker 1: if that makes me Yeah. I When I interview people
Speaker 1: on this show, one thing I've noticed is that every
Speaker 1: time someone hit a goal, the goal capt moving, so
Speaker 1: it was like impossible for you to find your happiness
Speaker 1: in hitting that milestone. Yeah, I mean I grew up
Speaker 1: in a single parent household, right, so six figures that
Speaker 1: I feel you just six figures seems like oh my god,
Speaker 1: will I ever obtain? And now it's like all right now.
Speaker 1: You also don't realize when you talk to six figures,
Speaker 1: there's a huge difference between a hundred thousand and nine
Speaker 1: hundred and nine thousand and nine. So now, yeah, like
Speaker 1: I'm working towards seven figures. Do you find yourself ever?
Speaker 1: And speaking from experience, but do you do you ever
Speaker 1: find yourself because you're working so many jobs? Do you
Speaker 1: keep yourself on a strict budget to survive or do
Speaker 1: you do you do you live a little when it
Speaker 1: comes to your finance? Do you put what okay, Okay,
Speaker 1: so you budget. I lived on a budget so for
Speaker 1: so many years, like literally this this meal reminds me
Speaker 1: of like back when I had to choose between toilet
Speaker 1: paper or food. Yeah, like I had roommates, I was
Speaker 1: like literally the financial aid office like nah, I need
Speaker 1: that to hit or I was calling not somebody like
Speaker 1: nah I need that now. Um and again back back
Speaker 1: in those days, which also is not too long, but
Speaker 1: having to go to Western Union, not having cash, that,
Speaker 1: not having zail, the way of getting means from people
Speaker 1: like it wasn't wasn't really you know, it was very expensive.
Speaker 1: I made two good eggs. Y'all can't tell me nothing. Okay, um,
Speaker 1: turn that So what at what point did you stop
Speaker 1: living on a budget. Was it like you hit six
Speaker 1: figures and you said screw it? Do you don't live
Speaker 1: paychecks and paycheck? Because I feel like most entrepreneurs don't
Speaker 1: do that. They know better, because I mean again, I
Speaker 1: think one of the things that I never had the
Speaker 1: luxury of doing when I was eating meals like this
Speaker 1: was even having a savings was knowing that another check
Speaker 1: was coming in or I mean I had to budget
Speaker 1: when I got to check every two that's all you're seeing,
Speaker 1: you know, the taxes that are being taken out and
Speaker 1: a lot of times, and that's how I was raised.
Speaker 1: Can I can I hug you up? She's adding up everybody. Okay,
Speaker 1: really good and then you know the little yo gonna
Speaker 1: break and it's gonna be delicious. Um. I now have
Speaker 1: took this out and I do not poison sauce. Um.
Speaker 1: And I also like sour cream, but I gotta stay
Speaker 1: away from dairy. I'm trying to stay away from dairy. Um.
Speaker 1: But this was this was my go to. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: bring my seat back over so we can sit and
Speaker 1: eat because the bitch is hungry, and you break the yoke,
Speaker 1: let it get into the rise. If you need some more,
Speaker 1: like I love everything super saucy and gooey. That's me,
Speaker 1: then you might. I definitely will because I love seeing
Speaker 1: all that sauce. A lot of people don't. I'm surprised
Speaker 1: so many people don't like they over easy, but I
Speaker 1: love it. I feel it's okay girl. When they don't know,
Speaker 1: they just don't know, like if they're sausage and pancakes,
Speaker 1: I let that sauce. You have to you have to. Okay,
Speaker 1: here's the thing. And I'm gonna tell you secret. If
Speaker 1: they don't like over easy eggs or runny eggs, they
Speaker 1: order their steaks well done. And you can't trust those people,
Speaker 1: you know what. You can't trust themand don't trust them.
Speaker 1: You can't trust them. You can't trust you know what?
Speaker 1: He does both. He likes him, so he doesn't eat
Speaker 1: him runny, and he eats his steaks while done. Oh
Speaker 1: not him eating beef turkey. Yeah, tell me what you
Speaker 1: think about it. You can do that. Well. I didn't
Speaker 1: cook the rice, but so shout out to whoever made
Speaker 1: the rice. This is jasmine rice. This is a little passage.
Speaker 1: I love those jazzin rights is my favorite. Doesn't it
Speaker 1: taste great? No? This is great m and literally to like. Um,
Speaker 1: my friends make fun of me, and I talked about
Speaker 1: this on the pot. I will put an over easy
Speaker 1: egg on anything, because I never so to me. As
Speaker 1: long as you put an egg on it, it's part
Speaker 1: this so so so good. It's good right right, I'm
Speaker 1: definitely gonna it's filling. Do you have you you have
Speaker 1: your protein. It is gooey, you have your protect I
Speaker 1: don't know if gooey is a good word to explain
Speaker 1: it saucy there, it's very saucy. I love saucy. Just
Speaker 1: soak my stuff, a gravy, anything, making a little hotter,
Speaker 1: that's my thing. You know what. Every once in a
Speaker 1: while we come across the dish that I say I'll
Speaker 1: make at home. This I will definitely. It's fast, it
Speaker 1: took you. It's five minutes fast, and supporta's affordability. This
Speaker 1: whole meal. If you buy a bag of rice and eggs,
Speaker 1: you have um at least five or six meals for
Speaker 1: under four bucks. Five or six meals. Girl, there's a
Speaker 1: dozen eggs in a container. If you six meals, isn't
Speaker 1: like you're trying to have a Thanksgiving dinner style with eggs.
Speaker 1: You have six Now eggs, I don't think if hit
Speaker 1: the inflation button yet, so you could still get them
Speaker 1: for like three nine rice you just always have and
Speaker 1: then catch up. So I mean, if you do the math,
Speaker 1: this dish maybe costs less than the dollars. So anyone
Speaker 1: looking to save money, this beats the beating faster and
Speaker 1: it's much faster. It does, and it's fast. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: I love it. Yeah, Now I don't I don't need
Speaker 1: this anymore, so when it came to the official box. Yes,
Speaker 1: you started that business during COVID. So the idea came
Speaker 1: in May, Um, I'm not gonna lie. I started a
Speaker 1: whole another podcast because I was like, oh, let me
Speaker 1: um journal, what this you know breakdown is like? And
Speaker 1: then by April I said, oh, we're not getting out,
Speaker 1: We're I getting out. I thought it was only gonna
Speaker 1: be two weeks. You know they told everyone just two weeks,
Speaker 1: say in your house, was only gonna be two weeks? Yeah, No,
Speaker 1: it wasn't. Um and I think that that's when the
Speaker 1: panic hit because we are our tour got canceled, so
Speaker 1: we missed out on six tour dates for horrible decisions.
Speaker 1: And then it was just like everything went down. Like
Speaker 1: I was just like, what else is gonna do? We
Speaker 1: only have ads coming in. This was before we joined
Speaker 1: Black Effect, and I was like, ship, what else can
Speaker 1: I do at We were all out speak her at
Speaker 1: the moment. We weren't with pocketfe yet and um so
Speaker 1: my home girl hit me up and she was just like, girl,
Speaker 1: you have this this audience you have, you know, you
Speaker 1: have a fan base. You need to sell something. I
Speaker 1: was just like, what you had a good circle. I
Speaker 1: love my circle. I can see why I love my friends.
Speaker 1: I love my circle is vicious. I love my friends.
Speaker 1: They're like, no, girl, why are you not selling anything?
Speaker 1: So I was like, I don't want to sell sex toys.
Speaker 1: I don't want to do that. And I mean, she
Speaker 1: knew like kind of where my journey was. Um, A
Speaker 1: lot of again, a lot of my friends. We talked
Speaker 1: about pH balances. We did this, and I was just like,
Speaker 1: let's look up subscription boxes. Um. And we had the
Speaker 1: idea of a quarterly because it was gonna be too
Speaker 1: much to do it monthly. And we were getting products
Speaker 1: from black owned and women owned businesses. How are you?
Speaker 1: They were just reaching out to you guys, saying, check
Speaker 1: out our products. They were No. I emailed everyone, so
Speaker 1: I was deeming them. I used that blue checkmark for something.
Speaker 1: I said, listen, um, this is what the value of
Speaker 1: promotion on my Instagram page would normally be. UM. I
Speaker 1: also just released another podcast, period sst to go with
Speaker 1: the subscription box. Um. And this is what I'm offering.
Speaker 1: This is how many products I need an exchange for promotion. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So I got all those the products for free, got
Speaker 1: my boxes from China. Um so we ended up up
Speaker 1: uh figuring out the profit margins for that, and so
Speaker 1: we released by October. So this was a five thousand
Speaker 1: dollar investment total for me for the design the website. Again,
Speaker 1: my homegirl does graphics, my homeboy does websites, so everyone
Speaker 1: I paid them a little song. Um so, five thousand
Speaker 1: dollar investments. And in year one we sold out day
Speaker 1: one of the of the drop and then how did
Speaker 1: you promote it? Just on just on my Instagram, Just
Speaker 1: on my instagram, just on my Instagram. And in day
Speaker 1: one we sold out all of the boxes in twenty
Speaker 1: four hours and I saw twenty dollars hit my account,
Speaker 1: and again, this is October Derrin pandemic, and so what
Speaker 1: were you thinking at that point? Oh god, I was like,
Speaker 1: oh this is kind of nice. And here goes my
Speaker 1: partner shout out to sid. She was like, we're not
Speaker 1: gonna touch that money. Now, let's make our own product.
Speaker 1: So we took all of that into white labeling and
Speaker 1: took that money from the first box and invested in
Speaker 1: the inventory. We did work acids depositories and apple side
Speaker 1: of vinegar gummies, and we white labeled our own products,
Speaker 1: which means we went to a pharmaceutical that already had
Speaker 1: the products, so I didn't go into the kitchen and
Speaker 1: whipping day up. But it was UM, a pharmaceutical company
Speaker 1: that already sold it, and pretty much we paid them
Speaker 1: for the product, and white label means we placed our
Speaker 1: label UM and then Yeah, so we made our Our
Speaker 1: one year was October and by then we were at
Speaker 1: a hundred and seven thousand dollars in sales. So during
Speaker 1: the pandemic in an e commerce space, I had not
Speaker 1: been familiar with it all. We did over six figures
Speaker 1: and sales in our first year. Yeah. So when you
Speaker 1: you're a personality on horrible decisions, you have your other podcasts, yes,
Speaker 1: which is how do I see the thing is? See
Speaker 1: the thing is? And you have this box yes your personality.
Speaker 1: Do you ever get people that underestimate your power because
Speaker 1: you have this huge personality but you're a serious entrepreneur.
Speaker 1: I mean all the time, I think like that's been
Speaker 1: the issue too with Wheezy and I coming into the
Speaker 1: space with horrible decisions. UM. You know, we'll sit down
Speaker 1: on other podcasts and they'll be like, hey, we have
Speaker 1: the horrors in the building, and it's like yeah, like
Speaker 1: that that completely diminishes an undermines everything that we built
Speaker 1: um as far as branding, marketing. I mean, for the
Speaker 1: first year of the podcast, I edited the audio, I
Speaker 1: boasted things. We still make the descriptions, we're still very
Speaker 1: hands on. UM. So I think it undermines who we are,
Speaker 1: Like I mean, we could be boss bitches and sut dick,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. And they try to separate
Speaker 1: And I say this to everybody. I don't care who's listening. Hey,
Speaker 1: no edit here, don't no edit out. No. I'm a
Speaker 1: firm believer that every girl goes through a whole face.
Speaker 1: I don't give a crap. I mean, girls all the
Speaker 1: time they're like, oh, I haven't gone through mine. I'm
Speaker 1: so innocent. I'm like, bullshit, Okay, I'm sorry. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm about to renswer one. Yeah. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: at least, I just say, at a minimum, at least
Speaker 1: once in your life you go through a whole phase.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna say whether it's multiple times or not,
Speaker 1: but I just I think the blanket thought that oh,
Speaker 1: this girl is a whole r versus this girl, it's like, no,
Speaker 1: you know she's a virgin today. Well you know next week,
Speaker 1: but like, but also that term. I think the reason
Speaker 1: why we even named sorry, why we named the podcast
Speaker 1: that you know, we put horror out there, and it's
Speaker 1: because it's a It's a word that stems from patriarchy.
Speaker 1: It's a word that men have pushed onto us to
Speaker 1: make us feel less than for enjoying the things that
Speaker 1: we enjoy. It just is what it is. And so
Speaker 1: if we can reclaim that it now doesn't mean anything.
Speaker 1: So now you're calling me that doesn't doesn't mean anything bad,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. But I still think the
Speaker 1: negative connotation surrounding the word is why I'm glad you
Speaker 1: didn't sit and say, yeah, we have a hole in
Speaker 1: no house like you know. And again, I've shared my
Speaker 1: sexual life, my my womanhood, UM, the things that I've
Speaker 1: dealt with with my body, with reproduction, with UM, my
Speaker 1: relationship so publicly that unfortunately it does get used against
Speaker 1: you as a woman, UM in terms of maybe them
Speaker 1: not feeling like you could show up the same way
Speaker 1: a man can. And I think I've done pretty well
Speaker 1: in this space, and I've been attached to a lot
Speaker 1: of the other men in this space as well, so
Speaker 1: you like, it's not not attached, not attached romantically, not
Speaker 1: attached romantically. I actually would never date a podcaster. So
Speaker 1: if you're watching this and you have high hopes, sorry,
Speaker 1: I want no one in this industry at all, um,
Speaker 1: but like being a part of the Black Effect Network
Speaker 1: and Charlemagne believing in um, what I'm capable of doing
Speaker 1: in this creative space. And then Joe Budden approached me
Speaker 1: to be the first pod under his umbrella for his network.
Speaker 1: So again, those are two very well respected men in
Speaker 1: this space. And I like to say that I'm the
Speaker 1: only woman that really got that opportunity to work with
Speaker 1: both of them, so you can, well, you could definitely
Speaker 1: say that, yeah, yeah, I feel like when when I
Speaker 1: met you, you know, I've heard I've definitely heard different things.
Speaker 1: I'll do what I know on a good okay, But
Speaker 1: what I hear most of all is your entrepreneurship. I
Speaker 1: don't really hear. I mean, I see the personality, but
Speaker 1: I more see the brains in the perseverance and the
Speaker 1: street smarts mixed with college education. So it's interesting that
Speaker 1: you have this show and I'm sure that there's like
Speaker 1: you're you're dealing in two different worlds. I'd say right. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean that's the thing too. As an entrepreneur, I
Speaker 1: know so many people want to just get right into
Speaker 1: the space. I don't feel like I would have been
Speaker 1: the savvy or prepared for a lot of the things
Speaker 1: that I've had to deal with had I not gone
Speaker 1: to college. So in terms of even responding to an email,
Speaker 1: do you know how many people don't know how to
Speaker 1: reply all? You'd be surprised, like when there's a c
Speaker 1: C and you see multiple people on the email, Like
Speaker 1: I'm dealing with people that forget to reply all something
Speaker 1: something as simple as that. Um, of course budgeting businesses
Speaker 1: that I don't Yes, I have a huge accounting background
Speaker 1: and my focus was on taxes, so I definitely get
Speaker 1: into the nitty gritty and handle that. I mean, I
Speaker 1: do have a h an account now to help me
Speaker 1: your hands, Oh, I'm so. I look in the account
Speaker 1: and I'll be like, um, who spent two dollars in
Speaker 1: thirteen cents? I think you swiped the wrong card. I'll
Speaker 1: call my business partners quick or I need an explanation
Speaker 1: on what is this and where where wasn't so you
Speaker 1: do have business partners. I have business partners in everything. Oh, God.
Speaker 1: I always fair business partners because I feel like it's
Speaker 1: it's tough where if to get both people to be
Speaker 1: extremely passionate at the same time. I mean again, therapy
Speaker 1: has helped. Um. Here's the thing. You can't expect everyone
Speaker 1: to show up the way that you do and anything
Speaker 1: as a friend, as a partner. UM. In business, a
Speaker 1: lot of people have different ways of communicating UM, different passions,
Speaker 1: things that they want. I mean, I think it's very
Speaker 1: you have to know how to compromise, communicate. It's definitely
Speaker 1: not easy, not even a lie. Um, we've put everything
Speaker 1: on paper, so very headed ahead of time, right, so
Speaker 1: been been in some not so great places. So if
Speaker 1: ever we're just out of stand still where we don't
Speaker 1: know what to do. All right, let's get the lawyer
Speaker 1: in vault. And all your partners are women. All of
Speaker 1: my partners, all of my partners are black women. Wow.
Speaker 1: And you know, when I think of the Black effect,
Speaker 1: what I think is special about them shoutouts to Black effect,
Speaker 1: shout out to Black effect, is that it is all women.
Speaker 1: Then you get when you get all that quarterly cold,
Speaker 1: it's nothing. Shout out to all of the women on
Speaker 1: black fact is you don't really run a stuff. Is
Speaker 1: what I like about working with black women. I think
Speaker 1: we know how to support each other in a way
Speaker 1: where we, you know, because black women are we're strong,
Speaker 1: we're resilient. We carry that crown very well, I think
Speaker 1: in a corporate space, but I think when we have
Speaker 1: to take it off and be vulnerable and like be
Speaker 1: that shoulder lean on, we're very good at it well.
Speaker 1: And see that's that's the thing that we allow each
Speaker 1: other to do. Unfortunately, in the spaces where I have
Speaker 1: worked with men um and again being on just networks
Speaker 1: and being in rooms of men that may or may
Speaker 1: not have been involved with anything that I'm doing, there's
Speaker 1: been a lot of pushback with men, Like if I
Speaker 1: come into the room and I say something, they'll immediately
Speaker 1: disregard what I'm saying is me being emotional, not that
Speaker 1: I'm coming with something that I'm seeking solution for, not
Speaker 1: something that I genuinely have a problem with, not something
Speaker 1: that I think is bad business. They completely just undermine
Speaker 1: what I'm saying based on, oh, you're just emotional. And
Speaker 1: so I think that when you come in as a
Speaker 1: strong woman to get mental listen to, you become harder
Speaker 1: so me working with women is it's just it's been
Speaker 1: a little bit more easy, I feel like, and it's
Speaker 1: also a safe space. Again. I love my home girls.
Speaker 1: They all helped me and we all have these business
Speaker 1: savvyest minds. Like my other best friend is a fucking
Speaker 1: truck owner. My other best friend owns a has an
Speaker 1: ice cream shot. Um, and this is all in the
Speaker 1: East Coast. All both of them are in Atlanta. Um.
Speaker 1: But yeah, like again, like I'm in New York. A
Speaker 1: lot of my friends like just do so many dope stuff,
Speaker 1: like they scream right. They have their own shows and
Speaker 1: and podcasts as well. Like I love women that go
Speaker 1: out and get it, and a lot of them do.
Speaker 1: When did you feel like you're arrived, like from from
Speaker 1: eating here. I'm sure there was a point where you
Speaker 1: were like, you know what I am? This ship? You
Speaker 1: know you know what's crazy? Again? Maybe back to living
Speaker 1: in fear. I I have to remind myself as the
Speaker 1: things I've done and the things that should be proud of. Um.
Speaker 1: Going on the Breakfast Club was like, am I really
Speaker 1: on the Breakfast Club? Again? Shout out to Charlottagne in
Speaker 1: the Black Effect. I mean again the conversation was around sex,
Speaker 1: but we were promoting horror decisions. Um, that was like, whoa,
Speaker 1: I'm wow. Um, wasn't your first time meeting Charloman? No
Speaker 1: oh no, I've again. I felt, yeah, I worked with
Speaker 1: him before. But the breakfast club that's a big deal.
Speaker 1: Was my pussy stock going. And then I mean to
Speaker 1: be fair too. And in January was I was just
Speaker 1: on a billboard in Times Square that was like that
Speaker 1: was Trump. I was like, Mama, my name is in life. Yes, yes, Um,
Speaker 1: I mean it's it's crazy though, Like I've been in
Speaker 1: a documentary on HBO Viceland. Some of the friends and
Speaker 1: people I hang around is just like I'm in this
Speaker 1: room and I feel like there's still so much more
Speaker 1: for me to do. So I still don't feel like
Speaker 1: I made it. I'll be honest though, probably the only
Speaker 1: time I feel like I'm in the right direction. Um,
Speaker 1: my apartment in New York, it's fly? Is it fly?
Speaker 1: Is it all glass? It's all glass? And here's how
Speaker 1: long I've been in New York. I'm like, I got
Speaker 1: a washer dry and um, but it's I have my
Speaker 1: my friends say that my view is the big rich town.
Speaker 1: So if you watch power. This is a big rich town.
Speaker 1: I just my view is all of Manhattan, So I loo,
Speaker 1: we should have done a special. So y'all, yeah, if
Speaker 1: ever y want to come to New York. I love
Speaker 1: like I love my kitchen, I love my apartment, and
Speaker 1: I moved there from the Bronx. At one point I
Speaker 1: was in a three bedroom, one bad basement apartment eating
Speaker 1: this meal. How long ago was that? To no, no, no,
Speaker 1: the three the basement apartment, that was. But I left
Speaker 1: the Bronx in But I left the Bronx in Wow.
Speaker 1: I just left the Bronx because they had COVID specials.
Speaker 1: Thank you to everyone who moved out of New York.
Speaker 1: Ya made y'all made the rent drop and I was
Speaker 1: able to get my dream apartment right back up the
Speaker 1: second the two year lease. Yeah, I'm smart. I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: the world go back, this rent gonna go right back up.
Speaker 1: But my view, so I'll sit on my cap sometimes
Speaker 1: and be like I would have never thought I would
Speaker 1: have ever even been able to live the way I'm
Speaker 1: living in New York because New York is just so expensive,
Speaker 1: and so of course they say, if you can make
Speaker 1: it here, you can make it anywhere I thought I
Speaker 1: was making it in my little basement apartment with two roommates. UM,
Speaker 1: and now this is You're able to live this week
Speaker 1: all off of your businesses. I love there by myself,
Speaker 1: but you don't have any accounting jobs or any side hustles.
Speaker 1: This is strictly your podcast and and my podcast and
Speaker 1: my box and UM I'm opening my own studio in
Speaker 1: Brooklyn next month. Look at you, your your serial serial entrepreneurs.
Speaker 1: Like so where everyone is like okay, all right, so
Speaker 1: and I'm like so down for what is what I
Speaker 1: could do it? I I am really curious about when
Speaker 1: you left your accounting jobs to pursue this full time.
Speaker 1: What was that ache or day or with that process
Speaker 1: like to come to the decision. And I want to know,
Speaker 1: like what those last days were, like you know what's
Speaker 1: so crazy? And I haven't shared this so you are.
Speaker 1: This is how fed up I was. First off, So
Speaker 1: in accounting, there's a high turnover. I worked at a
Speaker 1: big four firm. UM, I was at Ernsting Young. I
Speaker 1: could go out and say that. Now I've said it enough.
Speaker 1: So for anyone who works big for UM, it's it's
Speaker 1: a lot. It is a lot. UM. The turnover is high,
Speaker 1: and so I had seen a lot of people leave
Speaker 1: before me, and so I knew the week I was
Speaker 1: gonna quit because I had paid off all my credit
Speaker 1: card debt, got ten thousand dollars in savings, and got
Speaker 1: my new furniture. Those are the three things I wanted
Speaker 1: to do to feel comfortable. And I was like, I
Speaker 1: did all that and have money left over. I said, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's time for me to leave, to leave my job.
Speaker 1: And so I walked into the partner's office and I
Speaker 1: was like, hey, um, I want to put in my
Speaker 1: two weeks and he was like all right, and he
Speaker 1: was like why, And I told him at that point, literally,
Speaker 1: I want to say the week before, uh maybe maybe
Speaker 1: maybe the month before, we had a sold out show
Speaker 1: at Carolines. So I was touring every weekend. I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm leaving to work for myself. I have a podcast,
Speaker 1: I go on tour, I do these really dope things
Speaker 1: and it's making me a lot of money. I've actually
Speaker 1: made my salary in five months. So I think it's
Speaker 1: time for me to put more energy where the money's coming.
Speaker 1: And so the week before I left, I know that
Speaker 1: they normally fucking ordered banana pudding from mcnolia Bakery and
Speaker 1: get everyone in the office and they all say goodbye
Speaker 1: and how they're gonna miss you. I told that partner,
Speaker 1: I said, I don't do that. I don't like most
Speaker 1: of the people in this office. I don't need to
Speaker 1: they fake goodbye. I actually don't care about any of them. Said,
Speaker 1: there's three people in this office. I like. He said,
Speaker 1: what three? Told him the three, and he put it
Speaker 1: on the calendar to take me and the only three
Speaker 1: people I liked all to lunch on my last day
Speaker 1: because it was the last day, said Margarita's we're doing
Speaker 1: shots right, and I got drinks. But I didn't want
Speaker 1: the fake corporate goodbye like I had seen so many
Speaker 1: people even I was like, yeah, and I'd still talk
Speaker 1: to the people that I invited to that lunch, but yeah,
Speaker 1: I didn't want the audi pic ship. So that was
Speaker 1: my last week, Like save save the banana pudding. Since
Speaker 1: you left, have you had any like see things of
Speaker 1: doubt or have you just been looking onward and it's
Speaker 1: been nothing but positive? Has any hiccups come? Like the panorama,
Speaker 1: like the whole pandemic girl, Like I quit sick some
Speaker 1: months before they shut the world down. So I was like, uh,
Speaker 1: I said, Okay, we're gonna do this little podcast thing
Speaker 1: on Zoom, but so how how are we making money now?
Speaker 1: And then you know, you came in with the subscription
Speaker 1: box and that came in May again, I thought that
Speaker 1: the pandemic was gonna lie. Are you able to get
Speaker 1: any type of COVID relief or I don't hold on
Speaker 1: now that don't know. I ain't gonna have y'all edited
Speaker 1: that out. I'm just not answering. Now you're asking a lot.
Speaker 1: Now you're digging into something people going to jail, when
Speaker 1: people getting locked up. But I mean I did everything correctly.
Speaker 1: I didn't have a little bit out I did. I did,
Speaker 1: and I'll just say when my business, my business came
Speaker 1: to a complete hole. So I was like, I went
Speaker 1: through all the shades of grief. Like I was depressed,
Speaker 1: I was shocked, I you know, I was mortified, you know,
Speaker 1: but I had applied for like I was able to
Speaker 1: get that. Yeah, got the p PP, I thought, I said,
Speaker 1: everybody getting this thing. My accountant said, the way you
Speaker 1: don't payroll set up p PP doesn't have fly it.
Speaker 1: Then my homegirl was like now you can get it
Speaker 1: through the PayPal. I said. I was like, you know what, Nah,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna just stick to that, to to the s
Speaker 1: b A got got that little bit of change. And
Speaker 1: like I said, though, like I just was like trying
Speaker 1: to create a way. And then to be fair, See
Speaker 1: the thing is my other podcast I launched in October,
Speaker 1: so literally the same week I launched a new podcast
Speaker 1: and the subscription box same week. So you were working
Speaker 1: pretty much through COVID, dealing with the goddamn China getting
Speaker 1: things to the US, oh my god, dealing with just
Speaker 1: and and and again, starting an e commerce business where
Speaker 1: things are the male system is not being the same,
Speaker 1: nothing is acting, you know, the right way. And then
Speaker 1: I didn't realize how much Amazon has pulled us all
Speaker 1: I am delivering this out of my home the way
Speaker 1: they thought they was just gonna get the box. The
Speaker 1: next day, I say, give some time. Did you put
Speaker 1: a little disclaiming They had to. I said, let me
Speaker 1: add that business days, you know don't include the weekend.
Speaker 1: So I mean and again just did the research of
Speaker 1: all that, you know, I stay working. I felt like
Speaker 1: I had to, Like I wasn't just gonna get lazy.
Speaker 1: What tips would you give to business owners or anyone trying.
Speaker 1: I would say business owners that are trying to get
Speaker 1: into the position that you're in currently to date. Here's
Speaker 1: the thing, learn every position. Learn every position. Also, you're
Speaker 1: gonna need a team, but to me, you need to
Speaker 1: learn every position so that if there's a break in anything,
Speaker 1: your whole business isn't on the whold because now you
Speaker 1: can step in and do it. I think like from podcasting,
Speaker 1: I learned everything from Yeah, I learned how to edit
Speaker 1: audio very easy. All this video editing ready for y'all.
Speaker 1: It's like it's a whole another bees. But like again
Speaker 1: I looked up, you can get Premiere Pro. You can
Speaker 1: get the entire Adobe and just YouTube University girl. They
Speaker 1: also even Premiere comes with the comes with But then
Speaker 1: again that's time, that's sweat equity, that's in your time,
Speaker 1: So you have to you have to definitely do your
Speaker 1: own research. Literally, that would be my bit of advice,
Speaker 1: not only to get a competite team, but you need
Speaker 1: to know every part of the business that you're a
Speaker 1: part of. You just have to agree with that. I
Speaker 1: agree with that. Well, it was a pleasure to have
Speaker 1: you on the show. Thank you so much here, I
Speaker 1: feel like we're going to be vested. I'm I'm saving,
Speaker 1: we're hanging out. I'm here for like a week and
Speaker 1: a half. Girl, Thank you guys so much for checking
Speaker 1: out another episode of Eating Wall Broke featuring Mandy B.
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me out her official box and
Speaker 1: her podcast. That's why I make sure you guys go
Speaker 1: to official box owner dot com. Um we are currently rebranding,
Speaker 1: so you can get everything right now for ten dollars
Speaker 1: except for the box, but you can get work acid suppositories,
Speaker 1: applesider of Internet gummies, and also feminine pouches just so
Speaker 1: that you don't have to walk around with your tampons,
Speaker 1: your paths, your condoms, your loops, uh, those things just
Speaker 1: free flowing. And then yeah, you can check out my
Speaker 1: podcast Horrible Decisions on the Black Effect Network. We dropped
Speaker 1: every Monday, and my other podcast, See the Thing Is,
Speaker 1: with my co host Bridget Kelly, we dropped every Tuesday
Speaker 1: and Friday wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. Girl,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be do you hear this voice? Yes? And
Speaker 1: I and I have to be on set all week.
Speaker 1: I don't know how. I'm like, yeah, here, came straight here.
Speaker 1: I respect you, and I'm so thankful that you gave
Speaker 1: us the time. Thank you so very much. For more
Speaker 1: eating while broke from I Heart Radio and The Black Effect,
Speaker 1: visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.