 From day one, as a startup founder, I say this often, I wore all the hats. So, you know, you're a marketing director, you're a creative director. Of course, you roll up your sleeves and you do more. And you don't wanna let yourself down, you don't wanna let your teammates down. And you know, there's really, at the end of the day, nobody else holding you accountable except you. And that's a really beautiful, strengthening, liberating thing about being an entrepreneur, but it's also incredibly challenging. So, the more moments like that that you get through, it makes you a much stronger, smarter, more capable founder. This is Starved to Storefront, the podcast where we inspire entrepreneurship through truth. Today's guest is Sarah Summers, a co-founder of the Crowdfunding and Entrepreneurial Resource Center, I Fund Women. There are a lot of places you can go online in order to crowdfund your next venture, but I Fund Women doesn't just give female entrepreneurs access to capital, they also provide coaching and help foster connections that are vital for any new enterprise to thrive and grow. In the world of startups, there exists a gender disparity in access to funds and mentors, and bridging this gap is the main driving force behind I Fund Women. So, listen in as we cover everything from why pitches should be concise, efficient, personal, and data-driven, why she hopes to see more pregnant women building businesses, and how she ended up on the streets of New York City, pitching her company to confused tourists outside of the Broadway musical, Hamilton. Now, back to the episode. All right, welcome to the podcast on today's show. We're talking to Sarah, the founder of I Fund Women. Thanks so much for joining. Thank you, Diego. I do have to say I'm not the only founder, although I did wanna let that ride for a second. I am a co-founder, so thank you so much for having me. And for people who don't know, what does your company do? What do you guys work on? What are you trying to achieve? Yeah, so I Fund Women is the go-to funding marketplace for women-owned businesses and all the people who wanna fund them through access to capital, coaching, and connections. So through our platform, entrepreneurs and funders can access our rewards-based crowdfunding platform, our coaching platform that offers semi-private workshops, one-on-one coaching, as well as tons of other accountability and support built in there. And then of course, our network of tens of thousands of women entrepreneurs who are connecting and commiserating and collaborating and doing all the things that, all the inks that we do as entrepreneurs. So that's our business, Ifundwomen.com. Check it out. The reason I wanted to chat with you is we are in the process of building a brewery here in LA, and it's a brewery in the Cider House. And Chelsea is one of the founders of basically the brewery in Cider House. And so Chelsea has used your platform and they successfully raised, I wanna say, I think the number was $30,000, and it really put your platform on my map, let's call it, on my radar. And so I was like, well, this is really interesting, I wanna learn more. One of the things that we don't talk about that much on our podcast, but if you sort of were to take a high level view, we try to interview more women than men when it comes to our podcast. And I think we've successfully done that. It gets a little weird, but like my wife as an example, she's a business owner, she owns her own company. There are plenty of things women deal with that men do not. Oh, one of the biggest one being, what is it like raising capital when you're pregnant and all of these things, right? All of these things that kind of go with that. And in what you're doing, I just really love that there's an outlet for people to just raise capital in a way that doesn't necessarily work in today's society for reasons that are unknown. But before we get there, what made you wanna start the company? What made you guys wanna start this thing? And when, when did you guys decide? Well, I mean, it's appropriate that you'd mention the barriers that women face when raising capital because that's a big part of what led Karen, Kate and myself, my co-founders to launch iFund women. It was simply us being our own customers. We were working on startup number one, which was a huge failure, but had all the passion and grit that any entrepreneur could ever want to be putting into a new business. And we were just getting nos every which way. And frankly, looking back, we were also making a lot of first-time founder mistakes, which well-positioned us for our successful business now, which is iFund women, but essentially we had created a platform for women by women. It was a video-based conversation platform, sort of think like YouTube for women, right? And it sort of was built out of passions that were shared between Kate, Karen and myself and the different industries that we all came from. Karen had come from Google and YouTube. I was coming from the world of creative production and comedy, frankly, where there's obviously a huge disparity in representation for women and women of color, which we see so much more of now, which is amazing. But back in my day, which was like 10 years ago, but still so different. It was not even that way. So we created this space and spent a lot of time and a lot of money building a really beautiful platform that we had not proven any demand for or had tested, iterated in a way to know that people would actually really be able to use it successfully and use it in the intended way. So anyway, we found ourselves in this Hail Mary moment of like, all right, let's go out and try and raise some capital ourselves because we did have revenue coming in. We had some good business happening, but we really needed to raise some capital in order to keep it going. And it was through that experience that the light bulb went off in our head. Like we were on one of these other rewards-based crowdfunding platforms, and it was like, okay, where are the ladies at? Like, why are we the only women on here raising capital for our business, right? And also like, you know, it was a lot of dudes in their toys, you know, like raising money for their gadgets and they were getting the spotlight on the platform. And that's fine, you know, but it was problematic. And long story, long, medium short, we were able to reach our goal through our crowdfunding efforts, but it was a slog. I mean, we launched that crowdfunding campaign and we were like, okay, go. Where's the money? Where are the people? Like, what's happening? And then we realized, okay, we're actually gonna have to go out there and market ourselves and talk about why we need money, why someone else should be invested in supporting what we're doing. And that was a huge learning. And it was through that experience that we strengthened those basic building blocks that you need as a founder to build a strong business, right? It was helming our pitch, right? Going out there with a proper marketing strategy. What are we doing in week one? Week two, week three, week four. How are we talking to different segments of our audience, you know, between all of the people in our networks, right? There are those people who just wanna contribute to us because they love us and care about us, but then there are those people who actually might be able to take advantage of what we're building here. So, you know, the messaging had to be different and we tried everything. I mean, we were literally panhandling on outside of Hamilton, like back in 2015, I would say. I mean, it was just a wild, wild ride. So it's been a crazy few years with iFUN Women. We're approaching our fifth year anniversary, but essentially that's how iFUN Women was born. We're like, we need there to be a fundraising platform through rewards-based crowdfunding for women who are raising money for their businesses, right? Where we can create this alternative path for funding when those other more traditional paths are not an option, right? If women are getting around 2% of the VC capital out there, we have to come up with some other options in order to close the funding gap, which is, you know, our North Star KPI is just getting as much capital into the hands of women-owned businesses as possible. That's what we do here at iFUN Women and we know that it's not just about the funding, it's about also creating the access to the coaching, the educational resources, which is another thing that we found was lacking when we were crowdfunding ourselves, right? There was no intuitive way for us to really learn how to do it. And again, learning how to raise money through crowdfunding will set you up for success as you go on to raise follow on capital throughout the lifetime and life cycle of your business. I was first raising money. We were in San Francisco. This is probably 2014, 2015. And I remember, you know, this was eye-opening to me. So kid from Massachusetts. And then I was like, oh, interesting. Everybody that effectively is getting capital is getting capital because they went to the same schools or they look similar to the individuals giving them money. And it became very apparent to me. I was like, oh, I see. This is really a game of like, and to some extent it's human, right? It's like, I'm betting on people that look like me. And when it came to some of the females that I knew, they had a product and the VC might say something like, oh, I'll ask my wife about that when I get home because it's like they know nothing about that world. And it's one of these things where their wife is also not the major market, right? Their wife probably travels a different way and uses products from a different setting that maybe they're not working. And so it was almost like, you get alienated quickly without even recognizing it. And it was a problem that I learned myself like firsthand. Obviously we raised capital and everything was great. We were also in tech. And so to some extent people were like, oh, tech, that makes sense. We love tech, blah, blah, blah. But when it came to some of these other products or other platforms, it felt too risky for them because they had never seen it. Yeah, that's the beauty of crowdfunding. And particularly on iPhone women, it's democratizing the way that we raise capital, right? And you go out there and you're talking to people in your own network and you're solving a meaningful problem that likely you yourself are experiencing and you retain 100% control over how this business goes to market, how you're raising the money, the messaging, this isn't equity. No one's taking a piece of the pie as you go out there and raise this money. This is debt-free capital that you're raising in order to really grow the business, grow a sustainable smart business. Was that on purpose that you guys set it up that way? Was there any, you guys ever think about it like the equity platform but then it gets super technical with legalities and SEC? Yeah, it was purposeful for us to begin our journey with iPhone women in terms of the funding component being rewards-based crowdfunding, right? But we have big plans ahead and we wanted to continue being at the forefront of offering as many funding options to women entrepreneurs as possible, some of which will be debt-free and some of them may not. Stay tuned for more information on that but that's always part of our roadmap is how can we continue to innovate and cast as wide of a net as possible in terms of making access to capital as accessible as we can. When it comes to equity, will you guys ever become a Y Combinator or do something similar to that where you have these cohorts? Yeah, well, we do have our grant programs on iPhone women, right? So that's become a big part of what we do here Thankfully, much of which is led through our partnerships with brands like Visa and Adidas and American Express and Diageo and these are brands that are coming to iPhone women and they're saying we want to put our money where our mouth is, take some of our marketing dollars, put it towards supporting small businesses in a particular sector, industry, location and with those funding opportunities come also educational programs, right? We have our partnership with iPhone women of color and caress and that's been an incredible experience being able to provide 150 women of color entrepreneurs with the dedicated 16 week accelerator experience that then leads into a crowdfunding effort. And as we know women are entrepreneurs who invest in and who have access to not only the funding but also the coaching experience through iPhone women they're raising 27 times more than those who go it alone on any other platform. So if we set them up with a curriculum ahead of actually launching their campaign so they are actually prepared to go out there and raise capital, they go out and do just that, right? They're empowered in a way that they wouldn't be if they were just handed 10K and don't get that access to that coaching. So we have our own model, our own little, you know perfect secret sauce of coaching and funding here at iPhone women. That's so smart I was thinking about so when we first started my first real estate development project we were working with the Latino brewery and all the brothers were Latino and I had come from tech so you know my blinders are on fully around like oh everyone must know how to raise capital oh everyone is starting a company. And so I end up talking to these five brothers and they're like we've never done this before like we don't even know what to do. And I was like oh send me your deck they're like what's a deck? And it was the first time that I had realized like case in point around whoa this is nobody knows how to do this in reality is because I thought my little community of founders I thought we were all the same and therefore we must represent the world and I realized this is the thing that actually keeps a lot of people from raising capital. It's the fear and then the complete lack of what do I do? What are the steps? Exactly. Who can I turn to? Where is the mentorship? And this is where it falls apart completely and so I love that you guys are investing so much in terms of building that community and having people work with them and obviously successful founders to bounce ideas off of because I think that's more than the platform obviously the platform is the magic but I think that's the thing that keeps I guess your mission going is how I would view it. Yeah, it really hits home. Like it's a visceral reaction to even hear someone talking about what I experience on a daily basis, right? Like there's so much fear around not knowing so we get so far without ever actually learning it all bottles up and it can be debilitating and it sabotages your own ability to really become a stronger, more educated, smarter founder and the smartest people I know in my life are the people who ask tons of questions and require transparency and clarity. And I can think of coworkers I have who I'm so grateful to work around because they're constant reminders for me because I too, I default to a place of like, sure, sure, sure, yeah, totally like, got it. And then you get off the phone and you're like, oh my God, I don't, you know? And it just to me is like, that's just a weird human defense mechanism that some people are able to manage better than others but it's something I have to work out on a daily basis. And I empathize with any founders, especially founders of color who are struggling to find resources to learn how to be an entrepreneur and start a business and find others, other entrepreneurs like themselves who are in the hustle as well. That's a huge part of it, having a network, right? Of other founders who are also trying to raise capital and can share their experiences and provide that support and vice versa, that's huge. Did you see anything interesting as it relates to the pandemic and maybe more companies starting or more people wanting to sort of test the waters with a company? Did you see anything specific to your platform where you were like, oh, this is really interesting? Well, what we saw was interesting, which, you know, whether it was between the pandemic and also the murder of George Floyd is there was a renewed or an elevated focus on supporting black women-owned businesses specifically. And that's something that we were so proud to be able to support. Obviously, I Fund Women of Color has been a part of I Fund Women since in the beginning of 2020, yeah, we launched I Fund Women of Color at the Women's March with Karen Kahn, our founder and CEO, alongside our GM and creator of I Fund Women of Color, Women of Color Olivia Owens, who's also our first employee that we ever hired here. And, you know, so we were cultivating this incredible community of women of color entrepreneurs and a large percentage of them were black women who were launching, growing their businesses. And with the pandemic came this really incredible focus on supporting black women-owned businesses. And so we had brands like, you know, again, Caress and Visa dedicating resources specifically to black women-owned businesses. And, you know, I'm also proud to say like Visa, this isn't something that has led up. Visa has renewed that particular focus with a program that we just culminated last month for another 60 black women-owned businesses who each received 10K grants plus one-year annual coaching memberships on I Fund Women across six different cities that were hit the hardest through the pandemic. So, you know, really excited to be a part of that movement. And obviously it's all very aligned with what we've been doing here since day one. So. That's awesome. We had the fatter of curl mix on our podcast and I was hearing their entrepreneurial story and she had her then boyfriend, now husband, but she had him go on who wants to be a millionaire and they got like 30 grand and that became their seed money. And while that story to me is so amazing, right? It's like that, like how incredible is the level of thinking so far outside the box, right? Totally. But it was also this like, why is that, like why is that the path? Like it's gotta be easier than going on a television show. Like that's not necessarily the blueprint for all of us, right? Yeah, you know. Exactly. Just get on Jeopardy and I'm like, you know. Then launch your company, it's really straightforward. That's it. No, I mean, I love those stories, that those are the ones you want to be sitting on someone's like late night couch telling one day that the bed doesn't, that's not necessarily the average entrepreneur's journey for sure, especially now for women entrepreneurs. Yeah, totally. What else are you guys working on? So I know you, I wanted to at least talk about the grant program that you have going on right now. It's $100,000. Just tell people how that works and where they can apply and all that. Of course. Oh my God, Diego, bless you. All right. So last week we just launched I Fund Women Entrepreneur of the Year, which is our largest funding program to date. So this is I Fund Women Entrepreneur of the Year, 2021. Applications are open through September 20th, 2021. So that's a three month period for you to go ahead and apply and we encourage all women entrepreneurs to apply and what makes this program particularly unique is that the grand prize winner, our I Fund Women Entrepreneur of the Year will receive a 100K equity investment in their business. So this is a first in terms of just the grant amount itself, but also the type of investment and the type of grant. This is a 100K equity investment. And we are so proud to be putting this program out there that is demonstrating how women should not only be funding other women, should be founders of businesses, but should also be on the cap table. And that is just again, very aligned with our mission at I Fund Women and what we do here every day. We want there to be representation for women across every aspect of the business. So this is our way of putting a stake in the ground in a new elevated way and we're so, so excited about it. And it doesn't really stop there in terms of the pricing and opportunity. There are eight different categories that you can apply for. And in addition to the 100K equity investment, there will also be 10K grants awarded to the category honorees as well. And this will all be announced and it'll all be announced through a event on Women's Entrepreneurship Day 2021. So that's in November, November 19th, 2021. And these companies can be of any category, no matter what the tech or the CPG or whatever it might be. It's across the board. They can be anywhere. Absolutely. I really encourage everyone to go check it out. Ifundwomen.com slash entrepreneur of the year, 2021, I believe. Just go to Ifundwomen.com and you'll find it right there in our main nav. Learn more, take advantage of some of the resources through this program. In honor of the program, we are actually unlocking access to some of our most valuable and highly viewed workshops on Ifundwomen. And the topics that we've selected are correlated to some of the elements of the application itself to help you really strengthen your pitch and the storytelling you're doing around your business, the data that you're sharing to make sure that you're really providing the strongest version of your application that you possibly can. We wanna see and then win through this program. If you're not subscribed, can you go ahead and do that right now before we get on with the video? Helps us out tremendously. That's all we ask, and we're back. To go back to the early days of the company, when you guys first started, it's all about eyeballs. So like, how did you guys go about this? How did you guys go about getting your platform known to so many? So 2015, we had Twitter, Instagram was maybe coming up. Maybe social media isn't the best outlet. Maybe it's all about email campaigns. It was kinda your go-to-market in terms of just getting people aware of your platform. It was a grassroots effort. And while that may go in one ear and out the other for anyone who's listening, like an eye roll moment of like, yeah, sure, I'll email everyone in my network one more time and tell them whatever. It is the absolute truth and it requires sheer grit and determination because you see in your head the vision. You know how big the problem is and the solution that you're on your way to creating that's gonna solve that problem. So it's hard to take a step back every day and start at position one when in your head you're already at the finish line, you know? So you have to be patient. And you know, as much as possible, don't go it alone. And luckily, my two co-founders and Olivia who came on shortly after to be a part of that experience. So we had each other to keep us grounded and balance that sort of need to take these smaller steps towards growing our network and audience while also entertaining innovative ideas. And you know, and that's what Karen, our CEO and founder is so fantastic at is like really big ideas that we're all like, I don't know. And she's like, trust me. And we're like, okay, so it's a gift to have that dynamic going. You know, we launched I Fund Women with a beta and literally between the three of us, Kate, Karen and myself, we were calling the women entrepreneurs in our network who we thought might maybe be interested in like crowdfunding on our platform just to test it for us. So we would figure out what was working, what was not getting their feedback. So we could iterate shortly after that. That's where the I Fund Women method was born, which is our coaching methodology that provides a playbook. And that's something we continue to iterate on as we get feedback from our members, which has become increasingly more and more valuable because we're really, that is a reflection of the needs of women entrepreneurs on our platform, a resource like that specifically in our e-course for crowdfunding. I'm getting further and further away from your question, but the point is we found these 20 women on, women-owned businesses that were like, okay, we'll go out there, we'll raise capital. And we were on the phone with them. They were calling and saying, oh God, I don't know what to put in this email to like my network. Or like, I just texted my, you know, aunt twice and she didn't get back to me. And like, does she, you know, I'm feeling rejected. Like, you know, getting comfortable with nose and getting out there and making the ask over and over again, you need a coach. You need someone there to hold you accountable. Like, and also to test our platform, right? And just, and work out the kinks. So that's where it all started. And, you know, the benefit of crowdfunding is that it requires the crowd funder to go out firsthand and bring awareness, you know, around their campaign, their business through their network. So that's an exponential number of eyeballs that we're getting on iFund women. So it's been a really, it's sort of just, you know, built from there. And of course it doesn't hurt to have incredible opportunities that yield amazing press for us. And obviously our branded programs have been a great driver of that. So we consider ourselves to be very lucky in that way. And when it comes to some of the things that you've learned and just watching the different, different companies go ahead and raise capital on your platform, but we just did a talk the other day and we were like the number one thing, you know, we invest in some companies and it was like the number one thing we look for is like storytelling to some extent, like what's the story, right? We'll look at your deck. Maybe I call that like a number two, but ultimately it's about story and founder. When you guys sort of teach your group, is it similar? Are you seeing like the things that get the most traction might not necessarily be the best edited video or the best, you know, highly produced thing, but it's more around the story that is being told. What's the thing like, if you were to give someone tips on this is what we've seen work across the board, what are some of those things? I think, I mean, I wish I had something groundbreaking that differs from what you just said, but it's pretty aligned with what you came away from through that experience, it's storytelling and it's talking about your business and it's having a pitch that is concise, efficient, personal and also data-driven. Here are some things to avoid when someone asks you like what you do, and you're like, well, when I was in college, I once ate this snack and I was like, what is that? And then I, you know, in like 10 minutes down, you're still like talking about this one little anecdote and nobody has any idea what your product or services or the problem that's solving, that's an example of what not to do, right? Like you want to be able to, within the first 15 seconds of answering someone's question about what it is that your business does, they should understand exactly what it is, right? And that's a practice. And so you gotta just get out there and talk to anyone who will listen, a wall, a dog, a cat, a friend, a podcast host, anyone. Because it's all valuable practice for you and you learn and getting feedback, right? Was it clear to you how I talked about my business just then? Like, did you understand exactly what we do? Like, okay, I know, you know, I have a website, but do you get like what actually people can do on my website? Like things like that, it's important to just make yourself vulnerable to that sort of feedback because it will make your pitch stronger in the long run. And also having data to support, you know, the story that you're telling, right? How big is the problem that you are solving, right? It's important to just come with a data-driven approach. In addition to, you know, also making it unique, you're not a robot. So it's okay to explain how you relate to the problem that you're solving, just make sure that, you know, you're speaking to the larger market that you intend to serve. That's actually one thing I look for the most is like, are they solving a problem that is so deeply personal to them or that they've been affected by? Because that to me signals like they're willing to walk through or run through a wall to solve this issue and they won't quit because they need it back more than anyone else. Karen, Kate and I needed, I fund women, but so do the 1800 other women entrepreneurs who are starting new businesses every day. You know, you see what I'm saying? Yeah, no, it works. I've been receiving a lot of decks lately around this adaptogen market and not one of the decks has explained to me like, what is this market? They're all like, look how well we're doing. And I'm like, who gets adaptogens? Is it a coffee thing? Is it in their drinks? Is it a creamer? Why Lyons main? I would love to work with you Diego because you're just, this is what I'm saying. These are the reminders I need on a daily basis that it's okay to ask questions like that because you see adaptogens everywhere and you're like, okay, I guess that's a thing everybody understands, so I'll just go with that. Literally, and then I invite people like you on the podcast to teach me about this adaptogen market and then I'm like, oh, now I'm an expert. Awesome. Sure, yeah, I'm the adaptogen expert. All right, so now transitioning from the wonderful work you do for so many, you guys as a business, are you guys in the capital raising? Where are you guys in that whole world? Where do you wanna take iFund women from a platform? You've helped 1800, what does that look like from your side? Are you hiring a tech team? How big is the team? What are the growth plans for you guys as a business? Listen, I can't reveal all here but I can pull back the curtain a little bit. No, we do have a growing team, I believe from the start of the pandemic we've hired 20 new employees. We've got an entire engineering team that's been built out relative to what we had before which was myself, Karen and Kate. So, we've got an amazing team on our side building out our product and engineering teams as well as our marketing team just becoming a real grown up business to be perfectly honest and we feel incredibly privileged and lucky and we know we've worked really hard too to get to a point where we can afford to grow our team in this way. We also have rolled out products like our coaching product, like our grants product on iPhone women that has allowed us to really grow in this way so that's been really exciting. We've raised our seed round which we did back in 2019 and from then we have been growing pretty rapidly and we have fundraising plans ahead of us but nothing that I'm in a position to talk about more specifically right now which I know is like a little, yeah, yeah. The fall is coming. Yeah, we get it, we get it. It is a really exciting time and also like going back to work in general which I'm not about to start having one of those like antiquated conversations with you about like are you going back to an office or anything like the new state of work is it's all culminating, I think this fall is gonna be a really interesting, exciting time for iPhone women. Yeah, there's two camps. Some people wanna be remote, some people don't. And you know what, that's okay. It's just, it's been a gift to be able to hire during this period and bring on people across the country, outside of the US. I mean, just the talent that we've been able to cultivate here over the past year is pretty incredible and then it's a bit of a reality check when you're like, okay, now everyone needs an office. So that's the whole mother. Do you have a favorite story from when you guys were first launching? Like when I first started my company years ago there was like three of us in a one bedroom apartment and we were all, we had like whiteboards everywhere. And I was like, guys, we're always gonna remember this. This is gonna be, this is like rock bottom. You know, we're like in plastic folding chairs. Oh gosh. And I'm like, I hope I never revisit this again. This is like one and done, you know? But I'm like, it was so nice. We're so tight, we all live together. Yeah, no, again, I'm like triggered but I feel like we have white folding chair moments like all the time. But you know, I think a memory I always have which I sort of alluded to earlier was like, again, when we were crowdfunding and Karen, like our CEO at iPhone women which to now think of her doing this not that she wouldn't roll up her sleeves and get out there but like her and I were literally on 42nd street or whatever street on Broadway that Hamilton was on and there was a line of, I wanna say 300 people who were definitely from out of town and had never heard of the word crowdfunding before in their life, which was not something we anticipated. And we're out there trying to give them cards that we got printed at like Staples five minutes before that with a like CTA link to wherever our campaign was. And we anticipated, you know, of course, having to do a soft sell of like, you know, hey, we're two lady founders and we're raising somebody for our business. Check us out. It's awesome. You could find, hey, you seem like you like, you know, videos about hair. Like we've got great stuff here, whatever. I mean, the example is horrible. And then, and we'd be like, check out our crowdfunding campaign. They're like, what's crowdfunding? And we're like, oh, shit. Oh, wow. That's a time I will really, truly never forget. And then, you know, from there, it's all sort of a blur, but I do pictures are always helpful and just creating lasting memories. And there's always this vision I have of Kate, Karen and I standing outside of our first office, which subsequent to that raise, we ended up moving out of, because it was far too expensive. And we were in between offices for a bit, but Kate is, I want to say seven months pregnant, holding, you know, some piece of heavy equipment from our office. I'm like three months pregnant, holding a giant flat screen TV. Karen's like holding all the bags and, you know, all the linen like sort of swag bags that we've had just collected over the years. And we're just standing outside of our office, like. That's iconic. And we now have that picture in our investor deck because it's just, it is iconic. It is. It's symbolic of where we were and how far we've come really. I really love that. It's also empowering. You know, we were saying this before we started recording, but a lot of people fear this thing of like, what happens when I get pregnant? You know, and can I raise money while pregnant? I've been an investor in a company and she's now going out to get her A round and she's currently pregnant. And, you know, I'm like, hey Brooke, are you dealing with any of this? And she's like, you know, I don't know if it's more in my head or not, but basically the answer is like, I make sure I have the right team, right? Because if they do ask, it's like, well look, you shouldn't invest at this stage because of the founder. You should invest because they have a whole team and they're good at leading and delegating and setting up the whole system around them. It's not just them anymore. And I was like, that's a good answer, you know? I think that's so smart. And I hope to continue to see just more and more pregnant ladies out there raising money and building businesses because we need to realize that SHIT, I don't know if I can curse here, I probably already did. You can curse, you can curse. It's okay. Well, our sponsors will leave us. Yeah, yeah. We are now a sponsor free podcast. Exactly, thanks to Sarah Summers. Was there a time in your entrepreneurial journey where you had to lean in and really do more? So the answer to that is a big fat yes. And from day one, as a startup founder, I say this often, I wore all the hats. So, you know, you're a marketing director, you're a creative director, you are literally packing up all of the video equipment and taking an Uber to Brooklyn to get one of your customers' videos down that they've paid for while you're also in the back end helping them build their campaign pages while you're also the person posting on social for the entire business. Like, of course, you roll up your sleeves and you do more and you don't wanna let yourself down, you don't wanna let your teammates down and you know, there's really, at the end of the day, nobody else holding you accountable except you. And that's a really beautiful, strengthening, liberating thing about being an entrepreneur, but it's also incredibly challenging. So, the more moments like that that you get through, it makes you a much stronger, smarter, more capable founder. And I try to remind myself that as I come out of those moments and say, okay, you made it through, now you're a little bit stronger, a little bit more prepared for whatever comes next. So, I love those do more moments. When you think about your personal growth, do you feel like you're such a evolved human given everything you've been through? Oh yeah, I'm as evolved as you can get. No way. I think it's quite the opposite sometimes. I think often, because being a startup founder is so demanding, you have your head down a lot and you are constantly, constantly working. And that is the challenge of being a big picture thinker, but also someone who GSDs gets shit done, you know? Striking that balance is challenging and it's something I work towards every day. And I think that when I hit the mark, you know, on a given day or in a week or in a month, that's when I feel evolved, when I can sort of context switch in that way. And remember, you know, that this little thing that I'm doing right now is going to make an impact that will affect our bottom line and our mission at iPhone Women, which is to really ultimately just get as much capital into the hands of women-owned businesses as possible. If I can sort of holistically have that realization on a consistent basis, that's always a good thing. I love that. That's awesome. But listen, I appreciate you coming on the podcast, sharing your story, tell everyone where they can find you and then just remind them again of your wonderful fall campaign. Yes, you're the best. Okay, you can find us at ifundwomen.com at ifundwomen on all the socials. I would highly recommend the Gram. It's, you know, a great place to just see what's going on and what's hot at iPhone Women right now. I can't believe I just said, what's hot at iPhone Women, sorry. And definitely check out iPhone Women Entrepreneur of the Year, which is the campaign Diego mentioned, which is our biggest funding program to date, which applications will remain open through September, 2021. And there is 100K equity investment on the line, as well as other cash prizes and educational resources. So please, please check it out, apply, take advantage of the free resources that are on the program page right now, which will only be available during the course of this program. And yeah, we look forward to seeing you. Thank you. Thank you and your team for doing what they do. I love the mission. We're here to support. So this is amazing. Great talking to you, Sarah. Awesome, thank you so much, Diego. Have a good one.