 Aloha, welcome everyone to Sister Power. I'm your host Sharon Thomas Yarbrough, and we are gonna have an intimate chat with Jessica Norwood. Name to Essence Magazine's 50 Entrepreneurs to watch the list. Jessica Norwood is a financial activist, impact investor and social entrepreneur. Jessica is the founder of Runway. Runway uses entrepreneurship as a strategy to close the wealth. Gap in black communities by providing pre-seen friends and family, capital, or what's Jessica calls, believe in you money to fund black-owned companies. Jessica, welcome to Sister Power. Aloha, Sharon. Hi, thank you for having me. I'm so great to be here. It's so, we're so happy to have you. We have assistant in part in Hawaii and Sister Power. Congratulations on your new baby, Runway Magazine. Thank you so much. And thank you for always, always supporting me and other artists and entrepreneurs and making this platform available. Thank you for having me. I'm really excited about Runway Magazine. It's really a gem. Let's look at that beautiful cover, Runway Magazine. There it is. Isn't it great? And talking about that cover. Oh my goodness. This cover was, it is, there's so much to talk about with this cover. So I first want to just shout out the incredible team at Runway, our communications director, Jamaica Elle, who led consultants and writers to put this together. And on this cover, we actually have a lot of the companies that we support on this cover that we've invested in. So the flowers are from Essence of Flowers out of Oakland. Boss Mom is one of the companies. And then there is a little photograph right in the center of it. And this is actually the part that really warms my heart so much because that photograph is actually of Maggie Walker, the first black woman to ever start a bank, the first woman period in the United States to ever start a bank. And we honor Maggie Walker and her ashay that brings us here to do this work. And so she is also very present on the cover. That's beautiful, absolutely beautiful. But what inspired you to develop Runway? Like a lot of people I have been in business and I wanted to figure out why my business was stalling and I couldn't get the kind of finance, the capital that I needed. I thought, you know, is something wrong with me? Should I be doing something different? And I started to learn really quickly that there have been a historic chasm of not providing financial capital. And they started to call it the racial wealth gap, but it was bigger than a gap. It is sinister. And it really includes things like redlining and absolutely not making capital available for black businesses. And so I wanted to be a part of changing that and we started Runway to do just that. That's remarkable. You know, we still just think in 2021 we're still talking about redlining in 2021. Well, what challenges did you have to overcome at the beginning of your journey? Yeah, you know, I would say that one of the biggest challenges I faced in this is the first part was really being precise and talking about black entrepreneurs. A lot of times we wanna just talk about things from a diversity standpoint and we pull everybody together. Women and anybody who is not a white male then everybody fits into diversity. But when you do that, you aren't able to be really exact about the problem you're trying to solve. And so we wanted to really talk about black entrepreneurs and the unique history that they have faced in this country. And that was a challenge to get people to be comfortable with just expressly saying this is intimately about solving a challenge that happens when black communities and understanding the culture of those issues a lot more intimately. But even with that Sharon, that isn't actually even the biggest thing. The biggest challenge that we face is really the mindset. Often we're talking about what it means to be friends and family. That is the first round of money that any business gets is what they call friends and family round. And the idea is that you should borrow money from your friends and your family when you have a good idea for something. But with that wealth gap that we just talked about, that's not gonna be possible. Black families and other brown families have less money to pull on to actually make an investment in their business. And so what we started to talk about is we should show up for each other as friends and family and loan that money to these companies in really generous loving terms the way that a family member would give it to you. But people felt like, well, they're gonna take the money or they're gonna fail. Not thinking that part of the entrepreneur journey is to have that capital to actually test things out, to pivot and to do, you know, and to potentially succeed and sometimes you do fail. But it's the lessons we learn on the other side of it that really matters. And so getting people's minds to understand that this kind of money is the kind of money that we should be talking about, the believe in you money that shows folks that you really do care. You really see them and you see their innovation and believe that it's something that we need as a community. That just warms my heart because this is what we need to hear. We need to look at the glass half full. Yes. Just go into that type of mindset. So is that one of the uniqueness about your business? Is that one of them? Yeah, I think so. I think one of the things that's really unique for us is we're talking about financing but from a reparative way. So we're deeply looking at the wounds of the past and how that's created this huge chasm where we don't have the kind of capital we need. And so the money has to behave and understand what has happened in the past and not redo the same kinds of old underwriting and where you're like, what's your collateral and what's your this? And really start looking at more unique things that really talk about the character, the integrity, the business itself, and not all these other things that we already know that entrepreneur isn't going to have when we start off. So how we underwrite all of our loans is really different. And we're all black and brown woman squad of economists and finance professionals. We're artists, we're wearing many hats and we're bringing all of these pieces in together to give our entrepreneurs and our investors a unique experience about what it means to repair the damage that has been done in our country. And it is transformative for everybody. Once you get money in a loving way, you don't ever want to go back to anything else. So our entrepreneurs stay with us, our investors stay with us, and we're growing. We're growing. That's the key word that people do not associate with business is love. Love, love, love, yeah. And you can feel it though, right? You know, like when you go into a business and you're not feeling the love, you know when you're not, but differently when you are feeling that love, it feels differently. And I think what we've gotten into recently is we'll talk about businesses as, you know, with these sort of esoteric kinds of ideas, but the business has to have those values baked in in policy. It needs to be reflective in the leadership and it needs to be apparent in the actual consumer product. So it just can't be nice words to say. And the other thing is everywhere inside of runway, inside of our business, we are working those same values and that same cultural understanding. We have community run tables for our loans. So community members make those decisions. And equally inside of runway, it is a worker-driven organization. And so the people who work there make the decisions. It isn't me, it isn't me that gets to make the decisions. I get to be a part of it, but that's the way community really is. We get to be a part of a thing. We don't have to be the whole thing. And that is so liberating for me too, because I get to enjoy life and do other projects, right? So it's a sweeter thing. I think people think that they're gonna lose out or what's gonna happen to the power if I don't hold it all. But what happens is you get to spread it out to other people and you get to find other joys in your life than just being at work. Well, there's a rule for anybody. This is what people have to realize. This planet is huge and it can compass all of us. So what inspired the creation of runway magazine? I think we talked about it, love, you know, love. You know, when I started runway, it was right as I found out my mother had pancreatic cancer. I actually write like one, maybe three weeks between. And I think my mother intentionally didn't tell me at the time she really knew because she knew that I was launching this company at that time. And so as soon as I'm going out in public and I am talking about runway, my mother is telling me, you know, Jess, you know, this is what it is. And I'm her only child. And so it was us, it's always been us. And so it was like, okay, what are we gonna do? And I had to, as soon as I lifted up runway, I pretty much had to go into a quiet mode for myself to take care of myself and my mother. And I had to immediately let go of a lot of things and control of a lot of things that I thought I was gonna be, you know, handling and I'm gonna be on the scene and I'm gonna be here and a lot of money that I had to kind of step away from because I couldn't meet the demands and be there with my mom during the closing of her time. And so I was going through that at the same time. And at the end, you know, where I'm with my mother and I've pushed aside all of the work things and my mother just taught me so much in the way that she closed out her life. And I was with her as she took her last breaths. And I remember I was coming from Alabama and I'm coming up to Chicago to come and see her and I walked in the door and she had her arms out and she was much smaller than she had been since I had seen her maybe like three weeks before. And she said, I waited for you. I waited. And she literally really did wait. The next day she passed away. And that whole night, all she wanted to do was talk to me about love, about what I didn't know about it, about what she wish I understood, about how much she loved me, but I felt an enormous amount of love from my mother. And I knew then, Sharon, that that love was accessible in the world, that somebody would talk to God about me and hold up her life so she could give me these messages and not messages about making more money or all of these other things that we spend our lives pursuing, but it was about love. And it was about her demonstrating how much she loved me. So when I think about runway, that to me is sort of the essence of it, how much we love you, how much we need you, and how much we actually rely on you. Like you are our breath. These entrepreneurs and our businesses and our community, they make the thing work. They are the employers. They are the teachers, the friends. They are the sort of backbone. And that kind of love is available in the world, but we need to figure out how to move that in the way of our resources. And so it was my mama. It was definitely my mama. And you know, that's where you get your entrepreneurial spirit, I'm sure, is from your mother and for the sister power listeners out there here in Honolulu, her mother, Marvell Manga. We know her. I've worked with her. We worked on two projects together, Chocolates and Paradise of I.E. And the African-American Film Festival. Because of your darling mother, I have lifelong friends. We talked about that earlier. Dr. Patricia Jones-Blessman, June Deniz, Barbara Mitchell. I mean, I could go on and on. So, you know, so we're here. And here we are. And do you remember, Sharon, we met with Connie, actually. We didn't actually meet through my mom. We met through Connie. So, A-E-O. A-E-O. A-E-O. Our other good friend. Yes. It was a project. What do you have in the game? It was Runway. We were at the A-E-O conference and Runway was there. It was Runway Project. We've dropped the word project this past year. We're like Beyonce now. We're only one word, right? Right? I like that. And you were there at the very, very beginnings of that, supporting, as always. And so we have so many points of good, super women friends in this network. And, you know, and Connie got a chance to meet my mom before she trans. So it was just beautiful. It's been beautiful all around. Yeah. You know, we can go on and I just love reminiscing about sisterhood and what I'm loving. And when I read about your business, Runway Magazine, it's run by black women. Yes. Yes. It's exciting. It's exciting. The sister power that is wrapped around this idea. I mean, wow, we have, I can't even really just talk about the caliber of talent and thoughtfulness that goes into, when you get a chance to see this magazine and I hope everybody who's listening gets a chance to go to our website and check it out. You can access it there. But I'm telling you, the magazine and the team that puts that together, one of the things that folks don't know is we actually hired the companies that we invested in. So they were a part of the consulting team that put the magazine together. So it is a full circle thing that our vendors are actually the companies that we also invest in. And it's beautiful to watch, not from just a relationship of, oh, here's our money and pat ourselves on the back, but from a place of, we think your work is amazing and you work with us, you know, and we wanna see you go on. And so the writers, the whole team is just brilliant. They've been investment banking. They've been in traditional banking. We have a couple of us have done fellowships and work in impact investment funds. And, you know, so we are finance folks, but we are also artists. One of our actual fund manager is also a big time international DJ. And so we gotta like, look at the funds and go DJ. So, it's a lot of fun. We need to bring all that black love and all that black money and these entrepreneurs here to honeymoon with Hawaii. And we'll talk about that more. You know, this is so neat. I, before I forget, talking about your team, Malia Lazu. Malia, Malia. Homegirl, that's your homegirl. That's my baby. I'm so proud of you, ladies. I just feel like the mother, the auntie, the supporter. The love is there. I am so proud. Aloha Malia. Aloha Malia. Yeah, Malia is, I mean, you know, I mean, she is y'all baby, you know? And so she is fire and coolness and just brilliance and everything that y'all have raised her to be. And so she's been amazing. Been leading a lot of our banking work with our bank partners and political analysis is just always on point. We've been friends for years. I mean, this might've been 20 plus years of friendship. We have been friends for years. And so when I had the opportunity to say, come and work with us, please, she was there. And that's the best part about this is to be able to build a dream team like what we have. And when I tell y'all, we got the best folks, we got the best folks for sure. Wow. Well, what advice would you give to someone who is trying to become an entrepreneur? Mm, you know, this is a really good time to try it out. And I think you can set terms like you want. And that's the thing that I would really encourage people negotiate right now is a good time for you and your business. And if you've got something and you want to share that and somebody is interested, don't take the first offers. Talk about what it is you really want to see happen. I'm encouraging all of the entrepreneurs that I know that if you find yourself in a place where people are throwing money towards you, that happened a lot, Sharon. Right after George Floyd last summer, we saw so many people saying, we want to support black businesses. And it turned into just a haphazard, lots of things moving around and really not feeling great for a lot of folks. But some people did good. And so I encourage people who did well during that time, share it, pass it forward. And for the folks who are still out there trying, as you get an opportunity, definitely negotiate. Know your value and your worth. Talk about that with folks. And get feedback from other people who are doing the same thing that you're doing. And keep building through that. I think it'll work out. This is a good time for you. That's good. So again, Jessica, tell our sister power viewers how they can stay in contact with Runway Magazine. We need to know where you are, how to contact you, and hear more about your consistency. Yes. We would love it. So the best way to learn more about Runway is to go to runway.family. And it is a different email web address than what you might be used to, but don't put anything else. .family will get you there. And check out the whole website. It is Afrofuturism, Blackjoy Finance. Everything merged into one. It's a beautiful website. And first page on the website, you can see the link to our magazine. It is open. All we want to do is to know you. So give us your email address so we can tell you more about us. And we will send newsletters periodically. We don't send them all the time, periodically, about what we're up to. And we hope you follow us on social media. We're on Instagram as well. So that's a great place. And send us the love. We feel it. We know it. And we want to encourage more people to be talking about things like runway, like friends and family, like repair in the finance, terms that are loving. We want people to know that that is possible. And I want you to be asking for it. The more you ask for it, the more people will have to produce it. And I'm here to tell you that we do it. We do it. And it is possible. So that's what I was. Check us out on the website. Right. Why do you do this? And what sets you apart from other organizations? Why do we do it? I think the reason that we're after this is, you know, there's only so much we can do as far as thinking about shuffling, would they say shuffling the chairs on the Titanic, so to speak? There's only so much you can do. Eventually you've got to get really proximate to the problem. You've got to name it and you've got to really solve it. And I know for years we've talked about access to capital for black businesses as this huge issue that we could never figure out. Access to capital, access to capital. And I kept thinking there's money here and there are people here. And why don't the two meet up? And I came to the same conclusion over and over and over again, the mind has to change, the heart has to change. We have to stop looking at one another as if they're a risk. And when they're not, you know, we've got so much data, 98% of black businesses across the globe repayment rate. So these ideas that it's not gonna work or they're gonna fail is rooted in racism and bias. And we've got to say that and we've got to move on to a new thing. COVID, if nothing else, we've saw a record number of businesses closing, black businesses, brown businesses that won't open up again. And the reason that they closed because they had weaker banking relationships. They did not have the access to the same kind of capital that other businesses did. And so they weren't, they didn't have the cushion to withstand a couple, not even a week being closed, a lot of them. So this moment in time feels really, really important. And for Runway, the reason that we got into the game of this is to just tell the truth about what has been going on and to give folks a solution. Not, you know, Runway has a product that works with banks. We have trainings that work with folks who are looking to place capital for black entrepreneurs. And we have the best financing for our businesses, wraparound services for the life of the loan. And that makes us different. People will give you capital, let's say here, $50,000. But we're saying for the life of the loan, you are also going to get so much extra support because that's what friends and family would do. That's what we would do. So we don't want to ever, we want you to succeed. We want you to make it. We want you to take off on that Runway. And so we are different in that way where it's not just about capital, it is wraparound services and the whole shebang inside of it. How can our viewers, Jessica, contribute to the financial standability of Runway? Oh, well, thank you viewers, check me out. The website is a great place to go. There is an icon that says donate and we would be completely honored to have you as a part of our Runway family. Oh, excellent. Well, Jessica, what's next? Oh my goodness. We've got a big announcement coming up in April. I know, I know. I can't wait to tell you about it. You're gonna be one of the first people when I send everything out. I'm gonna tell you about big announcement coming up April 2022. And so I'll be in California for a couple of weeks making that announcement and go doing the rounds. And it's a historic announcement that'll be coming out. So it's been a couple of years in the making and it's finally coming together and we'll see foundations, banks, black businesses all lining up around this particular issue we're talking about. And so I'm very excited. You know, I moved here from Los Angeles. So if you need a LA girl, I'm your girl. Are you gonna be a LA girl? Are you gonna be a Los Angeles when you make the announcement? Very, very, very soon. Very soon for Los Angeles, yes. Okay. Jessica, I can't believe it is over. In 30 seconds, before you leave, give us and give the sister power, power while statement to all the black and brown entrepreneurs out there. I would just say that I love you. We love you, we respect you, we believe in you. And keep going. Don't let anybody tell you any different. Trust yourself, trust your instincts. It is your time. This is your season and your moment and you are purposely made for this exact time. And so let us be there with you as you take your historic journey. We will be deeply honored. Thank you. Mahalo, Nui, Loa, Jessica. Again, on behalf of Sisters in Park, the Bitey and Sister Power, congratulations. I'm your host Sharon Thomas Yarbrough. Aloha.