FAB NYC the takeaway -How they funded it? Sustainable Beauty and Fashion Founders.
A FaB panel of Founders, moderated by Sumeet Shah, investor (VHS Ventures). A meeting hosted by Lin Chen (Pink Moon) and Casey Dworkin (Sylven New York), co FaB chapter leaders in New-York.
A few questions from Sumeet to the founders:
-Casey, let’s talk about the state of the market. How have you been managing your companies in these turbulent times, and have you used any recent tools to conduct additional fundraising? If so, what have you used and would you recommend them to the audience?
-“Social media has been a huge strategy of mine. As a founder, it’s tough to be everywhere all at once, especially when we have such small teams. I’ve been aligning my social media strategy. During these times, visibility is everything. The more people see you, the more they think about you, the more organic opportunities that come from that. Building value within the company, use the resources you already have.”
-Charlotte, you’ve truly bootstrapped your business through so many ways, from loans to grants and things in between. Can you go into more detail on what you did and how you found these sources?
-“It’s your community! Use who you know. There are so many things I got for free. I have people in my corner that want me to succeed. I have people who contract for me pro-bono. My first boyfriend made my whole business plan. I went through a nonprofit called Volunteer of the Arts to get an operating agreement drafted up for $55. Be scrappy and use who you know.”
- Lin, we’ve got a mix of SAFE notes and grants. Can you walk through first, for those in the audience who may not know, what a SAFE note is, why you went down that route, and how you found these other grants and loans to build up Pink Moon?
- See the 🎬 replay for having Lin’s recommendation.
-Mary: You’ve raised capital through rewards-based crowdfunding and, down the line, are considering an equity crowdfunding for Reprise. Which tools did you use, do you recommend them, and what was your experience overall with both areas? The latter has been a bit of a wild west as of late…
-”Crowdfunding! I think it was the best way to start a business, especially bootstrapped. It’s a great way to build community, get people excited about what you’re building, and show people behind the scenes, and show them what it takes to build a small business.”
- Justin, here’s the traditional VC route. There’s a lot of stories we hear from founders about the ups and downs of raising capital from institutional firms. Can you share with us your experience with the fundraising journey, finding the right investors, and how it’s gone so far, even with multiple rounds?
- and… you will have to watch the replay for it 🙌 🎬, see the link at the end for susbcribing to the newsletter or follow the global FaB LinkedIn Group.
What would be your biggest pieces of advice for the founders in the room, given the state of this unpredictable market climate?
Lin: “Lean on your community. Founder friends, mentors, advisors, customers… whether you’re fundraising or not. Your community is everything. Network and talk to other founders who are a few stages ahead of you in business or brands you admire. People want to help and offer up insight, advice, and warm intros.”
Justin: “Be honest with yourself. There are so many companies out there faking the funk. They choose the wrong path. Sometimes you can just have a really nice business that sells at farmers markets. They think ‘I need to be a billion dollar exit. It doesn’t have to be that way. There are so many paths. My advice is to be really honest with yourself and look at your business. Looking at what you want. What is the real opportunity here. And then find the funding or go the bootstrapping route that truly aligns with that.”
THE FOUNDERS/THEIR COMPANY:
Founder Name: Mary Bemis, Founder
Company: Reprise Activewear
“Be scrappy and resourceful — equity isn’t the only way to raise money to grow your business. There are a ton of pre-sell and revenue-based financing options available that allow you to keep 100% ownership, especially in the early days.”
How much you raised: ~$19K with Kickstarter, I have been bootstrapping for the last 5 years by keeping my advertising job. I have relied on pre-selling ~4 weeks before my product arrives as well as a way to help with cash flow and paying vendors.
Sources of fundraising / capital: Crowdfunding (pre-orders) and planning a Crowdfunding Equity raise for early next year.
Founder Name: Lin Chen, Founder
Company: Pink Moon
“Don’t raise capital to give away equity unless you absolutely have to. Be scrappy, self-fund if you can and bootstrap to reach certain milestones and then raise with equity investors to have higher valuations.”
How much you raised: a little under $400k which includes the two SAFEs and two grants.
Sources of fundraising / capital: Self, internal capital, SAFE notes from self / VIP customers / friends & fam / RUV / angels, two grants, credit card, family + Shopify & PayPal loans
Founder Name: Charlotte Hess, Founder & Creative Director
Company: isobel & cleo
“It’s not solely about the money you can raise, think of creative ways to fund what you need without using cold hard cash. Consider working for trade, trust yourself to do things that you know how to do as opposed to outsourcing, use who you know: friends, significant others, parents, mentors.”
How much you raised: $215K
Sources of fundraising / capital: Kickstarter, Emerging Designers Competition, Buy From a Black Woman Grant, Square and Shopify Loans, bank loans, and revolving line of credit, friends & family, so much bootstrapping.
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Founder Name: Justin Silver Co-Founder Company: AAVRANI
“Know what you want (in terms of freedom, goals, power), know what your investors want (in terms of involvement, returns, and communication), and most importantly know what the business can do (in terms of revenue growth and profitability). Then you can raise from the right people at the right time.”
How much you raised: We have raised $10mm+ since 2017
How many rounds: We have raised over the course of 5 rounds (F&F, pre-Seed, Seed (incl. crowdfunding), Series A, and Series A extension)
Sources of fundraising / capital: Friends and Family, Crowdfunding, VCs, Family Offices.
FaB speakers and hosts, the Bios:
Casey Dworkin
Casey Dworkin is a designer, speaker, environmental advocate, and founder of next-generation footwear brand Sylven New York. Fittingly born on Earth Day, her sustainable pursuits began at a young age as did her love of fashion. With over 10 years of experience in the contemporary and designer footwear industry, she created the brand she wished always existed. One equally dedicated to her signature downtown New York aesthetic, unwavering commitment to environmental activism, and rooted deeply within traditional Italian shoemaking. She is known for championing cutting-edge plant-derived and bio-based materials within her designer footwear and is passionate about driving conscious change across the luxury fashion industry.
@roughlyplantbased and @sylvennewyork
Lin Chen
Lin Chen is the CEO + Founder of Pink Moon. Holistic beauty has been a core component of her professional life for a decade. Her experience and passion for holistic living ultimately led her to create Pink Moon, a NYC based consultancy that aims to uplift and radically transform the beauty industry. After working alongside over 20 female-led sustainable beauty brands at various stages of growth, Lin transformed Pink Moon into a purpose-driven holistic wellness brand and platform in mid-2020. Pink Moon has been featured in top tier press including Vogue, ELLE, Vanity Fair, The Strategist, Refinery29, and more.
@itsmelinchen and @pinkmoon.co
Sumeet Shah
Sumeet Shah has spent the last ~15 years across the early- and later-stage consumer investing and operating worlds, and is currently Founder & Managing Partner at VHS Ventures, an early-stage consumer venture capital firm. He spent the first 5 years of his career working with private equity firms and their portfolio companies with pre- and post-deal operations improvements. He recently spent the last 10 years helping to launch, manage, and grow two early-stage consumer venture funds (Brand Foundry Ventures and Swiftarc Ventures), building their sourcing strategies (as well as Swiftarc’s fundraising, platform, and operations arms).
@PE_Feeds and @vhsvc_ (Twitter)
Mary Bemis
Mary is the founder and CEO of Reprise Activewear. She started the company nearly 6 years ago after realizing how much of our clothing is made with plastic (over 60%!). Mary signed up for night classes at FIT and became passionate about finding a sustainable, plant-based alternative and communicating the importance of clean fashion, like clean beauty, in terms of skincare. Reprise began with a Kickstarter and Mary has been bootstrapping the company out of her apartment ever since. Reprise has been featured in Forbes, Fast Company, SHAPE, SELF and CBS’s The Talk daytime talk show.
@maryb612 and @repriseactivewear
Charlotte Hess
Charlotte Hess is the designer and creative director behind isobel & cleo, a luxury knitwear company specializing in handcrafted garments and cold weather accessories. Founded in Glasgow, Scotland from a fervent desire to sustain waning traditional knitwear production, the brand now calls historic Nantucket Island & NYC home. The entire collection is made in house by hand, using the finest yarns from the US and Europe. While one of Charlotte’s main goals is to sustain a business that generates jobs and revenue for the local community, her other purpose is to preserve handmade craft, increase production of ethical and sustainable goods made in the US, in addition to educating consumers about the value of artisan made products. isobel & cleo has been featured in Vogue, Elle, Condé Nast Traveller, has won award and grants from the Tory Burch Foundation & Fearless Fund, Buy from a Black Woman, the Scottish Arts Council, and has been worn in shows such as The Good Wife and The Good Fight, and HBO’s The Staircase.
@isobelandcleo
Justin Silver
Justin is the Co-Founder of AAVRANI, the beauty brand Powered by Science, Inspired by Tradition. Featured in the New York Times, Allure, Vogue, and more, the brand currently offers skincare and will be launching haircare in March 2024. Before starting AAVRANI, Justin was an early stage consumer investor where he partnered with entrepreneurs to help scale their businesses. He invested in beauty, food, and beverage including a skincare brand acquired by Unilever for $500M in 2019. Prior to consumer investing, Justin was a private equity investor at TA Associates in Boston. Justin started his career in the Mergers and Acquisitions group at Credit Suisse in New York City. Justin serves as a Venture Advisor to students in Yale University’s Entrepreneurship Program and as an Entrepreneur in Residence at Wharton’s Venture Lab. He’s also a real estate investor with over 100 properties in the Midwestern US. Justin received an MBA with honors from Wharton and earned a B.S. in Finance and Management from Stern at NYU.
@thejustinsilver and @AAVRANI
Talk to you soon!
A content curated by Lin Chen and Casey Dworkin,
We are FaB movement, a community of 15,000 founders within the beauty and fashion space, with 19+ chapters worlwide. A community founded by Odile Roujol.
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