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BARNARD INNOVATORS: TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS
A Panel Discussion with Maryam Banikarim '89, Stella Grizont '03, Ruthie Schulder '05, Andrea Stein '97, Samantha Unger '01, and Stacie Urbach '93
10.17.08
New York, NY (Oct. 17)-As the job market continues to tighten, it is inspiring to hear that women in the United States are starting their own businesses at twice the rate of men. The result, according to the Center for Women's Business Research, is 10.1 million women-owned businesses nationwide. Generating $1.9 trillion in annual sales and employing more than 13 million people, businesses run by women, especially in these uncertain financial times, are integral to the health of the global economy.
On Wednesday, Barnard College hosted a panel discussion and conversation with six young alumnae who have successfully launched businesses and are well on their way to becoming leaders in their fields. Moderator Maryam Banikarim '89, chief marketing officer for Univision and one of Crain's New York Business' "Forty Under 40" rising stars, introduced the panelists: Samantha Unger '01, director of California Emissions Markets at Evolution Markets, an organization that assists companies in implementing risk management strategies for regional environmental markets; Andrea Stein '97, founder of GirlMogul.com, a retail site selling feminist apparel and accessories for young girls; Stacie Urbach '93, co-founder of and President of Bach Enterprises, which manufactures "Smart Heel" high heel protectors; Stella Grizont '03, Director of Marketing at Ladies Who Launch, a small-business incubator that provides resources and connections for budding women entrepreneurs; and Ruthie Schulder '05, co-founder of little biRd, a personal shopping and styling service for children. Each described the trials and rewards unique to entrepreneurship, and discussed the reasons why women in particular are drawn to running their own businesses.
A crowd of students, alumnae, and friends of the College gathered to learn more about why exactly each of these alumnae decided to leave a more conventional career path to pursue a concept or idea, how they pulled it off, and what challenges each continues to face.
"Since I graduated, the pace of entrepreneurship has really picked up, which we can largely attribute to the rise of the internet," said Banikarim in her opening remarks. "Women-owned businesses are often started organically - statistically speaking - unlike businesses owned by men, which typically emerge from concrete, fixed business plans. Women just dive right in and figure it out." This description seemed to ring true for a number of the panelists. "It all came together one night at 4 a.m.," said Stein, who previously ran a small business selling dried soup over the internet. "I decided I would stop selling soup and start selling t-shirts for girls." Grizont, who is the co-founder and incubator leader of the local New Jersey market of Ladies Who Launch, similarly acted on instinct: "I just dived right in," she said.
Schulder was working as a production assistant at Saturday Night Live when the sophisticated fashion sense of her boss's children alerted her to the vast, untapped market of personal shopping and styling for children. "New York is a place where people will pay for service," she said, which is why she and her partner, Zoey Washington, CC '05, felt confident their concept would take off. Schulder is now pleased to be her own boss: "I feel I am using my creativity and am engaged in my work - just as I was during my time at Barnard." She explained that feeling intellectually engaged in her work was something she missed in a corporate setting, but qualified, "Not that I have a problem with grunt work!"
Urbach at first resisted the call of entrepreneurship, wary of being her own boss after watching her parents, two entrepreneurs, struggle to succeed. After a stint in corporate finance, however, Urbach was walking down the street in a new pair of Jimmy Choo heels when her eureka moment hit: her heel stuck in a subway grate and snapped, inspiring her to invent a high heel protection device. "I felt that if it was something I needed, it must be something thousands of other women would need too," said Urbach, whose product has been showered with media attention, including mentions in Glamour Magazine and on ABC News, and is now sold worldwide.
Unger identified music and the environment as the two things she has been deeply passionate about, even as a young girl growing up by the Florida Everglades, promoting the Dave Matthews Band. She followed these two threads throughout her years at Barnard, launching her own music marketing company with her brother, Seth Unger, CC '97, and subsequently taking a job trading emissions in California. Unger admitted that she was lucky to become knowledgeable and passionate about emissions trading in 1999, when the phenomenon was still in its infancy. "I've been riding the wave ever since," she said. "Do your research. And stay focused," she encouraged the audience, explaining how she often sets micro-goals so that she can feel she's accomplished something concrete at the end of each day.
The six panelists reflected on the challenges of their day-to-day operations. "Women are often more emotionally attached to whatever they are creating than men," said Grizont. "They treat their businesses like their babies." Schulder was more specific. "Working from home was my biggest challenge," she said. "And it's taken me a while to realize that. But now I know that I've got to get out, even if it means sitting in a coffee shop for five hours a day." Unger suggested that women in fact may have an easier time making it as entrepreneurs than men. "Women are better networkers," she said. "And we want to help each other more." The panelists agreed that surrounding themselves with a support network or a formal advisory board was important - and that networking among other women was tantamount.
— Johanna Smith
The event was sponsored by the Barnard Leadership Initiative, a multifaceted, interdisciplinary program that combines academic offerings and co-curricular opportunities to prepare women for the challenges of undertaking leadership roles in business and government. BLI sponsors a series of public lectures that feature inspiring public- and private-sector leaders. For more information, visit: http://www.barnard.edu/bli/
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