I started my first business under my bunk bed selling Bubblicious Gum to the neighborhood kids. I did. Once I realized I could buy 5 packs of the same gum for $1.59 instead of 1 packet for 59 cents, I was like, "Girl, we gotta boss up!" I picked up a couple chores from my family members and stashed some cash away to purchase my inventory. When my Mom found my safe box with a pile of dollar bills, ordered and stacked along with enough gum to blow a bubble to outer space and back, she had questions.
I promptly told her it was, "My business!"
To which she said, "No! Your business IS MY BUSINESS!" And in gleeful ignorance I replied, "Yes! It is my business and it is so fun!" As I pulled out the raffle tickets I was planning to sell at the annual block party to pawn off my kid sister's bike she didn't like and that was too big for me. Naturally.
Scaling the Neighborhood Gum Racket
You may be thinking, "Wow, such a stellar free market capitalist!" Little six year old Rose started to scale her neighborhood chewing gum racket and by the next summer, we had established operational headquarters in my grandma's backyard hedgery. As swiftly as I could, I got my work permit at age 14 and following a handful of odd jobs at pizza joints, cafes and a few moonlighting occasions as gal Friday, I quickly leaned into one of my inherent skills: being market savvy and community oriented. I learned fast that doing business is relationship building. And a lemonade stand always brightens up the neighborhood, even if it is a sales funnel to my larger network of My Little Ponies and last season's Barbies from my sister's discarded toy chest.
I proudly call myself a serial boat burner, a conceptual visionary and a social entrepreneur.
A handful of decades later, the responsibility of upgrading social systems that have long been outgrown, of using tech for good instead of extraction, falls into the laps of innovators in all fields, not just business. And it is my hypothesis that given the chance, women in roles of leadership in all industries can activate innovation at lightning speed.
A Matriarchal Baby
Before I jump into my current trajectory, I need to give credit where credit is due. You see, I am a matriarchal baby. I am the daughter of a single mother who made her way through fashion design school in the 1990s with two small children. She is the daughter of a woman who gladly wore shoulder pads to hustle up the corporate ladder in the 1980s, thanks Reaganomics. And all of us existed only because of her mother, a German immigrant to the US, a mother to two sets of children, four of whom perished in the Spanish Flu and four of whom she brought into life in the New World shortly after she immigrated, as a widow.
I am the result of their labors, triumphs and human struggles. And maybe that is why I never really felt I belonged in any single box. I am too many things at once. And I have learned that is a superpower, not a liability.
A scrappy, gregariously fabulous friend raiser, I naturally rally groups to unite around collective missions.
Into my more recent years of entrepreneurialism, I have been integrating both the bootstrapping nature of invention and the luxurious possibilities of big visions that can and will change the world.
The Great Incubation
When I had the opportunity to pause my women owned and operated production company during Covid and adjust course, it seemed like a "now or never window" to lean into better ways of doing business. I looked closely at my inherent skills once again and asked other women forward leaders I respect for their insights and wisdoms.
In 2017, I began polling the audience of women I had built community with through conversations around money, sex and politics with thought leaders, industry disruptors and business activists. During Covid closures, I took these conversations online and started building what would eventually become Business 4 Good.
What We Are Building
Business 4 Good is a digital platform that provides business and social connections through shared knowledge exchange. We generate access to civic resources, host conversations around money, sex and politics in a curated and inspired way, and we connect thought leaders, industry disruptors and business activists who unite to collaborate, elevate and inspire through a new economic model.
Women in Roles of Leadership
We have been talking about women in roles of leadership for a long time and that can be its own inspiration. Though sometimes it can feel that the progress we make gets pulled back in time when political power shifts hands and women's experiences are not valued equally with men's. In the last few years, such movements as the Great Resignation, #BLM and #MeToo have made the stage perfectly set for systemic change, for upgrades to how we access and redistribute power. Now is the time to take the innovations we dreamed up during that global pause and activate them as creative, business solutions accessible to all.
Can we bring all the women thought leaders, industry disruptors and business activists together, into one digital space where we can unite around a collective mission to collaborate, elevate and inspire?
Can this space serve as a collective pool of inspiration for those who have historically been left out of leadership roles? Can it help us effectively use our voice to advocate for access to the resources we need to gain progress on our own dreams and superpowers? Can we then begin to mobilize and organize the many who are eager for this groundswell of women forward leadership, cross connecting our networks for greater strides towards equality of opportunity for all genders?
My inspired answer is a howling HELL YES WE CAN.
Building a New Economy, Globally
This is what Business 4 Good is about. We are building a new economic model for women in business, powered by collective intelligence and technology. Not a networking group. Not a course. A marketplace where women have a container for gifting knowledge and getting paid our worth.
The model is built on the belief that when women have more knowledge, that equates to more power. And when women are more supported, the entire village thrives. It takes a village to raise anything or anyone up. When women rise, humanity rises.
The Cooperative Difference
We are not here to break the glass ceiling by climbing the same broken ladders. We are building new structures entirely, through a hybrid cooperative model where members own the value they create, profits return to the women who built them, and technology serves us instead of extracting from us. That is #Tequity.
From selling Bubblicious under a bunk bed to building sovereignty for women in business around the world, the throughline has always been the same: community is the oldest currency in the books. Relationships are how business gets done. And when women have everything we need, everyone flourishes.
If you are ready to build something different, something that centers collaboration over competition and community over extraction, I want to hear from you. We are building this together. Your knowledge has value. Your seat at the table is waiting.
Love,
Rose
