Get A Street Smart MBA with Sarah Shaw

When I saw Banana Loca on Shark Tank I knew they were a winning team. What peeked my interest was how they LOVED to visit inventor shows together and look at new creative ideas. I mean who does that right? Well luckily they did as it helped them realize their awesome invention of he the Banana Loca. A fun way to eat a a banana and add some flavor to it. They have been growing rapidly since being on Shark Tank so tune in to hear all about it.More about Banana Loca: For years, best friends Bechara and Renee frequented invention trade shows and shared cool gadget finds. One fruitful day when Bechara was talking about eating Nutella and bananas as a child in Lebanon, Renee commented about how her 15 nieces and nephews love banana slices with peanut butter. And the idea of Banana Loca was born! Besides wanting to do it because there's nothing like it on the market, bananas are just inherently funny right?! Just saying the word seems to make people smile, so they decided to make Banana Loca a reality. The thought of Banana Loca helping families have fun in the kitchen while giving tummies something yummy is everything to them!https://bananaloca.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Join me and Ashley as we chat about how she launched Pink Picasso, went on Shark Tank and wait for it........ check out the surprise. Ashely shares a lot about her start up story, being a stay at home mom with a business, dealing with Covid, shipping delays, product development issues and more.More about Ashley:Ashley Silfies is the CEO, Co-Owner, and Designer of Pink Picasso and Wear Your Sole.  Ashley’s background in photography and manufacturing allowed her to create a fresh start for her and her family, including her wife and business partner Brittany Silfies. Over the last three years, this wife team has worked from home while raising three kids and creating multiple consumer brands that their fans love.  Right now, they are ripe for growth and see a bright future of expanding their existing brands. Ashley and Brittany have won the attention of Oprah’s Favorite Things not once, but twice, and were offered four separate deals by the Sharks on ABC’s Shark Tank in November 2021.  What comes next is yet to be discovered, but they hope to continue creating what the world needs in order to feel creative and be their own kind of artist. When they are not taking the entrepreneurship world by storm, Ashley and Brittany enjoy spending time with their family (the kids, the dog, the cats, and the horses) and inventing new and exciting ways to work together doing what they love.https://pinkpicassokits.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Do you have a dog? Wonder how long it takes for that poop bag to biodegrade? Eons.Well I did until I met Tracey who created Pooch Paper, the first biodegradable paper pooch paper. Tracey is slowly changing the world of poop. Yep I said it again.Dive into our conversation about how she created Pooch Paper, where it's being sold ( like everywhere) and how she is expanding into dog parks and city parks with her Pooch Paper dispensers, all to help our landfills degrade faster.Tracey is passionate about Pooch Paper and I just love her attitude.Made in the USA, Pooch Paper is a recycled, non-chlorine bleached paper alternative to single-use plastic dog waste bags. Our sheets are 100% biodegradable, 100% compostable and are manufactured using renewable energy. Our fluorochemical-free, oil and grease resistant coating is made naturally during the pulp drying process in order to ensure your doggie’s doodie remains inside the paper and not on your hand! Most manufactured products contain PFAS chemicals that are nearly impossible to break down; Pooch Paper is PFAS-free. There are an estimated 22 billion pounds of doggie doodie dropped each year in the U.S. alone.While not all dog parents pick up after their dogs, roughly ten million tons of dog waste and over 500 million plastic doggie bags end up in landfills each year.Most doggie parents have become sensitive to the growing awareness around single-use plastics, and have begun to consider how dog waste bags play into this environmental concern. Some pet parents have chosen to “up cycle,” or reuse plastic bags that come from the grocery market, for example. Others use oxo-biodegradable plastic bags, which purport to be eco-friendly. The latest initiative to hit the dog waste bag market includes bioplastics. While all of these efforts are one step closer to being eco-friendly, there still remains one common denominator across all of these categories: plastic. Research suggests dog owners use more than 500 million single-use plastic bags for dog waste annually. Plastic is generally not biodegradable - it can take over 500 years to degrade, if it ever does. Some bags are manufactured as oxo-biodegradables, meaning that a formula called EPI is added during the manufacturing process to enable the plastic to break down quicker. However, oxo-biodegradables often do not fully disappear. Instead, they break down into millions of micro-plastic particles that enter the air we breathe, the water we drink and ultimately the food supply we consume. Such micro-plastic particles may, among other things, carry toxic or carcinogenic chemicals used in making the plastic, or they can act as a carrier for pathogens and heavy metals. Our planet and our pups are made to be loved!https://www.poochpaper.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Mae Karwowski, the founder and CEO of Obvious.ly, a leading global influencer-marketing agency and technology platform. Mae shares some amazing tips on working with influencers and how you can forge relationships to build your brand.  She shares how to vet the instagram influencers and how to gage their engagement rate. Also suggests looking at how many sponsored posts they are doing, and how much engagement they actually get. Mae suggests looking at influencers you want to build a brand with. She suggests checking out a couple of influencers sites called Hype Auditor, Grin, and Klear (Now Izea), that might be able to help connect you with influencers.Under her leadership since she launched the agency in 2014, Obvious.ly has become the global standard of influencer marketing by providing the best full service client experience, managing complexity and scale of influencer work, and using data analysis to inform all strategies.With thousands of campaigns under her belt, Mae is a recognized expert on the influencer industry and has been widely quoted in the press, appearing in publications such as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, NPR, CNBC, and the Washington Post.Obviously’s clients include iconic brands such as Amazon, Ulta, Lyft, Google, Coca-Cola, and Hasbro, and in 2019, Mae won both the Campaign Female Frontier Award and the Adweek Fastest Growing Agency award.Before founding Obviously, Mae directed social media for Gilt City, part of Gilt Groupe, and oversaw social execution for clients such as Bravo, UGG, and Coca-Cola with the agency 360i. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Derren knows his stuff when it comes to Instagram!  He openly shares new strategies, insights and methods to make your Instagram work for you like never before. We talked about making sure the "Shop" is set up correctly to using the app Ecwid to make your links are shopable - who knew?We also chatted about using the new feature "Reels" as a way to gain more followers, and how to attract and work with influencers.Follow Social Sensi on Instagram or check out his social media offerings.More about Social Sensi  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I've always been a huge fan of the Scary Mommy blog. It started right around when my twins were born, and helped me realize that I was doing things pretty well and that I probably wasn't going to totally screw up my children. Whew.It was a place I could go to read about other moms nightmares, forgotten children, terrible meals, dirty diapers and billions of things we all mess up on.... as well as the joy, laughter, and amazing moments.Jill is a genius in creating content. When she created the Mommy Confessionals, it took off like wild fire and took the blog into a totally new space with millions of subscribers and ad money pouring in. It's a safe and anonymous place to leave your "confession", get it off your chest and feel free of the burden.... while enjoying a good laugh or cry for sure.Jill shares her story, what it was like to talk about her own family and how the business grew, sold and what she's up to now.Quotes from Jill's Book Scary MommyI shall remember that no mother is perfect and my children will thrive because, and sometimes even in spite of me.I shall not preach to a fellow mother who has not asked my opinion. It’s none of my damn business.I shall maintain a sense of humor about all things motherhood.More about JillJill Smokler is a noted entrepreneur, social influencer, New York Times bestselling author, and community builder.As the founder of Scary Mommy, Jill has spent the last ten years creating and curating online content for parents, having grown her one-time “mommy blog” into one of the most influential digital parenting properties in the world.During her tenure at Scary Mommy — most recently as Chief Content Officer — Jill used candor, humor, and humility to redefine the role and influence of parents online. Her commitment to publishing honest, compelling, and sometimes controversial content, combined with her uncanny sense of how parents are willing to interact with brands online, created a new kind of digital parenting ecosystem that has given moms a voice and brands a roadmap for engaging the sought after mom audience.  In 2017, Forbes magazine named Jill a top ten parenting influencer.Connect with Jillhttps://jillsmokler.comhttps://www.scarymommy.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When you think of protective footwear you don't often think of a woman. At least I don't. I think differently now. Mary Steinbrunner is a woman leader in a man's world. She shares her story of working her way up the ladder from Marketing Assistant to General Manager of one of the worlds largest protective boot manufacturers in the world. While it might not seem sexy, Mary manages a large team and works hard to keep up with the latest technology in protective footwear to keep feet safe.Nicknamed "Wellies", I often think of the English when I hear this word as it is derived from the name of the boots worn by the British Aristocracy back in the early 19th century. Dunlop has certainly developed the "Wellie" beyond any 19th century boot makers wildest dreams.Dunlop has generously offered a 15% discount on boots to you listeners! Use code SarahShaw15 at checkout.More about MaryMary Steinbrunner, General Manager of Dunlop Protective Footwear -USA Division, has a strong background in Marketing and Business Development with a track record of solid leadership and successful business planning. Mary became the General Manager when the company was acquired in May 2016. She has been part of the organization since April 2000, where she began as a Marketing Assistant and grew alongside her team into the current role as General Manager, while navigating three ownership changes in the past five years.   She is committed to building strong teams and enhancing independent leadership within company and community. In addition to the pledge to her Dunlop family, Mary has worked with local Women’s initiatives to support domestic abuse victims, helping to rebuild their confidence, and their lives. Mary holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration from the University of Baltimore and Marketing Strategy Certificate from Cornell University. Mary has a strong belief in workplace diversity and supports training, education, and empowerment initiatives as key criteria to greater personal and business achievement. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Catching up with John Fieldly, CEO of Celsius Fitness Drinks was a treat. John is a money guy who knows how to sell products.  Using influencer strategies, social media, and satisfied customers, they have built a loyal following of consumers who have become natural ambassadors of Celsius. Besides selling in gyms across the nation and on Amazon and their own e-comm site, Celsius is now available in Dicks Sporting Goods, Target and CVS.CELSIUS® is a Fitness Drink which is clinically proven to function. How? As a thermogenic, CELSIUS’ proprietary MetaPlus blend accelerates metabolism, increasing your body’s ability to burn fat and calories. There are only two ways a body burns fat: through increased heart rate and/or thermogenesis. Drinking CELSIUS and then going into motion is double dipping, you’re accelerating the burn and the results are even faster Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Lisa Ascoles, The Inventress, and I talk about the differences between a Website based business versus an App only business. Which is better and why, how social media plays into that and how to run a successful product based company in todays world. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Lisa and I share some secrets about how to keep going when facing fear of failure, or just not knowing if your passion can sustain the journey.In this episode of Dial for Dollars you'll learn how to keep things afloat while building a business. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chad is a go getter that's for sure creating Eyewear that makes a DIFFerence. Growing up in the eyewear business, he visited factories around the globe with his father from an early age and got to learn and understand the world of manufacturing. Chad and his partners started DIFF by selling sunglasses at music festivals to get a sense of their target market before doing the deep dive into creating and manufacturing their own unique brand.Once they created their own designs, getting products to celebrities and the media was not too difficult and the brand quickly took off. Leveraging the media exposure, they were able to build an online business that has donated over 1 million pair of glasses to those in need.Giving back has always been at the forefront of the business model. Chad overseas all of their charitable arms and continues to look for ways to grow their ability to donate. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Join me and Lisa Ascolese,The Inventress for an enlightening episode on how to think more broadly about your product line so that you can get into more stores and more magazines. In this episode we share ideas on how to think differently about your line. For example, if you make a skincare line and have a serum or oil based product, consider pitching to mountain resorts where the air is dryer and women need more moisture in the products they purchase.You can take this idea a step further by pitching to wellness magazines and local magazines (in the resort town) as they are always looking for products that solve a problem. Many creators think to narrowly and don't see a bigger pitch for themselves. Take a look at your line and see how you can spin it into a new category, or a new sales channel. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Join me and Lisa Ascoles, The Inventress for anther episode of Dial for Dollars. Each week we bring you a technique to bring in more sales. This week we talk about how to turn a no into a yes. There are three stages of NO. The soft no, I'll think about it, the medium no, I'm not sure you've sold me yet, and the hard no, I'm not interested. In this episode, we share how to possibly turn that no into a yes over and over again. We also share how to determine which "level" of NO it really is and when to keep pursuing, and when to give up and move on to greener pastures.Bottom line, never take no for an answer until they tell you to lose their phone number.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Want to learn how to maximize sales after a Trade Show? Don't leave money on the table sister! Contacting buyers and following up is the biggest part of the game and is the key to building long lasting relationships and making sales. Lisa and I chat about how you can stay on top of buyers without seeming pushy, yet being bold enough to close the deal.Business is all about making money so you can keep growing. Don't be afraid to contact buyers and let them know you are there. In this instance the squeaky wheel gets the grease so don't let anyone else take your place on the shelves. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I'm excited to launch this new weekly series as a joint venture with Lisa Ascolese, The Inventress.Lisa and I want to help you be bold, get sales and learn the nitty gritty of launching a successful product line - no mater what it is.In this episode, we talk about how to make the most of a Trade Show, how to attract buyers and the media, and how to get sales, even when no one is stopping in your booth. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Glace Cryotherapy co-founded by Skyler Scarlett and his sister Brittney is a science-backed, quick, cutting-edge designed recovery and performance center that focuses on helping its clients and members achieve their pain management, workout recovery, fat loss, beauty, and health & wellness goals. Skyler is very open and encouraging about his journey to success. After an appearance on Shark Tank and a flurry of hype, he and his sister settled up their current journey. Skyler Scarlett got into entrepreneurship right out of college after graduating from Chico State with a degree in Exercise Physiology and a Minor in Nutrition. With his older sister Brittney Scarlett-Torres, together they started one of the first Cryotherapy Spas in the country in 2014. With limited business knowledge or funds they built a thriving business in their hometown of Carmel, CA. A few months after opening they hit their big break when they beat out 80,000 other entrepreneurs to appear on hit TV show ABC Shark Tank. As an aftereffect of the show and the exposure of 8 million viewers, the siblings worked out a deal with a major fitness club chain to bring their recovery and wellness start up into select locations. They started their first center inside of a fitness club in 2017 and were able to sign up 200 monthly members over the course of a year. They look forward to expanding their recovery model across the U.S. inside of fitness clubs nationwide.Skyler and Brittney have been featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur, Club Industry, and appeared on CNBC & ABC, and to date have raised over $300,000.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Becca Brown is such an enthusiast about her brand and products that you see why Solemates are a girls best friend.Who'd a thunk that heel caps would be such a big thing right? We've all been to grass party events, and weddings where your heel just sinks down and you know your shoes are ruined.... or need an emergency trip to the doctor.Becca and her co-founder Monica had the same experience over and over until they had their ah-ha moment.....and grass events were never the same again!Tune in and listen as we chat about how they started at night and on the weekends, got on Shark Tank, didn't take the deal, pursued sales on their own, are now in over 10,000 stores and still do the sales themselves. Whew!Like many engaged entrepreneurs, especially Trina Turk, Becca talks about how important customer service is and how on top of it they are all the time. They pursue PR, celebrities and most of all sales.Visit Solemates website for an instant 20% off your first purchase. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A working mom of 4, and five and half years of development and discovery, Elizabeth Crouch created and patented the Cupcake Rack that she sells in stores and through HSN. Earning a real Street Smart MBA, Elizabeth shares her story with us today. Pitching the benefits on HSN taught Elizabeth the importance of sharing all this on HSN to get more sales.In the beginning, Elizabeth watched Shark Tank and did a bunch of google research as she was on a super low budget.  Unfortunately, she took a few shortcuts with her patent and it's not as strong as it could be.  Elizabeth created her Cupcake Rack with the non-baker in mind. She encourages you to buy cupcakes, and just put them in the rack to create an edible floral arrangement, or easily decorate them yourself for a more personalized version. She uses video demos to show how easy it is to use which is handy for live TV too.  Elizabeth shares how many NO's she experienced and how to power through that and turn it around into positives in order to move forward instead of wallowing in the rejection. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tracy and I chat about how to know if you have a hero or a zero before you put a lot of cash into making a product to determine if it will sell or not. Tracy gives a ton of ideas on how you can use FB groups, testing similar products on Amazon or Ebay, how to use peers, and even church groups to pre-test your idea before you invest in your idea. We cover the pros and cons of patents and if they are necessary, and how to handle criticism. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

3 former Under Armour employees used decades of sportswear expertise to create $75 performance denimHenry Stafford is one smart man. Using everything he learned while holding down a powerful job at Under Armour, he and 3 partners launched Revtown, a denim company that is taking the mens jean world by storm. Deciding that jeans didn't need to be expensive to be awesome, they created their own denim fabric in Italy to set themselves apart from competitors. Henry talks a lot about how they do marketing as they only sell on their own website. No discounts ever, not even to staff, is one of their models.Henry Stafford has been in the Product and marketing space for over 20 years with long stints at Under Armour, American Eagle,Old Navy and Abercrombie.Henry was Under Armour's former chief merchandising officer and help Under Armour grow from $800M to $5 billion over 6 years. His partner Steve Battista was a former senior vice president of creative at Under Armour, and Matt Maasdam, was the former head of the Under Armour's e-commerce unit. Their fourth partner, Chris Lust, comes from the hedge fund world and is now the CEO and is the one who keeps them all in line!The three of them set out to create quality denim, straightforward fits, and unbeatable comfort — and it's clear they've achieved just that with Revtown.Find Revtown on Instagram and Facebook Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.