Topic 3: Case study. Long lasting partnerships in female entrepreneurship
Julianna Curtis. Julianna is the owner of the successful company “The Energy Barre”, an enterprise dedicated to offering fitness and yoga classes. According to her, starting her business was not easy, because she struggled to find a balance between assertiveness and being authentic to herself when meeting with potential partners or clients. Sometimes she felt ‘shrinking’ herself and ‘getting really small’ playing the female role, but at other times she felt ‘too tough, trying to prove herself too much’.
However, she slowly started developing networks with her clients and other entrepreneurs, which helped her to evolve and grow her business. Her network has also helped her change or shift her way of running her business. Now, she recognizes she is dependent on her network and cannot do it alone. She has also managed also to transfer her knowledge to her team and received their reflections as well, which has created a unique sense to her entrepreneurial project, in which all the networking actors share the same values. For that reason, she describes her business as a ‘family business’, where workers, clients, and suppliers, although not family-related, all feel so as they develop strong ties.
Amy Nelson and Heather Carter. Amy founded “Riveter” back in 2017, but after the pandemic, she decided to share her business with Heather Carter, former vice president and dear friend of hers. They both met at college, and according to Amy, “stepping back in, and doing it with a partner feels exhilarating”. “Riveter” is a national membership network of community, content resources, and coworking spaces, built by women. Networking is the self-aim of their business, since it serves as a platform for sharing best practices, joining different communities, and promoting their brands. Riveter exploits all the positive aspects of building relations: it is a hub for knowledge and information sharing, where deals and other material-related outcomes take form.
Now their business is growing every year, and Membership for using Riveter Spaces is only $25 a month. Their products (Newsletters, Podcasts, Blogs, Social Media etc.) reach over 100.000 people a month, which represents an important incentive for interested partners and clients.
According to Nelson, partnerships and networking only work if there is a transaction between the actors involved, if both extract something positive out of it, either from a material or a more abstract perspective.
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