Empowering Women Entrepreneurs: Strategic Debt Financing with Sheena Brady, Founder of Tease Wellness

Speaker A: So that's the fun but not so fun fact that I like to share is that Tease did its first half a million dollars in revenue with a $1,000 secured visa. Now, that 500,000 in revenue might have been three years, four years to get to the first 500,000. But while that might sound impressive on the surface, like, oh, this woman did half a million in revenue with a $1,000 credit card limit. Like, make no mistake, like, it was a logistical nightmare because when you look below the surface of, um, that managing cash flow, managing inventory, managing what I needed to grow the business, I had no other access to capital. Every dollar that I was making with the business, I was putting it on, um, this credit card.

Speaker B: Welcome back to her CEO journey. I'm your host, Christina Shahli along with our sponsor, Profit Reimagine Inc. We are grateful to have you join us today as we wrap up our podcast series, Women Scaling CPG Businesses. I am excited to introduce our last guest, Sheena Brady, founder and CEO of Teas Wellness and the Founders Fund. Teas is a fellow B Corp sisters on a mission to craft functional teas and botanical essential that help us live and lead with intention. What is really compelling about Sheena's journey is her firsthand experience with the lack of financial support and option for women founders as well as her experience improving her own financial literacy. This challenge motivated her to use her first business to build a community that supports diverse women entrepreneurs at the early stages of their journeys leading to the birth of the Founder's Fund. I must say my heart swells when I see such meaningful interconnection as seen as highlight two significant challenges women entrepreneurs face. First, there is the struggle to access non extractive capital and second, the lack of support needed to help women grow their businesses. Beyond seven figures, it is clear that the current financial system is not serving women entrepreneurs and that has a real impact on the economy. I have deep respect for Sheena for taking action on these issues and working to open doors for more women entrepreneurs. I am sure you will enjoy this conversation with Sheena uh, as much as I did. It is full of valuable insights on scaling your business, why women founders shouldn't fear debt financings, and the importance of being financially savvy as a founder. Before we dive into the conversation with Sheena, I invite you to connect with me on LinkedIn so we can keep this conversation going. If you are a founder growing your business, visit us@, uh, profitreimagine.com fractional cfoservices to discover how we can Support your growth and if this is your first time tuning in, welcome. Our podcast, along with our sponsor Profit Reimagine Inc. Is dedicated to making your financial journey smoother and more impactful. Now let's jump into Sheena's CEO journey. Sheena Brady, welcome to her CEO journey. As a fellow B Corp, it's such a pleasure to have you here today.

Speaker A: It's such a pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me, Christina.

Speaker B: For sure. Sheena, you are the founder of Teas Wellness and the visionary behind the Founders Fund which we're going to talk about your journey in both areas. Now, your beginning started in luxury hospitality and you struggle with some health issue due to the daily level of coffee that you took, uh, because of the high pressure job. Now, reflecting on your journey in this luxury hospitality, what moment made you realize that the wellness space was where you wanted to channel your energy?

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. Uh, I very much self identify as a multi passionate, super ambitious go getter, for better, for worse. And maybe that's part of like growing up professionally through formerly what we called hustle culture.

Speaker B: Right?

Speaker A: Especially as a woman feeling like you had to always have seen so many plates in the air and work, you know, extra hard to kind of get somewhere in your career. And so that was very much me before. I was working in luxury hospitality for over a decade and I was consuming seven or eight cups of coffee a day to get through those 12 to 15 hour shifts sometime. And I was not paying attention to my well being at all, frankly. It was nights, weekends, holidays. And so I sacrificed relationships, which is also part of your well being. In addition to taking care of myself holistically. That journey in hospitality led me to working at the Shangri La hotel in Toronto. And the short of it is I was tasked with implementing the city's largest tea program. And through that process, I became a professional tea sommelier. And that's where I learned, oh, wait a minute. Like, however you're feeling, there's different tea and botanical blend that might be able to help support that. And so I just started creating these functional formulations really in essence to support my own well being because I was feeling pretty miserable and stuck in my career at the time in all transparency. And so tea and botanicals really just kind of became the spark and the catalyst to my, my next era. I guess as I was looking to create my own building blocks to support my own well being, I was turning to valerian root for a better night's sleep. Right. Or yerba mate to get a bit of a 2:3pm um, energy boost without the crash or jitter that you sometimes get from coffee. And so I just became inspired by so much more than tea. And I actually really look at us like that, at teas, like we're more than just teas. We create flavor filled, functionally filled, everyday wellness essentials to really elevate your, your everyday experiences.

Speaker B: One thing that as I am looking at your website and then I purchased this is the Blissfully Blue tea, which is it turns into blue color when you pour the water. I felt like, oh, uh, this is very interesting. I never thought about this. It's interesting because you put butterfly blue pea flowers and then it's supposed to have a calming effect and it's just different. And then it has aswagandha, it has tulsi, it has St. John's Wort. Who thought of that?

Speaker A: It's just amazing when we think of our core selves as just everyday human beings, from one human to another, and we look at the change of seasons, I think that we have a lot in common with the change of seasons and we're going through our own changes seasonally. You know, whether it's against the literal seasons of the year, but that blend specifically, Blissfully Blue was really inspired and created to capture the essence of the transition from summer into fall. I think maybe I'm far from alone in sharing this, but as we kind of wind down into summer, I think a lot of us have that feeling of, oh, wow. Like these summer days that are left are few and precious and. And all of a sudden I go from this idea of trying to have these like, blissful moments, carry them into the fall. But yet fall is like back to reality mode, back to school mode, back to work mode. Oh, no. Year end is around the corner. Let's hustle and get through overwolves before the end of the year. And so that's really what Blissfully Blue is formulated to kind of, you know, inspire these moments to carry you through the change of season from summer into fall transition and inspire moments of presence and moments of bliss. And so with that beautiful blue color, it's actually chemically activated when you add fresh lemon juice and it turns this beautiful pinky purple color. And it's this idea of, you know what? Blink and you might miss it. Take a moment to prepare that beautiful blue tea, add the lemon juice, watch the magic happen. Watch it turn pink. Don't miss it. Embrace this moment. Embrace a presence before you head on to the ambitious to do list ahead of you. Every tea is a story and it's a moment to invest in yourself and your well being because we believe when you really prioritize those moments and we try to make them easy and accessible through T is the tool at teas. But when you take that time to invest in yourself and your well being, you're better equipped to take care of the people, communities and things that you care about the most. And so we're just here to help support that and make it enjoyable, experiential and hopefully easy.

Speaker B: Let's go back a little bit to your experience at, uh, Shangri La. In many interview you mentioned you were let go by Shangri La and at that moment you felt disposable. Now looking back to that experience, because I am sure, and then you said this, it was like a hard moment for you. You kind of like question, what am I doing right? Like I gave a decade of my life to this hospitality industry luxury one and here I am now. How did that moment of vulnerability influence the way you approach building teas?

Speaker A: Yeah, as you pointed out, it was a decade of my life's work. And not just that, it was the thing I went to school for. I graduated in hotel restaurant management, I got my first working visa in the United States, like working for Michelin star restaurants. And I went to San Francisco and then Toronto, Shangri La. So I had like given truly my life most of my 20s, you know, to an industry that made me feel disposable in an instant. It was quite essentially my version of rock bottom at that time. I think like at the time, you know, I was a bit in denial, like, oh, like they're the problem, not me. And I think like, that's a really interesting moment. I think once you find you hit your version of rock bottom, it's natural to sometimes go into a bit of maybe denial. But then there's a really important moment where you've got to do one of two things. Number one, dust yourself off and say, okay, you know what, that experience happened. But I still have all of this experience, I'm going to go find another job in hospitality. But for me that wasn't an option because I knew once the denial had passed, it's like, wait a minute. No, I was the problem. They were not. I was, I was miserable and they knew it. And it was even though it was a conversation that was not necessarily had directly, indirectly, everyone knew that I started to fail at showing up as my best self because again, I was abandoning my well being, I wasn't taking care of myself and I was just Miserable, cranky, burnt out, on overdrive and not taking more agency of, um, maybe communicating that at the time and doing something about it. But anyhow, the path that I chose was to completely start over because I knew that I at least had this spark of joy, you know, I was again blending teas for myself out of my tiny condo. So I decided, okay, even though I'm getting paid well at the time to do the thing that I went to school for on paper, you, uh, know, I'm quote, unquote killing it. As far as like experience goes. I'm going to take a, a major step back to hopefully eventually take 10 steps ahead. So what that looked like for me was finding an entry level job. And for me, the transferable skill was when I started teas. I started it with nothing but 500 in ingredients and a Shopify store. So I knew someone who worked at Shopify and I asked them like, hey, this is my resume. I've never worked in tech in my life. What do you think? And they said, well, we love that you're a merchant, so maybe you could work in customer support. And so at the time, customer support was maybe like 18 bucks an hour. I can't recall, but it was very much like an entry level role at Shopify. I thought, wow, this is going to be a big hit to the salary that I'm used to and there's no benefits at that time. But I, uh, thought, you know, what if I know that my hours are, you know, whatever they were at the time, they were eight hours a day. I wasn't going to work 15 hours. And I knew what my schedule was instead of my nights and weekends, I could reclaim as my own and put into teas. So be it. And that's what I did. And I don't know if you know this already, Christina, but I actually worked at Shopify for eight years and grew my company teased in parallel as a side hustle. And it was only about three years ago I quit Shopify. And uh, yeah, I grew it and I had a team of six. We were a multimillion dollar company. Like we had really grown significantly before

Speaker B: I quit at Shopify because we already touched on Shopify. I kind of want to dive a little bit further on that. You stay for eight years over there. Your investment into teas at the beginning was $500 to start that Shopify store. Also, you have $1,000 limit on your credit card. I'm pretty sure from what I read, and correct me if I'm wrong, but, uh, you probably reach like, 500,000 in revenue a year or two after you started teas. Is that right?

Speaker A: So that's the fun but not so fun fact that I like to share is that Tease did its first half a million dollars in revenue, and with a $1,000 secured visa. Now, that 500,000 in revenue might have been three years, four years to get to the first 500,000. I can't quite remember. But while that might sound impressive on the surface, like, oh, this woman did half a million in revenue with a $1,000 credit card limit. Like, make no mistake, like, it was a logistical nightmare, because when you look below the surface of that, managing cash flow, managing inventory, managing what I needed to grow the business, I had no other access to capital. Every dollar that I was making with the business, I was putting it on this credit card. And I would beg my bank, my traditional institution at the time, for a higher credit card limit, a small loan. They kept turning me away. They kept being frustrated with me. At one point, they started to give me business cards to other banks. And it was shocking and disappointing. But at the same time, looking back, I didn't know how to talk to a banker like a banker so that they could advocate to the underwriters to really understand what was going on in my business. I didn't even really understand what an underwriter even was. Honestly, I was just kind of beating with this woman who was supposedly my business advisor at the bank. And so what I learned from that experience is that that was part of the problem. The other part of the problem was that, uh, you know, I was raised to believe that debt is bad, right? To not take on any debt, to not take on any credit facilities that you don't have the money to pay back right away. Obviously, we know, like, defeats the purpose of digging out credit. And so I thought, you know, I was a quote, unquote, good girl. Throughout my teenage years and my adult years. I had no debt, no major credit cards, nothing. Well, plot twice. That ended up being the worst advice I could have ever taken when it was time to be an entrepreneur, because I had no track record as far as my credit history went to prove that I was capable of taking on debt and paying it back responsibly. And so that was also part of the barrier.

Speaker B: I find it ironic, though, Sheena, if I thought about this, I understand as women, uh, entrepreneurs, like women founders, and then I talk to so many, nobody really want to take on debt, right? And a few things, in my opinion, I'm, um, included, because I grew up in a country that does not believe in debt. There is really no such thing about credit history where I'm from. It's not culture. But what I find interesting is that many financial institutions, number one, use credit history as a measure to give out debt or not giving out debt because they believe if you don't have a credit history, we don't know what is your habit. I just find it frustrating and ironic because when you actually trying to be responsible with your money by not taking debt, you are being penalized because of it. The system is not supporting us to really like, be more responsible is we are in a culture that is like, oh, get more debt, you know, and then, uh, if you just learn how to pay it slowly, it's great. That means you have a great credit history. The truth is it's not always right to do that. Right, that's, that's kind of like number one.

Speaker A: Yeah. And I think you just, you just perfectly described, you know, the difference between systemic and traditional barriers that women entrepreneurs can face. I think on the traditional side, you know, you mentioned your, your family history, you know, outside of Canada, that you're from, um, a country that doesn't promote the idea of credit cards or the concept of debt. And so I know that that's not mutually exclusive to women, of course, but that is a huge problem when we talk about supporting newcomers into, in Canada in the first place. Right. So that is a perfect example of a systemic problem on the financial side. And then of course, like, you know, on my case, like with my family growing up here in Canada and myself included, we came from a family with not a lot of money, like very honestly, like bordered the line of like poverty at times growing up. And it was just, again, it was just ingrained for, for me on like a traditional level. Like you, you do not take out money that you do not have. Like, you just don't do that. And so that was really part of like my upbringing. And then I think when we look at traditional barriers for women collectively in this country, I mean, it's really only in the 70s and 80s across Canada and the US that uh, we started to see this change of women not needing co signers for bank accounts or mortgages. Right. And so these are also those traditional systemic barriers that we're finally seeing a little bit more change on. But it is a tough, like chicken and egg, slightly like hypocritical scenario when you're, you're trying to, to grow your business when you have these barriers stacked against you.

Speaker B: Nonetheless, definitely, I Also think, though the education about debt financing is lacking. Many, many education out there is about, okay, how do you pitch to an investor? That's number one, really, how do you pitch to your banker? How do you explain your story to a banker so you can have the opportunity and believe that debt is not a bad thing? There are ways to manage the debt in a very strategic ways, but, uh, the education is not there. If you think about it, we are not being educated. We are being forced to think that, okay, giving a piece of your ownership to an investor is the best way to. And then it kind of like added to the fear because there's no education, if you think about it, how to manage your debt, how to prepare taking on debt, how to have the financial literacy to take on that. Don't you think?

Speaker A: Yeah, and I think like, that's really where it should start. And I completely agree with you, like, once, once you kind of start to navigate through that world of what it looks like for it to practice proper debt hygiene, for lack of better words or like building your credit. I'm a big proponent of, uh, I've avoided 11 years entities taking on any sort of investment. We have no 100% bootstrapped to this day, 11 years later, no investors. And I love the idea that we don't have to wake up and answer to anybody except ourselves at the end of the day because we haven't relinquished any equity. And further to that, that, you know, I, over the years have grown to become a lot more savvy and strategic into understanding what are the best types of debt that I can leverage for the business that will, funny enough, make me more profitable as a company. Because if you have the right kind of debt, for example, you can do things like all of a sudden you have this cash injection to better negotiate better terms with your manufacturers, lower costs, possibly to order things with economies of scale and like hire, uh, the right people maybe. And all those things might drive more revenue and therefore profitability. If you're doing it strategically with the

Speaker B: debt, let's dive deeper and then let's try to educate our listener about how did you manage the type of debt to grow your business? Because I know the starting point. Normally in the CPG and in your world, it's working capital. If you want to increase your revenue, you want to sell more, you need to build your inventory, but you won't get paid by your customer until later. So you need to have an upfront capital in order for you to purchase the inventory. So can you share a little bit More like, number one, what are the type of debt you have taken over the years that allow you to build a profitable business?

Speaker A: Mm. Yeah, I think working capital loans are definitely the one that we've gone to time and time again. We'll take one out, repay it, rinse, repeat the front. Anyone who's curious about where to start to identify, you know, what type of funding should you look at and also when do you know if you, if you need the cash? And I know that this experience might be more rare for many entrepreneurs and we would, like myself included, but if you ever find yourself in that rare moment where things actually feel kind of balanced, it's like there's a little bit of like, consistent cash coming in. You don't really need a loan. That's the time you start looking for a loan. Like so, so start there. Because trust, when I say it is way more difficult to be in a position of power to leverage the best terms and the best type of capital possible when you're at a place of, uh, like scarcity within the business, because that signals to the bank that there might be just a little bit more risk and therefore maybe higher interest or more difficult terms to, to work with. Right? So that's the first thing. Like try to take on a loan when you actually don't need it. As, ah, counterintuitive as that might seem. Because trust me, as we all know, we'll always need the cash at some point and it'll be nice for it to be there when you need it. So that's, that's the first thing. But the second part is the get very clear about what you need the cash for. So to your point, for the sake of round numbers, an example, let's say you have a retailer or a partnership opportunity and they want to issue a $100,000 purchase order again just for the sake of round numbers. But you know, they don't need that delivered till three months from now. And you also know they're not going to pay you until 60 days after you deliver it in three months from now. So next thing you know, you've got to invest in inventory today that you're not going to get a penny for until five months from now. So you get very clear on what you need it for. How can you leverage other areas of, um, your business to maximize what that working capital score beyond the po? So in that PO example, if I know they want these certain skus, how can I maybe order more than what's needed in that po, go back to manufacturer and say, okay, now that I'm ordering three to four times the amount that I normally do, what better pricing can you give me? What better terms can you get me? Right, so now you're hopefully through those economies of scale, you're, you're getting a better price and you're getting your cogs lower. So that's the first thing, the second thing that I like to do, especially if they're more like one off type of partnerships or bigger retailers and you're pricing it out if you can, and it's difficult, but try to pass some of that cost on to them, meaning work that into your numbers. Right. So whatever you're agreeing to sell it for, you know, wholesale price, maybe a bit less, whatever that looks like, try to bake in some of that interest of the loan that you're going to be paying out. You don't tell your retailer that, you don't tell your partner that. But the point is you come up with a mutually agreeable cost at the end of the day that you're going to charge them that can help offset ideally some of the cost of the debt that you're taking on in the first place. So that's another thing that I really try to do intentionally because again, like any, in uh, any way you're able to get really strategic about these debt facilities that you're taking on, hopefully it does put you in a position to make more money and actually be profitable.

Speaker B: That is very true because when you said that pass it on, it's part of your pricing because that is a direct cost to create your product. And I think that it's very smart because a lot of people forget. And then when I help clients who basically analyze their, their margin and then their cost of goods sold, what we always think about as, ah, a uh, direct cost to create our product, it's only like the material and the labor. But you forget the financing cost should be part of your direct costs and it should be built up, uh, and then incorporated into your pricing because if not, how can you be profitable? That is absolutely critical.

Speaker A: Exactly. And you're also like incepting a bit of like risk cost and risk mitigation too, because when you're baking that into your final cost that you're charging onto them, like the longer that you take to get paid from them, the more of a risk that is on your business. Right. So I think that that's really important too. And um, you know, on the same note, it's definitely worth trying to negotiate, you know, deposits and everything wherever you can with your partners. But that's, that's a whole other conversation.

Speaker B: The other critical area is really analyze your cash flow because if not, you don't know how much you really need. I think this is where, like forecasting is very important when you are planning to take on debt. It's forced you to think ahead and then really think about, okay, where do I want to be in the next 12 months, 24 months, and what type of investment do I need? And as a result, how much cash or how much loan do we need to apply in order to support the growth that we needed in the next few years? If you don't know how to analyze your cash flow, and then this is the financial literacy piece that you always believe in. Number one, you don't know how much you need and then you also don't know if you're going to be able to make the loan repayments.

Speaker A: Exactly. You don't want to put yourself in a vulnerable situation where let's say again, it's a hundred thousand dollar loan. And then that looks like I'm making this up. Let's say it's $3,000 a month in repayments back to your bank. Well, if, if you don't think you have enough cash to come in first place and uh, make a $3,000 a month payment plus all your other expenses, you're, you're putting yourself in a very risky position. So to your point, you really do need to analyze your cash flow for the short term and the long term.

Speaker B: Because if you are not able to pay your debt, it also doesn't look good on your balance sheet. We all know that there is this term we call a debt to equity ratio. And um, it's a critical ratio as you are building your business. Because you never know when you want to exit and then when you want to exit your business, really you want to exit in your own term and then you are able to get the right price for your business. After all, you put in like years, sweat and tears into the business and you really want to get a healthy exit instead of just like burnout exit

Speaker A: or frustration exit or a break even at best exit. Uh, yeah, no, you're right. I think sometimes as founders, and it's completely understandable, we just feel ingrained. Like if we do have a grip on our finances, it's prioritize the P and L prioritize that profit and loss, right? Because it's like on your profit and loss statement, you literally see your revenue minus your cogs, minus your expenses. Boom. Um, profit or loss. Right? And so, logically, founders gravitate towards that as the little bible business. But, uh, the balance sheet cannot be understated or overlooked. And I believe, personally, I don't learn this the hard way. It's not like I just, like, knew this out of gate. Trust me when I say I learned this the hard way. The balance sheet is arguably even more important than your profit and loss because in its essence, it's the health check of your company. It's the current health status and health check. And if you don't know how to read that health check and you don't know if it looks good or bad or if there's concerns or not, uh, you're going to be in a very difficult position, as you said, to plan that intentional exit. And the best example I can share a, uh, founder of mine with a smaller business. They had poured their blood, sweat and tears into their company for about five or six years, and they were profitable. They had a great piano. However, the balance sheet. And before I actually put the plot twisted, the balance sheet, this founder for their small business was offered about, I think, 7 or 800,000, like in cash essentially, to have the business purchased entirely from them. And for the founder at this time, they're like, that's perfect. That $800,000. That's great. It's what I need. It's a number that makes me feel good to start my next chapter. This is a great starting point. But then as things started to progress, obviously with the person who wanted to acquire, naturally, you know, they made clear, like, look, we got to clear off all your liabilities on your balance sheet first. So that means with this 800,000, you're paying off your own loans, you're paying off your own credit cards, you're paying off whatever taxes you owe cra, and whatever is left is basically cash in your pocket. Well, that $800,000 all of a sudden turned into less than 200,000 for that founder. And that's a huge difference because, again, the balance sheet is really the true representation of the health of the company at the end of the day.

Speaker B: Yeah, definitely. Definitely. And it's sad because your story, the story that you just share about the exit, it's common, believe it or not. It's very sad because when you putting years of your blood, sweat and tears. And then we know building a business is not easy. It's not easy at the end of the day if you left or exited the business because you feel like you had to, because you just frustrated, and because you don't understand your finances from the beginning. It's sad. As women founders, we really need to be able to be more aware, to educate ourselves more on how we can have a healthy exit. It doesn't matter though. It doesn't matter you're building a multi millions or not at some point, if you are thinking about exiting, that is not a year worth of work. It's decades sometimes. And throughout that decades, you need to build like the key drivers to build value of your business. And like it or not, financial performance is one of them. Right? Among other things.

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. It can put you in a more empowering position. Right. When you kind of look at your finances as a tool to claim agency over what your future looks like with your business. So definitely it's something that I had to kind of learn the hard way over the years, but it's something I would recommend. Any founder listening really try to dial that in and feel good about your finances and have a plan in that regard too.

Speaker B: So, Sheena, the type of debt financing that you did over the year, number one obviously is working capital. And then it could be like, I don't know, a line of credit, PO financing. What else is that? You had taken the type of debt financing that you had taken over the

Speaker A: years for the most part. But working capital can come, as you pointed out, in different forms. And so early on, back when I only had that $1,000 secured visa and no one else was give me loans, I was taking out loans with what some called B lenders. So these are non traditional institutions. They're usually private lenders. And one time I took a 23% interest loan with daily repayment rates because that was all I could get access to immediately at the time. Right. And I think some people would be horrified. Like, how could you take out, you know, a loan that has higher interest than a credit card? Well, I took it as a calculated risk. It was all I could access and it was what I needed at the time. So I've taken out different types of debt in that way. So from private lenders and traditional institutions like just general banks. But outside of that, like we've taken out, yeah. Line of credit, working capital. We've done PO financing. I'm trying to think what else that we've done that's pretty much like the broad scope of it. We've applied for grant funding in the past, but I think that's a little bit more unique. But there are a lot of incredible Canadian grant funding programs that are very worthwhile to look at as well now

Speaker B: I know that these. Basically you're trying to focus on three areas. Number one, you want to benefit the customers and because you are a B corp, you also care about the planet. The third one is benefiting women entrepreneurs, which I believe this third impact led you to create founders fund in 2019. Is that accurate?

Speaker A: Yeah, that's accurate. I created founders fund in 2019 which is our sister company at Tees that we own and operate. And Founders Fund is essentially a community, uh, invested in elevating the future success of ah, women entrepreneurs through funding education and grant mentorship. And we created this community in 2019 out of uh, the personal longing that I had when I started in 2013. As I mentioned, like I was a first time entrepreneur with no access to capital, you know, not great financial literacy. I also failed to mention that before I went to school hospitality, I was a business school dropout. Ironically before that in high school I did grade nine math three times before I passed like I had no business starting a business on paper. And I wished so much that I had a different set, the community that I could lean into when I started out to make my entrepreneurial journey. Just connect the dots easier, you know, because you can't Google what you don't know to Google in the first place. Right. And so that was really the catalyst of founders fund in 2019. And yeah, I'm proud to share that through our organization we've uh, raised and distributed over $250,000 today in the form of accessible mentorship educational events and uh, we funded over 15 Canadian women entrepreneurs.

Speaker B: So what type of education that you provided to this uh, Founders?

Speaker A: Yeah, so we have a deep focus on financial literacy. Again I think we've talked at length about how empowering that can be when you do kind of have like a solid foundation in that area. Mental health, especially in this like pandemic and post post pandemic era, the mental health challenges that women have been struggling, you know, disproportionately with, you know, taking on the burden of childcare or aging parents or just responsibilities in the home and taking a back seat on their businesses. And so mental health is really a big one as well. And then just general business growth tactics and strategies that can be applied across broad industries.

Speaker B: Was there a moment that you kind of just said, you know what, I just going to do it, I want to support other women and then I want to support them through a fun and I want to give them the opportunity to grow. Was there like a moment or a situation that kind of like Push you forward and make it happen.

Speaker A: There were a few little moments that led to the big moment. And really those little moments were leaning into what I call an entrepreneurial village. Right? That old saying, like, it takes a village, like in the family. Well, it takes a vil in entrepreneurship. And what I found over the years, like the more I started going out of my way to like find peer mentors who are on my level so that I had a safe person or safe space to connect when the days were really hard or when I was frustrated or when I wanted to just bounce ideas off into somebody who would get it, or when I had the audacity to just ask someone on LinkedIn who had 20 times the experience that I do. Hey, do you have time for like a 20 minute call? I love everything you've built and it's just this one thing. And like, I'd love to get your thoughts on the thing that I learned that founders inherently, we seem to all have in our DNA is to want to pay our successes and our experiences and our stories forward to really help the generation of entrepreneurs coming after us to connect the dots easier for them. And so that was really the moment I thought, oh, I don't know why I was so timid and so afraid of like reaching out to others for help for myself when it turns out there are so many people who do want to help. And so that was the capitalist of Founders Funding. It's really for founders by founders. Even though TEAS operates it, it was founded by an exceptional community of uh, founders who pay their experience forward in the form of mentorship or to be speakers at our educational events. And that's why Founders Fund so special and what it is today, it's really the founders who are behind it.

Speaker B: And this is not a not for profit. Right? It's a profit type of fund. Yeah.

Speaker A: That was important for us to be structured as a social, for profit social enterprise essentially because we knew that it's important to walk this talk like we do at teas. And so it was the same with Founders Fund. Like we don't, we don't believe in the idea that it's up to government alone to solve our social challenges, especially when it comes to entrepreneurship that uh, we believe that business is built for purpose and built for profit can do both of those things in parallel. And so we really wanted to set that example with both TEAS and Founders Fund.

Speaker B: Have you ever give some thought about the long term exit strategy for teas?

Speaker A: It's so interesting. Like I feel like founders are Constantly asked, what's your exit plan? What's your exit strategy? And I know founders who are asked that in their first year. And we are both just kind of like, that's a strange question, like you're just getting started. How can you think about the exit? So I find it's interesting. I think it's necessary to think about the future, obviously, and what an exit could look like. Because once you have that in your mind, then you can create an architect, the work back, plan to get there. Right. And it kind of becomes a North Star for your business. But with tease, I don't plan to solely, uh, own it for the rest of my life. I just know that it's what's made sense. For now, my exit looks like partnering with people who have an aligned vision and strategy to carry the legacy into its next era. And hopefully I can still be a part of that, uh, as long as possible.

Speaker B: That makes sense given what you have built to date. And I never asked you this though. Why did you stay at shopify for 8 years if your business has been so profitable from the beginning, but you stay until what, this was like seven figures even?

Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah. We were doing over a million in revenue for a few years before I launched Shopify.

Speaker B: So why is that? What is the reason?

Speaker A: First of all, I do not subscribe to this concept of, um, you have to be all in on your business in order for it to grow or be taken seriously. I think that is dangerous advice that entrepreneurs are often given. I believe in slow, steady, sustainable growth. I believe in pairing your entrepreneurial growth with a job and or career that's aligned with your business goals. In my case, I mean, let's be real, Shopify was the best e commerce education I could have ever dreamed of. Right. In that way. I also. This is going to be a spicy opinion. I believe that most businesses don't need their founders full time. I really do. Like, especially in the first, like early years. Because the reality is like when you're just kind of building it, getting it off the ground, it's not something that is required of you 24 7. I know we like to over glamorize a lot of like this type of entrepreneurial, um, culture out there. But if you really think that your business needs you full time, you're not investing your time in the right places, you're not investing in delegation, uh, and if you're not investing in delegation and success planning in certain areas of your business, you're not growing, you're staying stagnant and you're holding your growth back. And so that was important for me. You know, like, I wanted to hire other people, um, first and really have other areas of the business that could be managed without me if I fell off the face of the planet. Because that's how I knew we were growing, we were scaling. And it was only then when Teas was able to run with a solid team, uh, and we started to, to grow significantly, that I was ready to put in my full focus on Teas. And it's great because now, you know, even now, like, I look at the team that we have today and several have been with us for two years now because I've had to juggle a full time job. At the same time, they have been by design hired to be executives of their department within the business. Right. They have been hired to be business owners of their department. So my operations manager, she owns that. Uh, I am not micromanaging her. Like, she knows that area inside and out marketing is the same, right? And so that's how you grow a business. I know it's very long winded, but for me it just made sense to say at shopify and hire the right people to help grow the business until we started to reach a point in growth where, okay, I'm going to come in exclusively, focus on this to help bring everything we've built to the next level. Work on the business instead of in the business. Right.

Speaker B: You know, that is spicy, Sheena.

Speaker A: I know people are going to come for me, but.

Speaker B: But it's interesting you said that because yesterday I was just uh, like watching Dragon's Den episode and this founder was working, still working with the government and then she didn't want to leave her job yet. Right? But she's asking for an investment. And you are absolutely right when you said it's a common expectation if you are an entrepreneur, you have to go all in. But, uh, the reasoning that you just gave me, it makes sense. It's interesting what you said, because there are several key driver when you want to build value in your business. It's not only about financial performance. The other thing, it's about operational freedom. What that means is exactly what you just share, that you want to build a team. If something happened to you, the business can continue to run without you. Or if you want to take maternity leave, you can do it. Right? So honestly, it's very smart.

Speaker A: And I would push back on the Dragons because I've seen them tell people like, oh, you're still at your job. Like, I would love to push back on Dragons and just say, shouldn't you actually celebrate this founder for being incredibly responsible and resourceful? Like not taking a full time paycheck out of the company and instead hiring contractors in certain areas or freelancers or a part time team member and then eventually a full time person, like, isn't that a more responsible way to grow a business? Because when people are taking salaries out of their own business, like that's a scary place. And you almost feel guilty, right? You feel guilty. It's like, oh, the more I take out of my business for a salary to pay my bills and pay for the roof over my head, it's less for the business. And that scarcity mindset as a founder can also be terrifying. But I started by hiring, uh, freelancers, contractors part time, then full time. Right. And I was paying them before I paid myself because my needs were taken care of. I had a secure paycheck at the end of the day.

Speaker B: And that's really smart. Actually, I never heard that strategy. So thank you for sharing that. I'm glad that I asked the question because I was curious about that. I'm like, why she didn't leave her job before. But that's a really great strategy. So, Sheena, if you look back from the beginning of your journey until now, what is your proudest moment in your impact journey?

Speaker A: Honestly, the proudest moment is the team that I've created today. And I know that that probably sounds cliche, but collectively we're pretty exceptional. Like we're five people on a good day. Like how we have teas and over 700 retail stores across Canada in the U.S. like how we've been on Dragons Den, the View, the Ellen show, soon QVC launching and whole food. Like, man, we've just done so many incredible cool things for a small team. But it's because the team that we have, they are so mighty and powerful and they are treated and trusted and show up as owners, business owners of their own domain. And so that is really what I'm most proudest of because I think when we talk about empowering people, empowering women, and our team just happens to be all women, that is empowerment at its core is, you know, really supporting the people around you to have what they need to show up as their, their best selves to drive themselves forward and drive the business forward.

Speaker B: You just crushed another myth out there where people are saying, if you are building a multimillion dollar business, that means you need to have a lot of people. You have what, five, six, including yourself.

Speaker A: Yeah. And you are running five, including me right now. Yeah, see, we're really. Yeah. One of them is on matlie, and actually one of them's done that leave. So four. So there you go.

Speaker B: See? Go. And then you're running a multimillion dollar business and a profitable business. You're doing something right. So anyway, where can people find you, Sheena?

Speaker A: Yes. So you can find us, uh, @teest.com if you want to connect with me personally. You can find me on LinkedIn Sheena Brady, or you can just find me on Instagram at Sheena Brady.

Speaker B: Sheena, thank you so much for being here. I appreciate all the story and the transparency that you share. Thank you.

Speaker A: My pleasure, Christina. Thank you for having me.

Speaker B: And that's bring us, uh, to the end of another episode. Thank you so much for listening to another episode of her CEO Journey, the business finance podcast for mission driven women entrepreneurs. When you are ready to grow to the next level and seeking a, uh, finance team and a fractional CFO who are all in on your mission and can help you maximize profit to make a bigger social impact, connect with us at, uh, the profitreimagine.com. let's chat.