{"id":5048,"date":"2021-05-19T06:10:00","date_gmt":"2021-05-18T20:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/the-exit-podcast-being-a-female-founder-with-a-passion-for-grit-with-kate-nowlan\/"},"modified":"2021-09-02T17:19:15","modified_gmt":"2021-09-02T07:19:15","slug":"the-exit-podcast-being-a-female-founder-with-a-passion-for-grit-with-kate-nowlan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/the-exit-podcast-being-a-female-founder-with-a-passion-for-grit-with-kate-nowlan\/","title":{"rendered":"The Exit Podcast &#8211; Being A Female Founder with a Passion for Grit with Kate Nowlan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-listen-on-apple-podcasts\"><a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/being-female-founder-passion-for-grit-kate-nowlan\/id1532346146?i=1000518991272\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\"><strong>Listen on Apple Podcasts<\/strong><\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-listen-on-spotify\"><a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/episode\/6l0adXoFnieoNRIq9E9h2i\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\"><strong>Listen on Spotify<\/strong><\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-listen-on-google-podcasts\"><a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.google.com\/feed\/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5zb3VuZGNsb3VkLmNvbS91c2Vycy9zb3VuZGNsb3VkOnVzZXJzOjg4MjY1MjIyOC9zb3VuZHMucnNz\/episode\/dGFnOnNvdW5kY2xvdWQsMjAxMDp0cmFja3MvMTAzMjIwNTkzOQ?sa=X&amp;ved=0CAUQkfYCahcKEwiQqpCtgtDwAhUAAAAAHQAAAAAQCA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\"><strong>Listen on Google Podcasts<\/strong><\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<iframe width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" allow=\"autoplay\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=https%3A\/\/api.soundcloud.com\/tracks\/1032205939&#038;color=%23ff5500&#038;auto_play=false&#038;hide_related=false&#038;show_comments=true&#038;show_user=true&#038;show_reposts=false&#038;show_teaser=true\"><\/iframe><div style=\"font-size: 10px; color: #cccccc;line-break: anywhere;word-break: normal;overflow: hidden;white-space: nowrap;text-overflow: ellipsis; font-family: Interstate,Lucida Grande,Lucida Sans Unicode,Lucida Sans,Garuda,Verdana,Tahoma,sans-serif;font-weight: 100;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/theexitpodcast\" title=\"The Exit - Presented By Flippa\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Exit &#8211; Presented By Flippa<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/theexitpodcast\/ep033\" title=\"Being A Female Founder with a Passion for Grit with Kate Nowlan\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Being A Female Founder with a Passion for Grit with Kate Nowlan<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Today we\u2019re talking with Kate Nowlan, co-founder of women&#8217;s athletic apparel company Graced By Grit. Kate always had the traits of an entrepreneur, always finding ways to improve things, always with a side hustle, but she didn\u2019t consider herself an entrepreneur until she started Grace By Grit. She goes over how the company came about, how they met the acquiring company, and how the acquisition happened. She also shares the realities of starting an e-commerce company, building a brand, and the importance of a brand. Listen in to hear how she is encouraging and helping other women to get involved in business and entrepreneurship.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-becoming-an-entrepreneur\"><strong>Becoming An Entrepreneur&nbsp;<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Like a true entrepreneur, Kate was always finding things that were missing and starting programs. For instance, she noticed there wasn\u2019t a great swimming program for her daughter, and so she started one. Kate was a triathlete but noticed there wasn\u2019t a great master swimming class, so she started one. Kate was great at organization, and so she started an organizing company called Absolutely Organized, but she still didn\u2019t see herself as an entrepreneur. When she moved to California in 2008 she again found herself searching for a swim program for her daughter. While asking around about it, she discovered a center that was looking for someone to run just that, and so she came aboard. While working the swim program she noticed holes in the company&#8217;s billing software, so she set out to improve it and ended up running the whole office. Kate had also started a women&#8217;s running group and while training one woman they started to discuss what was missing in women\u2019s athletic apparel. The woman said they should start their own apparel company, but Kate still didn\u2019t believe she was an entrepreneur. A few years later when the office work was no longer fulfilling to her, she reached back out and the two women started Grace By Grit. Kate finally decided that she was in fact an entrepreneur.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-relationships-and-resources\"><strong>Relationships And Resources<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>With all the great relationships she already had in the athletic world, Kate sought out help to understand the athletic apparel market. Her co-founder\u2019s husband happened to run a men\u2019s athletic apparel company and Kate thought they could team up together. The company wasn\u2019t interested in teaming up as they were looking at their own exit but offered the two women many great resources. Kate and her co-founder put in $30,000 for branding and initial designs, which took about three months. They knew to appeal to women they needed an authentic narrative. While reaching out to her friends for help she realized they all shared a common thread of grittiness. They\u2019d all overcome big things that defined them and gave them grace. Right then Kate knew the storytelling component needed to be around women\u2019s gritty moments that brought grace. When the company finally launched a year later, they hit the ground running. For four years they scaled the business, always knowing they wanted to exit in five years.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-female-founders\"><strong>Female Founders<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>As female founders, they found it hard to raise capital. Always chasing the money, they knew to be taken seriously they needed to hit ten million in revenue but had a hard time doing that without the capital. While at a conference looking for funding they ran into the CEO of a men\u2019s athletic apparel company, Hylete. Kate thought a women\u2019s line would be a great compliment to their company, and so she drafted a deal. The CEO initially said no because he thought they already had great ideas, they just needed to focus on them more. Kate knew they needed a woman&#8217;s touch to make it happen, and so she didn\u2019t take no for an answer. Kate restructured the deal, and they ultimately settled on an asset deal. While there was no specific requirement for Kate to stay on for any amount of time, she and four other employees continued on with the day-to-day of Graced By Grit. Kate maintained this position for almost two years before she dropped the reins and became a board member. Part of the deal was that Kate wanted to continue her work of teaching young girls about grit and how to cultivate it in themselves. Graced By Grit Foundation was established with Hylete funding scholarships.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-looking-for-an-exit\"><strong>Looking For An Exit<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Kate&#8217;s co-founder had been helping companies to raise money and figure out an exit, so she had a lot of experience with the process. While it wasn\u2019t a shock that they wanted to sell as it was written into their business plan, there were a lot of ups and downs. They had an initial push for crowdfunding as many women were looking for ways to get involved in the company. They also had ideas of merging with other female-run companies but found that wasn\u2019t truly what they were looking for. Finally, they decided they needed to get together with someone that had a strong men&#8217;s line where they could become the women\u2019s counterpart. A few deals fell through before they found Hylete, but Kate knew they had a great product, so she never gave up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-knowing-what-you-know-now-what-would-you-tell-yourself-ten-years-ago\"><strong>Knowing What You Know Now What Would You Tell Yourself Ten Years Ago?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Kate says she would simply tell herself to listen to her gut. Whether it was with a hiring decision or a product design, there are many times Kate wishes she would\u2019ve listened to her gut. She says women have an innate gut feeling, we need to learn to listen to and trust it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-where-to-learn-more\"><strong>Where To Learn More<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Kate can be found on LinkedIn where she\u2019ll soon be launching a new online workshop called Face Your Grace that will help women entrepreneurs with things like making a business plan, marketing strategy, and how to raise capital.\u00a0 You can also check out the scholarship foundation at gracedbygritfoundation.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Listen on Apple Podcasts Listen on Spotify Listen on Google Podcasts The Exit &#8211; Presented By Flippa \u00b7 Being A Female Founder with a Passion for Grit with Kate Nowlan Today we\u2019re talking with Kate Nowlan, co-founder of women&#8217;s athletic apparel company Graced By Grit. Kate always had the traits of an entrepreneur, always finding [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":130,"featured_media":2422,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","content-type":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"dipi_cpt_category":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5048"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/130"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5048"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5048\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2422"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5048"},{"taxonomy":"dipi_cpt_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/dipi_cpt_category?post=5048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}