Serial Entrepreneurism and Financial Feminism with Shelley Kuipers
THE RICHARD DRI PODCAST
Shelley Kuipers, Co-Founder and C0-CEO of The 51, joins me for today’s episode. Shelley represents the truest form of the serial entrepreneur as she envisions new ideas, starts businesses based on them, foregoes salary, works without a safety net while assuming all the financial risks, and repeats this process over and over again. She has been involved with numerous businesses over the year, and her current venture, The 51, is a platform dedicated to increasing female impact upon the economy by connecting women with capital to women with business ideas.
In our conversation, Shelley shares the meaning behind ‘The 51’ and the concept of financial feminism, as well as The 51’s objective, marketing approach, community, investments, and investment committee. She also reviews The 51’s venture capital fund, sheds some light on her family office and how it compares to The 51, and shares her experiences with failure and coming back over the years. Shelley concludes the episode by recounting the lessons she has learned, her plans for the future, and her extremely valuable entrepreneurial advice.
LISTEN TO THE PODCAST – DOWNLOAD THE TRANSCRIPT
Highlights:
- Financial feminism is a movement to drive equality for women in money
- At The 51, they try to break down the work that they’re doing into consumable experiences, consumable content, highly community-driven, and try to put role models at the center of it
- Shelley’s family office began with a high risk investment, has grown over the years, and is made up of early stage investing
- Shelley envisions The 51 has becoming a dominant player in financial services in servicing women in the next five years
- She sees the time we’re in now as an extraordinary opportunity for innovation and for women to really get involved in what’s going on and fully participate in Canada’s economy
Quotes:
“We self-identify as community members at The 51 as financial feminists.”
“It’s largely been creating a brand that’s very attractive, very accessible, and is creating an experience for participation.”
“We’re also patient investors and want to be super strategic about the companies that we’re investing in and how we’re deploying this capital.”
“We give back to the community. We invest a ton in entrepreneurs and coaching and mentoring and championing.”
“I think utilizing our network and really getting reinforcement that the entrepreneur has aligned values with our value system I think is really important and it’s something that we do.”
“Curiosity drives confidence.”
“I think Canada could look very different if women were fully participating.”
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Investing and Entrepreneurship with Dooma Wendschuh
Jeff Adamson Co-Founder of SkipTheDishes on Disrupting the Financial Sector