We were lucky to catch up with Laurel Mintz recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Laurel thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Any thoughts around creating more inclusive workplaces?

At my first company Elevate My Brand, our team is and has been 100% diverse since day 1. Because that’s always been part of our core value set, I am extremely clear that in order to shape the culture of any company, inclusivity, communication and diversity have to be core tenants of the leadership of the team before it can trickle down. It’s also one of the many reasons we launched our second firm, Fabric VC so that we ca further impact diverse-led businesses who only receive 2% of venture dollars but who return on average at a 25% higher return rate. It’s this discrepancy that we hope to shift with our work and by setting an example both on the services and funding side of the table. Our goal is to show that you can do good and do well and that they are not mutually exclusive end games.

Laurel, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

At Elevate My Brand (EMB), we exercise a strategic digital and experiential marketing methodology that provides innovative, creative marketing solutions. Our team specializes in elevating both business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) brands in garnering the attention and exposure they deserve within their niche markets, regardless of their size or stage of operational growth. As an award-winning WBENC certified agency, it’s our mission to develop and execute perfectly tailored marketing initiatives for brands who share our values, our vision and our passions.

Fabric’s mission is to weave together diverse founders with the funding they need and deserve. Our experience matched with our inspiring diverse-run portfolio companies will elevate and support the need for diversity, equity and inclusion in fundraising. Doing great things together by investing in companies doing great things in the world.

The time is now.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

I sat quietly in my dad’s office chair behind his huge mahogany desk that dwarfed me. I could smell the Otis Spunkmeyer cookies that we baked in store daily to entice people to buy (honestly I haven’t been able to look at a chocolate chip cookie the same way since), and I stared down at a terrible cup of coffee hoping it would wake me up from this living nightmare. As I sat there, I thought to myself, “what the hell am I doing here?” And I expected that any second, someone would walk in, laugh at this silly little girl sitting behind daddy’s giant desk, and kick me out…talk about imposter syndrome.

That was me at 26 when my father asked me to step in as interim CEO of a national furniture brand that some of you probably have in your house right now. I remember the moment he asked me to do it. At that time in my life, I was ready to take on the world. I had just graduated from law school and business school and had moved back from the east coast (the snow is not for me). I was living with my parents while I figured out my next big move. Things had been oddly tense the days prior, and then, one sunny summer day, my parents told me we needed to talk (never a good sign). I remember walking into their bedroom with a pit in my stomach the size of a grapefruit. I knew that something was horribly wrong. My dad was sitting in his bed, already weak from the advanced cancer that was ravaging his body. My mom, always his champion, was sitting calmly next to him, holding his hand, and even though my heart was in my throat, I asked, “what do you need me to do?” As the oldest of 2 girls, it was my natural reaction. It was always my lot to step up and be the responsible one, and now was no exception. I didn’t even think twice.

I had no idea that my dad was going to literally hand over the keys to a castle he’d built for the past 30 years. Without hesitation I took them, told them I was going out, drove around the corner and cried until there was no more liquid left in my body.

Even though I had no idea how to run a company or what the hell a back rail was, I was all in to make sure my family could survive financially and emotionally. And even though I was terrified, I never hesitated, and I still don’t to this day. I knew whatever was going to be thrown my way I could handle (ah the joys of being 26 and thinking you have all the answers). Honestly sometimes I still think I do.

Over the last decade plus of running my agency, I’ve had clarity on a few things 1. who I am, why I’ve chosen this career and why I’ve been put on this planet 2. that we all think we know who we are and what path we’re supposed to be on and 3. That the universe has its own ideas.

I’m proud to say that he survived and now, after running an agency for 15 years and launching my first venture fund, I am truly where I’m supposed to be in my life.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I had to unlearn that fitting in wasn’t for me and that by standing out I could have a much larger impact on my clients and my community.

But when you have a J.D., M.B.A and you come from a Jewish family, you’re either a doctor or a lawyer, there’s really no other option (to this day my mother still introduces me to her friends as my daughter the lawyer. I remember so vividly putting on those boring colorless suits to interview, crushing the interviews, and feeling like shit walking out of HR’s drab offices with, you guessed it, mahogany desks as far as the eye could see. And even though I thought it was what I wanted, every time the phone rang, I would jump, and every time I got one of those big 6 figure offers that should have made me deliriously happy, I became physically and viscerally nauseous. Meanwhile, my parents were ecstatic. They had clearly raised me right because I was going to be a big-time lawyer.

After the second or third time this happened, I had to stop and really take notice instead of just continuing to go through the motions. What became clear to me was that every fiber of my being was telling me that this was no longer my path. At first, I tried to ignore it, after all, that’s what I was supposed to be doing with my education, but time and again my body told me NO, and finally, after finishing my 4th bottle of bright pink pepto bismal, I decided to listen. The body is an amazing intuitive tool that hasn’t steered my wrong since, once I finally decided to tune in.

And that’s ultimately how I came to launch my own agency, by realizing that fitting in and doing what I was supposed to do, actually wasn’t for me.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.fabricvc.com/ https://www.elevatemybrand.com/
• Instagram: @laurelmintz @fabricventure @elevatemybrandla
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurel-mintz/