Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Mandy Nagel. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Mandy, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

I Thought of You was founded by Mandy Nagel after a visit to a small market in Indonesia led her to meet Yulia, a local woman who made and sold jewelry to support her family. Nagel was impressed with the beauty and craftsmanship of the styles for sale and purchased many pieces to bring home with her to the US. After learning that more than half of this population lives on less than $2USD per day, and that more than 80 million Indonesian children live in poverty, she felt compelled to do something more but hadn’t yet identified what that could be.

Mandy returned to the US where she worked an office job. She showed off these souvenirs to friends and family who were equally fascinated with the details and artistry. As the compliments on these styles continued, she put a piece up for sale online, then another, and then another. They sold instantly. These pieces she purchased for herself were paving the way to create a fashion brand for good.

In 2014, I Thought of You officially opened its virtual doors. Mandy traveled back to Indonesia often to work with Yulia to craft styles that were on-trend with colors and styles popular in the US. What resulted was a collection of modern Fair Trade accessories that supported a family a world away.

Today, Mandy and her team continue to work with Yulia, who has expanded her business to hire more artisans to keep up with customer demand. I Thought of You now also works with many artisan groups each in 9 more countries as well as 3 all-women maker groups here in the US.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Founded in 2013 by Mandy Nagel, I Thought of You began as a means to sell Fair Trade products that are not only beautiful but also have a beautiful stories behind them.

These apparel, accessory, and jewelry styles are made from upcycled or eco-friendly materials and transform lives in a real way by offering sustainable income opportunities for people in developing countries. The artisans who craft these styles are inspiring women who have found steady and rewarding work through this sustainable venture.

Nagel began a career in design and marketing, working with some of the world’s best brands including Apple, Inc., Dunkin Donuts, Febreze, Microsoft, Harry Potter, Warner Bros. Pictures, and Xbox. Although this path helped grow her skillset and provided exciting challenges, this corporate path didn’t lend itself to a sense of fulfillment.

Nagel longed to use her skills to influence for the better, bring positive change, and leave a lasting mark. After a coincidental friendship formed while traveling in Indonesia, I Thought of You was born.

Nagel’s small and nimble US team now works with hundreds of artisans in 9 countries. There has been an incredibly positive response from our customers towards the mission of using their dollars and fashion to create a lasting impact.

Let’s move on to buying businesses – can you talk to us about your experience with business acquisitions?

Slowing retail sales. Supply chain issues. Lack of resources. Soaring shipping costs. Not enough employees. These are real issues facing every small business right now. And the sad truth is that even business with the best of intentions may not survive these hardships.

Most companies make purchases on “terms” where the manufacturer sends the products and the company pays for it later. What happens when a company places an order and then can’t pay for it? Usually they go out of business and the manufacturer has to absorb that loss. But what happens when a small business with a good mission can’t pay for the items they ordered from makers in developing countries? This can mean literal devastation for the makers (and sometimes even the whole village) who have invested their own funds into the materials and paying the workers before it’s shipped to the business buyer. It means families may go without food, without the ability to pay for school, and may even lose their homes.

Last year we learned that of a few brands with a similar mission to ours found themselves in this situation, and thinking of the sweet makers who would be caught in the middle of this literally kept us up at night. As a team, we decided to step in and make it right. We purchased the inventory and have integrated those pieces into our next launches. Some of the brands who originally made these orders have since gone out of business while some are staying open but are focusing on restructuring, but our hearts and minds can rest easy knowing that hardworking people in India (who we now are so proud to call “our” makers!) aren’t going without.

Did we budget for this? No. Could we know this was happening without doing something about it? Absolutely not. The Fair Trade community reaches far beyond brands—it’s a mission to do good whenever we have the ability to.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

2022 was a whirlwind year for me (I’m sure many of you can relate). I always find it’s helpful to have a look back at what happened—good and bad—to better plan for the future.

On a personal level I was distracted more in 2022 than ever before; I had my first baby in April and the uncertainty of the world economy really wore on me the second half of the year. We have a lot of safety nets as citizens in the US, I’ve never worried about going hungry even if our business should completely fail, but our partners in Indonesia, India, Guatemala, Peru, Colombia, and the Philippines often can’t rely on their governments taking care of their basic needs if work dries up. Not only that, our partners also have to find a way to pay for a lot of the luxuries many of us take for grated—including basic public schooling for their children.

This is a concern that’s been on my mind from the moment we opened our doors. I don’t take the commitment we give to our makers lightly—it’s imperative we follow through on all promises made because if we don’t it would literally mean bellies going to bed hungry.

When the economy slows we take the opportunity to inspect every facet of our business to make sure we can ride it out and can support our makers through the unique hardships in their own countries. Sometimes that means giving them a head’s up that our next order might be a bit smaller than usual, sometimes it means we encourage them to take our designs in a different direction (like when we began relying more on upcycled materials at the beginning of Covid), and sometimes that means asking what basic necessities they truly needso we can provide those needs for them, even at a distance.

As we look into how our business will evolve this year I have two main areas of focus: show and tell. I want to show you what we’re doing and tell the story of how we’re doing it. That’s it. It seems simple but I feel like we may have lost that in 2022. I hope you take a moment to follow us and supporting what we’re doing (even if that’s just being our cheerleader on social media or telling friends about us—we appreciate that more than you know!) so we can grow despite uncertain times.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://ithoughtofyou.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ithoughtofyouxo
• Facebook: https://www.instagram.com/ithoughtofyouxo
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChJquTEPNFPzhwuc0TBf5rA
• Other: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ecoempowered https://www.pinterest.com/ithoughtofyouxo https://www.tiktok.com/@ithoughtofyouxo