We were lucky to catch up with Cat Perez and Marianna Di Regolo recently and have shared our conversation below.

Cat / Marianna, appreciate you joining us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

Famm was born out of two personal pain points:

1) Not having an easy and efficient way to find gender-affirming apparel brands to shop from ( I shopped from the same 4 brands for years)
2) Experiencing the lack of autonomy, agency, impact as a queer professional, even in the highest levels throughout my career, drove me to want to bring more visibility to the amazing companies by LGBTQ+ founders in order to drive more business, support and visibility.

This idea came to my wife and I two years ago, but we were working full time jobs and didn’t have the capacity to pursue it. May 2023, a chapter closed for me at the startup where I was Cofounder / Chief of Product for 8 years, scaling that team from 7 to 200 full-time employees and building the leading private marketplace for ACA enrollment (enrolling over 15M people in subsidized health coverage by the time I left). We decided to build Famm the way we wanted to see it done – much more visual, easy to use, focused on e-commerce brands (online shopping) and centered on the founder who started the business.

We believed that this could work because although there were/are many directories, not many of them are visual, centered on UX, and focus on the founder’s story and journey rather than what they are selling. When we shop, we aren’t just looking to buy a product, we are supporting someone’s brand and there is always a human with a story and a why behind that brand. Getting older, and our exposure to the ongoing anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, hate crimes and violence have all contributed to intentional spending – we want our queer dollars to go to queer businesses!

Cat / Marianna, 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?

I (Cat) have a professional background in product and design, specifically in tech for almost 20 years. My wife and cofounder, Marianna has a background in marketing and entrepreneurship for the last 15 years. Together we have worked for startups in tech, fortune 500s, and started our own businesses centered around community building and healthcare.

Famm is a website where you can easily discover LGBTQ+ owned e-commerce brands (that sell products online) and LGBTQ+ service providers (who primarily offer virtual services). We take a highly visual approach with a focus on user experience. We also care deeply about sharing the stories of the founders behind the brands because we believe in sharing information, learnings, and resources. We are stronger together versus taking a scarcity mindset approach. We have taken an intersectional approach to building Famm from the get-go by allowing site visitors to find BIPOC folks on heyfamm.com. Given our lived experience as queer POC (Cat is Puerto Rican / Korean and Marianna is Iraqi), making sure that we are lifting up voices of BIPOC and marginalized queer folks and building features that can help bring them immediate visibility and support is key.

From the beginning, we have built Famm with an intersectional perspective, allowing site visitors to find BIPOC individuals on HeyFamm.com. Given our lived experiences as queer POC (Cat is Puerto Rican/Korean and Marianna is Iraqi), we are dedicated to amplifying the voices of BIPOC and marginalized queer folks and building features that can help bring them immediate visibility and support.

In one year, we have added over 350 e-commerce brands across 11 categories (apparel, food & beverage, beauty, home goods, plus more), have hand-picked over 325 curated products (Famm faves) across these brands, and have created a marketplace of ~80 service providers across 23 categories (marketing, financial, legal, design, health & wellness, tarot, DEI, plus more). We have also shared the stories of over 50 entrepreneurs and professionals, and we are continuing to grow with over 10,000 people using Famm.

All of this has led to the next evolution of Famm; Famm Connect – the first mobile app for queer professional networking.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

Yes, this is applicable today. When my 8-year career as a product and design leader came to a close in May 2023, I had a choice: search for another job or take a chance on myself and pursue the vision we wanted to bring to life from our perspective. We chose to pursue Famm mainly because of the climate around anti-LGBTQ+ legislation. My wife and I decided to give ourselves the rest of the year to gain some traction, planning to reevaluate this past January, 2024. However, I did return to the interview scene, looking for a full-time job while also working on this project. This slowed down progress drastically, and I couldn’t find anything that felt truly exciting or inspiring. So, we both continued focusing on Famm.

Also, during our interactions with entrepreneurs and professionals, we noticed a natural desire for professional connections. This realization led to our current addition: Famm Connect. Famm Connect is the first-of-its-kind mobile app for queer professional networking, set to launch later this year. We believe this app could be a game-changer, connecting LGBTQ+ individuals looking to grow in their careers, collaborate, connect, partner, mentor, and more in a truly intentional space.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

One lesson I had to unlearn was the belief that speed is synonymous with success. Early in my career, I equated working quickly with being productive and effective. This mindset was reinforced by the fast-paced environments like startups in tech, where being first to market was everything.

I often find myself deferring back to this belief, but I’ve realized that building Famm and now Famm Connect—which is meant to be an intentional, empowering, and safe space for LGBTQ+ folks—requires slowing down and being super mindful to create impactful solutions for our community. This means spending time talking to 100 business owners and professionals to understand their needs and how we can help them achieve their professional and/or business goals. It takes time and intention, and we’ve learned to prioritize that over being the ‘first’ to market, getting all the press hits, or having 50k followers on Instagram. None of that matters if you don’t have engaged people who truly value your solution because it makes their lives better.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.heyfamm.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hey_famm/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/heyfamm/
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@hey_famm?lang=en
  https://www.threads.net/@hey_famm

Image Credits

Photos by Safe Space Photos with the Famm backdrop
https://www.heyfamm.com/services/safe-spaces-photo