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

Hi Kathleen, thanks for joining us today. Alright, so you had your idea and then what happened? Can you walk us through the story of how you went from just an idea to executing on the idea

When it comes to formulating and later founding PEPPER Magazine, it was definitely not a cake walk and there was no linear “from A to B” path to getting to where we are now. Imagine coming out of the Pandemic and the financial aftermath of it with your current streams of income not cutting it and having no particular plan B—that’s where I was January 2022.

As an intuitive life coach and creative consultant, the economy made it so that most folks weren’t able to afford coaching and creative work. I knew I had to quickly develop my own alternative income by creating something relevant, something that did not currently exist in my part of the US, and simultaneously something strongly desired with a humanitarian baseline. Publishing is what I know. Journalism, photography, storytelling and creative design are what I’m good at. But I’d never had to create a full magazine from the ground up—literally from a blank page to 230 fully formatted pages of highly visual and wordy essays—in one month.

So I sat down with a pen and notebook and began to brainstorm. I started by listing everything I wanted the magazine to be and everything I wanted to stay away from. From there, I constructed a more formulated outline of what I’d need to make it real. Next, I developed a “timeline” to guide me through what next steps to take. Because I’m a visually creative artist, I started with the design, trusting the rest would follow.

Immediately after solidifying my design, I broke the golden rule. I publicly released and announced that PEPPER Magazine was coming. This is a giant no no in the industry because often plans or funding fail, so the rule is you don’t show your cards until you have everything ready and in place. I blatantly disregarded this, and I did so intentionally. I knew myself well enough to know that the moment the work became tedious or too challenging, I’d ADHD my way out of it. The only way to force myself to stick to it was to create public accountability. I’ve said it out loud, I’ve shown it and people love it, they want to see more…so I better not drop the ball.

From that point forward, it was go, go, go. I juggled gathering stories, pulling from my archives, photographing places and people, getting my DBA, networking, etc… It has been a massive roller coaster which I set in motion the moment I announced PEPPER with nothing more than notebook paper to back it up. And I don’t regret it for even a moment.

By our fifth issue, we’d won Magazine of the Year at the Texas Fashion Industry Awards. We had cultivated a firm following of creatives and professionals, were already working on our first docuseries (something I originally never thought possible), and had a fully functional media department. Now, with issue 8 coming out shortly, we’re kicking off 2023 strong with the soft theme “DO BIG THINGS”. This is no irony as one year later, PEPPER Magazine has gone from just a lofty idea to a tangible and impactful global publication with an international staff and more readers by the day.

Kathleen, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I’ve been hyper fixated on photojournalism since middle school. Growing up as quirky undiagnosed autistic creative kid in the 90’s was hard. Social dynamics were harsh and I found carrying my camera around with me became like a security blanket, in a way. It made it easier for me to talk to peers, to engage socially, albeit awkwardly. I decided this was what I wanted to do in life—to capture things visually that maybe others missed, to write about things most people don’t think about, even to illustrate and create visual artwork around that storytelling.

After graduating, I spent the next few years juggling my talents and honing them in ways that provided supplemental, and later a lucrative income. I illustrated and sold art when I could, I provided photography services for bands and restaurants and designers and even families, and I wrote here and there for local independent publications. I even began modeling which is not something I had ever anticipated.

By my thirties, I was a work from home mother at which time life coaching came into play. I was happy to finally put my working knowledge of psychology to use since it had been a consistent side study (one of my niche interests) from childhood forward. I didn’t realize through all of these accumulated skill sets and professional experience I was actually building myself into the competent CEO & editor in chief I’d later become at the age of 40.

As for PEPPER Magazine…
“We are a mirror—our aim is to show the world how beautiful we ALL are.
Every flaw, every scar, every smile that dares to gleam even through the darkness.

Let’s keep on shining our lights…
Let’s make it count.”

This has been the way I’ve described our purpose from day one. We are an INCLUSIVE global publishing firm with an international staff.
[ The United States / United Kingdom / Spain / Africa ]

We place heavy emphasis upon the underlying human story in every subject we cover.  A journalistic collection of intimate editorial biographies, rich with creative and documentary imagery.

Our articles run like mini biographies. It’s one of the things that sets us apart. Another important difference is that we practice what I call “compassionate journalism”. You’ll never find any slam pieces in our magazine. We do not villainize or gossip. With my background as a mental health professional, creating a safe space for serious discussion is crucial. In doing so, we’ve created a platform for ALL people, all ages, all cultures, religious affiliations (or not), orientations and all disabilities and abilities.

To date, some of the most important work I’ve done has been helping refugees and war victims to tell their stories, and helping create more awareness for nonprofits and community efforts. We’ve given unknown and struggling artists a seat at the table. We empower marginalized communities and let them tell their stories in their own words. We’re not trying to speak for people—we’re here to pass you the microphone.

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

In the process of building this previously unheard of culturally inclusive and topic-diverse publishing platform, I’ve received my share of resistance and blow back. It’s like this when pioneering something new.

I’ve been told that our coverage of BIPOC stories and artists is too frequent. That we’re “too minority heavy”.

I’ve been threatened and slammed for running stories on areas currently engaged in war. I’ve had to help refugees carefully conceal their identity in order to tell stories they would risk imprisonment or execution for if they attempted to publish in their own countries.

I’ve had to deal with a couple of situations involving harassment from individuals suffering mental health issues who had difficulty acquiescing to my process. These instances were resolved favorably in the end, but were extremely triggering for me as a trauma survivor with anxiety.

And that’s only the tip of the iceberg. None of this adversity has halted my progress or caused me to question my purpose or impeded my desire to move forward with PEPPER. If anything, this kind of resistance has further proven to me the relevance and need for the thing we’re building. We’re truly shaking things up, and that is how to ignite real and lasting change.

What else should we know about how you took your side hustle and scaled it up into what it is today?

I tell people who ask me this that PEPPER is literally a double full time job. It’s absolutely a full on career at this point, and I can say with utmost certainty it’s only going to become more demanding moving forward.

This is a happy and welcome thing for me. I’ve enjoyed freelance work over the years and even life coaching has enriched my life vicariously through helping others. But I truly feel honing all of these separate skills I’ve developed into one unified vehicle with a clearly defined vision is what I needed all along. I had to build to get here.

Now that I have, I’m making it my life’s work to reinforce, fortify and ready it for the next generation to come. Knowing that I will be able to employ my own special needs son (low verbal autism with a cognitive disability) to take on modified creative work and data entry, as well as being able to facilitate for other individuals with special needs to find meaningful employment means everything to me. It’s safe to say I no longer do “side hustle” anymore. I’m building an empire.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://msha.ke/peppermagazine
• Instagram: @hello.peppermagazine
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/peppermagazine.satx?mibextid=LQQJ4d
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pepper-magazine-88793a23a
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@peppermagazine
• Other: Digital subscription : https://issuu.com/store/publishers/artist.katday/subscribe Individual issues : Digital — https://issuu.com/artist.katday Print — https://www.magcloud.com/browse/magazine/2251162

Image Credits
Main photo : wardrobe Hello Tallulah styling Kristina Uriegas-Reyes photography Felicia Sealey hair Erika Guerrero makeup Frank Coronado Other photography by Amado Ochoa, Michael Avila Christman and K. Day Gomez Hair Belleza by Terry All wardrobe and accessories ethically sourced and sustainable.