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

Vikki , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

I am the Producer/ Director for The Vegan Fashion Show, a charitable and educational non-profit event and organization. Our mission is to celebrate and elevate vegan fashion through facts, fundraising, and fun events! Guests can enjoy a fun fashion show while contributing to meaningful, long-lasting help for animals in Canada. Proceeds benefit Animal Justice, the organization leading the legal fight for animal protection in Canada. The event showcases vegan collections from multiple designers and brands on the catwalk. There are also vegan vendors, speakers, musical guests, creative dance, raffle prizes, photo walls, and film. Educational materials are available to take home as well.

Last year was our inaugural event which sold out. We will return again this year in late fall. However, we are not just a fashion show. The educational component is very important, and doing so to reach those who normally wouldn’t take notice to the importance and benefits of vegan products. We had several ways of executing activism last year, which we will continue to do. This year we also have planned the “Plants VS Leather Challenge”. We will be tabling at various locations where people will try to guess which fashion accessory products are made from plants and which ones are made from animals (these will be donated and second-hand). The idea is to show off just how far vegan leather alternatives have come; they can be indistinguishable from the real thing! We will also highlight the environmental benefits. Many plant-based leather alternatives are plastic-free (although we are just at the beginning stages of these materials being commercially available). All vegan leather alternatives are less harmful to the environment overall compared to animal-derived leather, according to several studies such as the comprehensive 2017 Pulse of the Fashion Industry Report.

Vikki , 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?

These days I am successful with a lot of my work, landing myself and others in high end publications like Forbes, Playboy, Fashion Week Online, Elle, the world’s biggest tabloids, and countless more. Being a model on clothing and product brand websites was once a goal that’s just too easy now. I wake up to paid brand deal offers in my DM’s. I have a large, engaging audience, and I was verified long before Meta offered to sell it for a few bucks. It wasn’t always like this, however. I worked hard and consistently over the years to get here. In fact, when I look back at some of my beginner pictures and videos on social media – I cringe.

I didn’t have any type of social media until 2014. I started modeling at fashion events, which was easy to land since I am 5’10”. Most of my photos at that time though were glamour model type photos, but they were not that great at first. After experience and networking for some time, I finally started taking better photos and finally – after years of trying – landed myself on the cover and centerfold of Playboy (international). That’s around the time I really got the ball rolling, and it’s safe to say that’s how I originally got my name out there. At the same time – and still today – I worked on building my social media daily. Eventually I started doing more fashion photos as well, and product photos, because that’s where the brand deals come in. At first I wasn’t offered any money, only gifted products.

I was also in the news occasionally for my animal rights activism (animal rights is my biggest passion in life). So between that and my growing modelling publications, I qualified to be verified on Instagram. That’s when it took off a lot for me. I am so thankful because I am able to make even bigger connections in my network, be taken seriously in my fields, land even more press, and bring awareness to The Vegan Fashion Show and the causes I care deeply about.

I decided to officially start my public relations firm, Lenola PR, after years of friends and acquaintances constantly asking me for help in this area. I specialize in landing press for models, influencers, entrepreneurs, fashion brands, and vegan brands. These are niches I know well from experience. I find my post-secondary educational background in Business as well as Environmental Studies is helpful too. My ideal client is already doing interesting things and I am there to get them the recognition they deserve. I do this through strategy, storytelling, and utilizing my many connections from years of networking. The best way to work with me is on a monthly retainer basis, where I get you as much press as I can for your monthly budget. However in some cases a per project basis works as well, I customize the strategy for everybody based on their goals and how ready they are for what they want to achieve.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

I founded The Vegan Fashion Show because I wanted to find a way to help animals by combining what I’m passionate about with what I’m good at and am experienced in. The vision of our organization is an informed and compassionate fashion industry. A lot of people don’t think about how their clothes were made, or realize the mass and immense suffering animals go through. If they saw what was going on in-person, many people would be in tears and certainly wouldn’t pay for it, especially when it’s entirely unnecessary. Many people also don’t understand just how interconnected people, animals, and the environment are. If you care about any of these three things, you will need to consider all three of them when it comes to fashion (and more), since they all affect one another. The fashion industry isn’t going to tell you that though. You just see the end product. I recommend watching the documentaries SLAY as well as The True Cost. There are also other resources on The Vegan Fashion Show website. Check out our blog to learn about different materials and solutions to the problems. For example, our last blog post is about “25 Plant-Based Leather Alternatives” and includes a video!

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

I work on my social media daily, and have been for years. That’s why I can charge for promotional posts. As many creatives and entrepreneur types have joked before, you don’t owe me for how long it takes me to do something, you owe me for the years it took me to get this good at what I do! So if you want to get to that point, it’s going to take a lot of your time, energy, and resources. You will be planning and maybe paying for photoshoots or graphics. You will be thinking of captions. You will be learning the latest tools on social media. You will be messing that up sometimes like I did today… I finally put together the perfect reel with many individual texts that popped up at the perfect time – only to not save it properly and have to start all over again.

Besides all of this I will you the basic advice most experts will tell you; be consistent, figure out your niche, and either provide value, be entertaining, be inspiring, or be relatable. Network with others in your field, do share for share, do collaborations, being annoyingly engaging on other people’ posts to support them too because it’s not all about you. These things all help people discover you.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.theveganfashionshow.org and www.lenolapr.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/vikkilenola
• Linkedin: https://ca.linkedin.com/in/vikkilenola

Image Credits
Cactus leather handbags: Bags are by the brand AVE Bags. Cactus leather takes 164,650% less water than animal-derived leather to make! Source: Collective Fashion Justice, as seen on one of the graphics they made for The Vegan Fashion Show. Hogwood t-shirt: Photo from a photoshoot for a collaboration post with Viva Charity to promote their documentary, Hogwood. Watch on Netflix, Amazon Prime, Google Play, or Apple TV to follow their intrepid group of undercover investigators as they expose shocking atrocities inside Hogwood farm. Learn more at Hogwoodmovie.com. Photographers: Mark Wong and Preacher Photography.

Shoes by Organic Garments, made from hemp and Piñatex. Shop these and more carefully selected vegan items on The Vegan Fashion Show website. When you do, The Vegan Fashion Show will earn an affiliate commission, increasing the amount of money donated to Animal Justice!