Women and Entrepreneurship ◾ 51
3.8 An Interview with Sarah Brown
Q. In an nutshell, what does your company seek to accomplish?
A. We cover all green sectors including renewable energy, energy ef-
ciency, smart grid, energy storage, green building, the recycling industry,
water, organic foods, and healthy lifestyles. We also cover multinational
corporate green pioneers that are making a commitment to sustainability
and acting on it. But the broader mission is to create a vibrant community of
engaged citizens, and the businesses that serve those citizens.
Q. What were your challenges of starting/running a business with small
kids at home?
A. When I started, kids were 4, 7, and 8 years old. That was the hardest
part. There is a cultural expectation that women will take care of the kids.
And it isn’t just the logistical problems of working nights and weekends.
More debilitating is the extra stress and brutal anguish that affects women.
As a mother, you cannot overcome the guilt about the time you’re not
spending with your family because of your startup. And you take the failures
that come with business more personally.
Q. What were the benets of running the business but reporting to a co-
owner with more equity in the company?
A. I had very supportive partners. Being a sole proprietor, I actually
wanted a partner to share my emotional burden. Women are used to work-
ing collaboratively, and having someone else to share the stress was help-
ful. It is tough to have the entire burden of running a business on your
shoulders.
And while there were certainly times where I wished I had 100% equity,
the fact that my business partners were successful businessmen themselves
was actually reassuring. More recently, I’ve had some investor interest.
Ideally, if I had a strategic partner or investor, I’d want to the partner to be
involved in the business, but I understand that’s not always possible.
Q. How did you overcome doubts that a woman with no previous experi-
ence running a company could succeed in a difcult economy?
A. I started this enterprise when my partner, who himself was a
respected young entrepreneur, said it could be a viable business. And I’m
like most other women; outside approval is important to me. That gave me
the condence to move ahead. I was doing activism before starting this busi-
ness, and that’s obviously an unusual path to business ownership. But my
activism on environmental and community issues tied into the business con-
cept of connecting citizens and local businesses, as I had a well-developed
52 ◾ The Guide to Entrepreneurship: How to Create Wealth for Your Company
network of consumers and businesses to approach when building my cus-
tomer list and growing my sales.
And while the sluggish economy hasn’t helped my business, I do stress
to my clients that the type of communications, outreach, and lead gen-
eration I do—to a well-educated consumer base that will demonstrate
above-average brand loyalty—is really important when marketing budgets
are lean.
Q. How do you price your services?
A. I charge based on the number of full-time employees a customer has,
with higher prices for larger companies, as they have more resources. I’ve
considered basing it on a company’s revenues, which would actually be a
better way to gauge how much to charge, but then I would be asking for
potentially sensitive information from private business owners.
Q. Do women have special business insights?
A. Women are good at recognizing their own weaknesses, and we are
also better at admitting weaknesses or mistakes than men. I think that’s a
positive trait in business; for me it means I’ve outsourced tasks that I person-
ally don’t like to do, so that I can spend the majority of time on the aspects
of the business I enjoy, which keeps me motivated.
3.8.1 The Importance of Emotional Support
A supportive spouse or partner can make a signicant difference. Brown
credits her husband for not only supporting her entrepreneurial spirit, but
also picking up much of the slack at dinnertimes, after-school activities, and
parental involvement, despite his having a full-time job. “I would not have
been able to hold on this long without my husband,” Brown declared force-
fully. “I’d recommend anyone in a relationship having an honest conversa-
tion with their partner about not just the time involved, but the emotional
burden you’ll both be going through, because that stress of running a busi-
ness is very hard to keep inside.”
The need for support can extend beyond immediate family. Having
a co-owner or strategic partner to assist in a new venture can be an
immense help. “I was lucky to have supportive partners, and to be getting
advice from successful entrepreneurs,” Brown said. And a woman’s natural
tendency to work collaboratively can help mitigate the stress of running a
startup.
Women and Entrepreneurship ◾ 53
The business got its start when the co-owner of Brown’s employer felt
her marketing and business development concept could be a viable busi-
ness. “Hearing that my idea had support from other successful business-
people gave me the condence I needed, since I never even saw myself as
a businesswoman.”
3.8.2 Don’t Undersell Yourself
Brown’s background is illustrative of the recent trend of more women start-
ing business who weren’t born entrepreneurs; her background was in jour-
nalism (having served as a foreign correspondent for CNN during the 1990s)
and community activism. “I saw how my communication and media skills
could tie into my employer’s business model, generate leads, and capture
additional market share. She also had to learn from other business owners.
One client insisted she was working too hard for too little money, and was
doing too much work on certain projects that simply didn’t generate enough
revenue.
In addition, Brown warns that the female tendency to want to help peo-
ple can work against women entrepreneurs. “I lent professional support to
numerous community groups and other entrepreneurs, and I’m proud of the
impact I’ve had on many local businesses. But that was part of the reason
that even though I had a great client list, I was still barely protable.”
Brown also cautions against making the mistakes she made when secur-
ing her initial client base. “In addition to starting this business at a time when
marketing/communications budgets were being slashed, I also underpriced
my services. In part, that was because I had pre-existing professional or
personal relationships with many of them, and wanted to extend favorable
pricing.”
Once those precedents had been set, Brown found it hard to raise prices.
“Even when I tried to raise my rates modestly, I got a lot of push-back from
my clients.” She recommends that other women entrepreneurs be careful
not to undersell their services when they are selling within their existing
network.
Now, Brown has come around on the need for sustainable protability.
While still struggling with prot margins in a tight economy, she wants her
company to be successful nancially—at least to the point where it matches
the emotional support she receives from her community.
54 ◾ The Guide to Entrepreneurship: How to Create Wealth for Your Company
3.8.3 Overcoming Perceptions, Gaining
Respect, and Finding Success
As for her dealings with clients and others, Brown feels that sometimes she
is not respected as much as her male counterparts are. “Some men don’t
understand that women entrepreneurs go through the same trial by re.”
However, she insists that for every “disrespecter,” there is a man willing to
lend a hand or make an important introduction. Brown’s business is up to
115 clients, and continues to enjoy abundant regional respect and inuence.
3.8.4 Putting It in Perspective
For women who have done their personal and professional due diligence,
and choose to take the plunge into entrepreneurship, Brown’s ultimate
recommendation is that women should leverage the social and emotional
skills they have developed in their careers and personal life to nd business
opportunities. “There might be opportunities to serve businesses in some
way right in your own region that no one’s addressing yet.” At the same
time, she warns women not to let their tendency to be their own worst crit-
ics stand in the way of success.
However, despite the slightly higher hurdles, entrepreneurs of both gen-
ders share the same excitement about creating and running their own busi-
nesses. “I’m not sorry for a minute that I chose be an entrepreneur,” Brown
concluded. “At this point, I’d probably nd it hard to work for someone else!”
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