She's On The Money - Brittney Saunders Turns Lemons into Lemonade

Episode Date: May 30, 2024

Add the yay to your Friday as Jess and Bec are joined by the force that is Brittney Saunders! The entrepreneur, podcaster and founder of FAYT The Label, shares her refreshing insights into making the most of business mistakes, the cost of hiring the wrong person for the job, her formative entrepreneurial experiences from making phone cases to spray tans in her basement and SO much more! Plus the team give thoughts on this weeks Money Dilemma of scaling your business, and our community D.M on managing a toxic work environment. Check out Brittney's podcast Big Business with Brittney Saunders! Acknowledgement of Country By Natarsha Bamblett aka Queen Acknowledgements. The advice shared on She's On The Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She's On The Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision. If you do choose to buy a financial product, read the PDS, TMD and obtain appropriate financial advice tailored towards your needs.  Victoria Devine and She's On The Money are authorised representatives of Money Sherpa PTY LTD ABN - 321649 27708,  AFSL - 451289.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hello, my name is Natasha Nabanunga-Bamblett. I'm a proud Yorta Yorta, Kernai, Wolperi and Awadjeri woman. And before we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land of which this podcast is recorded on Awadjeri country, acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming through. As this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing and the storytelling of you to make a difference for today and lasting impact for tomorrow. Let's get into it. She's on the money. She's on the money.

Hello, and welcome to She's on the Money, the podcast for millennials who want financial freedom. My name is Jessica Ricci, and as always, I've got the beautiful Bex Syed joining me. No Victoria for the next month or so. She's living her best Europe life. Must be very nice. Must be nice. But I'm excited because we're bringing back the guest episodes. You guys loved them. So did we. And I'm really, really excited because we've got an awesome guest joining us today. We'll be sharing some of our favorite money wins, helping to answer a juicy money dilemma, which this week is all about discovering your dream job, is actually a bit of a toxic nightmare. And we're

going to unpack something you slid into our DMs about, which this week is all about figuring out costs and suppliers when starting a business, which I think today's guest will have some insight to share there. Oh, so mysterious. We are super excited today to be joined by founder of fashion brand Fate, podcaster and all-round force of inspiration, Brittany Saunders. Welcome. Oh, hey, guys. I love that intro. You're making me sound amazing. You are amazing. Yeah, you are. You literally are. I feel like there's going to be a lot of people so excited to hear this episode because you're super well-known now because you're a bit of a business

mogul. You've got so much going on. But also a lot of people who maybe remember you from like way back in the OG Beauty Guru YouTube days. 100%. It's been a really interesting journey for me to go from that like YouTube days back in the day, like they were the glory days of the internet to now I've just fully, you know, gone in this other direction. And I remember for so many years, I'd run into people out and about and they'd be like, I love your videos.

I love your YouTube. And now it's just super cool. It's people will be saying, I love your podcast or I love your business or, you know, more also what I'm doing now, which is super cool. You're one of the few people that I feel like really transitioned super cleanly from that space into another space, like springboarded off and really like established yourself as a super, not official, but like you run so many businesses now, you seem so successful. So I'm really excited to hear more about that. And I'm sure everybody else is too. But before we get started, how's everybody's week been? Do you want to go first,

Britt? Yeah, my week is, I mean, it's only Tuesday so far. So, so far, so good. I go to Sydney every single Monday. So, I'm based in Newcastle. Yeah. So, I'm based in Newcastle, which is like two and a bit hours from Sydney. So, every Monday is my podcast day in Sydney. So, I go there and back every Monday. So, I did that yesterday. And then this morning, we've done a bit of a photo shoot this morning. And then I've ducked out of the office to come and do this podcast with you guys. so so far the week is great you've done a lot it's only like nine o'clock in the morning it's only ten oh my god busy busy girl that is extremely impressive i wish i could do half of those things in like a whole month um that sounds awesome but jess what about you how's your week been it's been

good not a lot going on obviously vd's away missing her dearly just i think enjoying the wintery weather that we've had the cozy vibes yeah I love the fashion I love winter fashion so much more than summer like totally I love summer weather because it makes me feel like I want to go out more and do things and on the weekends I like want to be out doing things but I kind of love this cooler weather and rugging up and wearing like all my favorite clothes and then not feeling guilty if I am just staying home all weekend doing absolutely nothing whereas when it's a beautiful day outside I'm like I really should get out there but I love winter for that Yeah, and like listening to the rain on the roof.

The leak in my roof has been fixed, by the way, for anyone playing at home. So now I'm back to enjoying the cooler weather, I think. Yeah, no more anxiety. No, not at all. It's just coziness, pure coziness. How about you? My week's been really good.

Also enjoying the weather. It's really like winter is the month of guilt-free rest, I think. Not that there ever, you know, you should never feel guilty for resting, but just like this thing we do to ourselves. But winter is like time for coziness, time for rest, time for just like wholesomeness. Yeah, my week's been really good. Just been seeing friends, just going out, obviously,

you know, with limited funds, been trying to find ways to like have fun without money. And it's actually been an exciting challenge I've set for myself. So yeah, it's been a really good week so far. Amazing. Yeah. Speaking of money challenges. Oh, very nice. Was that good? That was good. What money wins or losses do you have this week? I've got a good little roundup for you guys this week. I'm going to start with one from Kim who said, I achieved my initial $3,000 emergency fund savings goal, which I'm going to be topping up every fortnight with an extra hundred bucks. She had her first investment on shares. She did some overtime work last Saturday and the money is going to be added to her emergency fund and her investment. And she said she's back doing an

office job as a part of her secondment. And she said it's a win because she can listen to the podcast while working from home. Cute. I love that. Four wins. Well done, Kim. Next, I've got a money win from Beck who said, good name Beck, absolute money win. We were gifted a bunch of cleaning supplies when we bought our first house in December, which was also a big win. It included a very luxe scented fabric softener, say that five times fast. And she said at Coles it's 15 bucks, 1.9 litres, but she happened to be at Costco and got five litres for $17. That's so good. One of the few times that Costco is actually cheaper than everywhere else because I feel Like it never is normal.

You reckon it's not? You reckon it's just the same? You've got to do the cost per unit. So a lot of the time you're buying heaps, but it's not as much. Depending on what the item is, a lot of the times if you compare it to like your Coles or Woolies sale price, it's not necessarily as much. But probably bad use. I do love Costco though.

Like I love just going there. Yeah. The experience and going through every aisle and just seeing all the stuff that's there. It's amazing. It's so good. Buying nothing. Just looking.

Taking samples. Yeah. Yeah, and trying all the samples. A hundred percent. And the pizza. The pizza is so good. Next, I've got a money win from Lauren, and she said she received a notification that a unit next door to hers had termites in their side fence.

Sounds like a money loss. They organised for a pest and termite inspection, as she could see parts of her fence were looking a little bit spicy. Turns out the mowing guys were going too hard on the whippersnapping. no termites and the company didn't charge her for the inspection oh great so sometimes the worst case scenario is in fact the best case scenario true love that for you lauren and then lastly i have a money win from millie who said i used my wrong debit card when i tried to pay for parking at work and it declined and i got so embarrassed and let the person behind me go first happens to

me literally all the time she said once they'd finished she went to pay for her parking and it had already been paid she wasn't looking so she's not sure if the people in front of her paid for her or if it was just a glitch but the universe aligned and she was feeling super blessed wow that is really wholesome I I can imagine that the person in front was like oh it's a client I'll pay for you that is so sweet has that ever happened to either of you guys where someone's like paid for something like in front of you or like for you no not for me but I feel like I should do it for someone like I always see that on TikTok and stuff like people paying for the car in front of them yeah I think or like paying it forward with coffees as well like I know a lot of people do

bad. Yeah. Yeah. It's such a fun idea. I've never done it because I've never been in a position where it felt like it made sense to me to do it. But I go, it seems like such a fun idea. I need to figure out how to pay it forward. It would be so cute. I think that like the only time I've kind of had that is when, you know, someone is leaving a car park and they're like, do you want to use the rest of my ticket? You know, that kind of thing. Oh, that is nice. That is iconically Australian, I feel. Yeah, totally. I think I saw another video the other day too of someone topping up someone's needed parking in their car or something because they saw that like it was about to run out or whatever and they put a fresh one for them in there and like paid it again.

It's just like it makes you feel good, doesn't it? Yeah. Now, Britt, we do normally ask our guests if they have a money win or a money loss that they would like to share to bring one to the table if you happen to have one with you. Yes, I actually have, I've got two money losses that are also related to business. One's about turning lemons into lemonade. And then the other one is just a bit of a general lesson in business in general. So a big money loss for us that we experienced in our business, but then we turned it into something positive. And I think that's something important to remember is you can, you know, take a really negative situation and turn it into something great. Was last year, we had manufactured these beautiful corset tops and

they were kind of like silky and finished with boning in them and it was our first time ever making corsets and they're obviously really tricky compared to like a usual top or whatever that's really stretchy because they've got a lot of structure in them but when our bulk stock arrived and we'd made these corsets in like four different colors the straps were just a little bit too long and because they were like made of this silk fabric with no adjustable straps it was kind of like oh they're gonna fit some people and they're not gonna fit others yeah and so it was this whole dilemma of like, we can't sell these because when we shot them on the models, like it was not fitting them right. What are we going to do? This is a massive loss for us. Like we've got

these four corsets, the bulk stock is here. What are we going to do? And I was speaking with my partner, AJ, and then we just come up with this idea. Why don't we just, because we don't want them to go to waste, obviously, but I didn't want to sell them because with us, like I don't want to sell anything that isn't like amazing quality. Yeah. So then we said like, why don't we, we're obviously not just going to throw these tops out. That is completely wasteful. What if we just give them away in people's orders just as like a gift. And then we just copped the loss, you know, of the manufacturing. We're not selling them. So then we're like, all right, let's do that. And we'll just put them in people's orders that have ordered a top so that we like

have an idea roughly of their size. And then, so we got these little cards and we got like a bunch of them printed out for the same amount of tops that we had. And then we'd pop them in every order saying like, Hey, this is a little gift from us to you. Like it may not fit or it might fit someone that you know and we kind of tried to make it this whole like maybe you can give this top a life in some way if people were handy like they could probably shorten the shoulder strap so that was like our little activation I guess that we made we also made a video about it and chucked it up on Instagram and TikTok and I kind of was just like laughing about the mistake that we'd made and just said oh we've made all these corsets and this hasn't worked out but

we're going to be throwing them in people's orders just to kind of teach a lesson of you know turning those lemons into lemonade. And then it ended up being kind of a win for us because that video then absolutely blew up on socials. And then we ended up getting like so many orders because then all of a sudden people were like, I want one of these tops. And so it all kind of worked out in the end. We had like so many people placing in orders just in hopes to get the corsets, even though that wasn't like the objective at all. And it turned out to be this really positive thing, even though we'd obviously lost the money on the tops. It kind of made this really nice vibe within our community and people were getting these free tops and yeah, it kind of worked out well in the end.

Yeah. I love that. And then I did have another one that comes to mind, which is more of a loss that business owners will experience. And it's probably not something that people think of much, but it's very real and relevant to me and to any other business owners out there. A huge loss that a lot of business owners will experience is hiring the wrong person for the job. Oh, tell us more. That sounds juicy. That sounds very juicy. So this is something that I've experienced time and time again. It's something that all business owners will experience and it's not something that you ever really think about. And this is

what I speak about a lot on my new business podcast, Big Business. Shout out to my own podcast. Okay, listen, it's a good one. it's brand new. But it's just one of those things that I never thought about when I started Fate. But hiring the wrong person for the job can be a huge loss for a business financially. And I guess I just really want to stress the importance of spending your time finding that right person. And it can be really tricky because the reason why it can be a loss for a business is you spend so long doing your hiring process for that particular role. You've got everyone in your team, hiring them, interviewing, going through resumes, calling references, doing all these

rounds of interviews. You then get this employee on their contracts and everything like that. All this takes time, effort, money. You're paying everyone to do these things. Then you have this new person come into your business and then you're spending all your time and energy training them, getting them into the team. And then if it, for some reason, for whatever reason, there can be a billion reasons it doesn't work out or that person isn't the right fit for the role, then you're back at square one. So it's really important for anyone out there in business, especially if you're new to business or if you're a startup and you're hiring that first employee, which feels like yesterday to me. And people always ask me, how do I know when to

hire that first employee? And I'm scared and I don't know how to trust people. My advice to that would be take your time, hire slowly and make sure that you're hiring that right person because it does cost a lot of money to bring someone on board and you want to make sure that that's that right person because you don't want to be back at square one and have to do it all over again a hundred percent we talk about that a lot from like an employee perspective on the show and how if you're like in a workplace and something's not right like working with your employer where you can to you know upskill or change or sidestep or whatever because from you know for a business it makes so much more sense for them to try and find a way for you to still continue to fit within the

workplace rather than just having, you know, leaving and going somewhere else be your first option because it is such a big cost to businesses that, you know, on both sides, it makes sense for people to try and like make it work. You always want to try, in my experience, to promote people within your team rather than constantly just bringing in new people. For sure. One of the most interesting parts of that from a business owner's perspective as well is trying to scale your company at a sustainable rate that your staff can also continue to grow with you yeah especially for a smaller startup I find but like small startups they're going to struggle maybe with their employees not being able to grow as much as they want to because that owner is in

those startup days I think back to years ago you know we had a our store manager at the time Grace working in our store when we just had our one retail store here in Newcastle and she was just working like casually, but like quite a lot of hours, but she would always say to me, Brit, like, I really want to grow. I really want like a full-time role. Like, I don't know what it is. I don't care what it is, but I just really want a full-time role. And I remember saying to her, leave that thought with me and I'm going to make it happen for you kind of thing. And then it's like, you're trying to grow your company so your staff can grow and you have this fear of them going elsewhere because maybe your company isn't big enough for them yet. But now she's our national

retail manager so she's all good and she's got a great time yeah how many stores do you have now we have four and we're about to open the fifth that's amazing i love that you like know like you like know the names of everybody too like that's just really nice i mean as a business owner that you know everyone because you'd have so many people i guess employed with running all those stores and running all your other businesses it's just lovely that you remember but we'll come back in the second half of the show because we have a little bit more to talk about employee employee-er stuff. But Bec, do you have any super fun broker tips for us this week? I most certainly do. Now, usually I share two from the community, but I'm going to reserve one

for you, Britt, if you happen to have a broker tip at the end of this. So first one from the community is from Catherine, who says, the Plant Jammer app or similar gives you recipe ideas based on what you already have in the fridge or pantry, which I think is really cool because we have mentioned that before, like little, you know, different websites and things like that. But plant jammer app which I have not heard of before I think that would be very convenient so just download that chuck whatever you have in your pantry or fridge already and it'll come up with a recipe for you you don't have to spend any money and I feel like we always feel like we do if we have like bread and maybe a tin of diced tomatoes you can probably make a whole meal out of that

so I think that's a really cool thing and also just like a friendly reminder that that's also an option. So do that before you go to the shops. And then my broke tip for this week is it's kind of like common knowledge. It's a little bit commonsensical, but I also still feel like it's a bit of a good reminder, as everyone knows, because I won't shut up about it. I don't really have money at the moment in between jobs. And I have used this week as like a little challenge to myself to have fun without spending much money. So as I mentioned before, I go to pubs that have free soda water, things like that. But just the other day, I think I spent in total $3 and I fed myself and I brought my girlfriend a little gift. And do you know how I did that?

I made, this is going to sound disgusting, but it was really nice. I made a little thing of rice, which, you know, it depends where you go, but you can like, if you're being really lazy, you can get like $1.25 sachets where you just microwave it. And that's plenty. And then I bought a 90 cent can of sardines and that was my meal that's all I needed that's actually less than three dollars and I had like some bread and stuff I am cheating because I had bread already in the house and so but that was like my that was my dinner and I was like this is plenty for me and that was great and it was like it kind of felt healthy what I did was I like walked around the neighborhood and picked flowers and made like a mini bouquet and potted it in a pre-existing

mason jar and that was a gift for my girlfriend so i spent in total less than three dollars i managed to feed myself all day and i managed to bring a cute little gift for my girlfriend to her house and i just think that's like god that's such a win-win you know what i mean yeah so just remember that there are treats around you even if you make a little bouquet of rosemary from your communal garden like there there are ways to kind of go you know make someone's day make your own day without having to spend much money or any money and I know it's a very privileged position I don't have kids I don't have like you know anything other than myself to really take care of so that's really only relevant if you are like that so that's my broke tip for this week

find joy in the little things and it's those little like thoughtful gifts they mean so much more I think than oh like I felt like I just bought you this expensive thing like yeah totally You took the time, you took the love, you picked things that you thought she would like. Like, I think those things are so much more meaningful in a relationship than just, oh, I just bought you something because, you know what I mean, I could. Yeah, I totally agree with that. Okay, Britt, do you happen to have a broke tip for us? I have a savings tip that I used when I started to want to save money, but I feel like maybe

this is something that everyone already does. I don't know. I could be just saying something here that everyone already does. So I dropped out of school when I was 16 and I didn't even get to experience driving to school because I didn't get my P's in time. Everyone got to drive to school. I fully missed that. I was talking about that with my friend yesterday. I'm like, I didn't even get to do the whole like driving myself to school thing. And then so when I dropped out of school, the reason I dropped out of school was because all I wanted to do was work. I wasn't interested in any of the subjects I was

doing at school. I wasn't interested in going to uni or anything. I didn't know what I wanted to do. All I wanted to do was work and earn money. So I ended up working in over 20 jobs and I was basically on a mission to just try and find something that I enjoyed doing. And as soon as I knew that I wasn't enjoying a job, and I'm talking, I did waitressing, bar work, retail. I worked at a school camp doing sports instructing. I worked in sales. I did absolutely everything. I was just trying anything and everything. And I would sometimes, it was really bad. I would get a job for three weeks and if I hated it, I'd just go get another one because I was like, no, I don't like that. Would I advise people to do that? Maybe not. But also like I'm all for trying

to find that thing that brings you happiness, you know, even if that means you are job hopping. But during all those years, I had no money. I remember constantly looking at my bank account and it would be in like negative $1.25, like just always sitting around there. And throughout my late teens and into my early twenties, I really did struggle to save. I never had any kind of guidance from family or anything to save money. Like that was never taught to us when we were kids. And I moved out of home when I was 17 as well. So I never really had anyone around to be like, you should save money. And, you know, so it wasn't until I got into my YouTubing days. And when I quit my full-time job, when I was 21 to try and become this YouTuber,

like that was my thing that I found that I really wanted to do that. I thought I'm going to try and save money, which I had never, ever done before. Never had more than a couple of hundred dollars in the bank at any given point. And so the way that I did it back then when I was not working anymore and trying to make this YouTube thing work, and this was like 10 years ago now. So this is when YouTube was so new. I was earning a bit of money here and there, like just enough to get by and pay my rent in my share house and 60 bucks on petrol. But what I did was, and it's so basic, everyone probably does this but you know I started to get focused on a certain number that I always wanted to have in my bank account and I remember starting with a thousand dollars so I would build

my bank account up until I had a thousand dollars in there and then I would get really fixated on always trying to make sure that I had a thousand dollars in that savings account mind you then like car rego would come and then it would go back down again but I found that having that number was really motivating. And I just remember starting with that. I always want to have a thousand dollars. Like I always want to have a thousand dollars. And then once I got to that, and then I could grow my account a little bit more beyond that, then I thought I would change that number and I'd go, I want it to be $2,000 that I always have. And I think it's really good to kind of, it was good for me anyway, who had never done any type of saving before, just to

like find a number that was achievable for me and stick to it. And then once I was comfortable with that, then I would up it and go, well, now I want to try and save $5,000. And that was the way that I started saving in my early twenties. Make that competitive nature work for you, girl. Yeah. And you, I don't know what it is. Like you become a bit obsessive with the number and it's like, nope, I can't, I can't buy that thing that I really want because I've got my $2,000 in savings and like, I never wanted it to go below that. And I know it's not realistic. Like if something comes up or an emergency happens or rego or anything like that, but that was the start of saving for me it like builds a good habit for you for sure yes I really like that and I think I

actually might start doing that that's definitely not like just have a number like even if you're just starting with like 500 bucks or like mine was a thousand and I don't know I just became really hyper fixated on always ensuring that I had that yes and then I continued to grow it from there I see that's my little really really cool when I had no money that's how I started saving and it worked for me so I always say that to people if they're wanting to save yeah okay I feel empowered right now. Yeah, that's an awesome one. Absolutely. Let's go to a really quick break. And when we come back, we're going to talk all about getting a job that turns out the grass is maybe not greener and also how you can figure out costs and supplies and all those

really fun but overwhelming kind of things if you're thinking about starting a business. So don't go anywhere, guys. Welcome back, everyone. Here's our Money Dilemma. hi there have you got a money dilemma you just can't solve the she's on the money team is here to help every week we tackle your dilemmas both big and small to answer your most burning money career and life questions to get involved simply head to our website and leave us a short voice recording and you might just find yourself on the show now let's take a listen to this week's money dilemma hi gals i'm currently very unhappy at my job this is really getting me down because i was certain it was my dream job. I'm not going to say who they are as they're big on socials but they

are a business that makes great social content and I adored and followed them for ages because they really resonated with my values. Basically I'm depressed and deflated because the workplace is toxic. I know I should leave but I am finding it hard now looking at other companies who seem more boring on socials to even know how to trust myself or my instincts. I guess I'm just in need of a pep talk or some advice. Baby girl. I feel like everybody has had that experience where they've taken a job and they've thought it was going to be one particular thing. And you've, you know, been there for a little while and the shine's worn off and you've gone, oh my God, what have I done? Yeah, totally. And you do kind of feel like, am I going to regret this in the

future? Like, will it get better? I don't really have any solid advice here. I'm thinking in any kind of situation where you think it's going to be one thing and it's kind of not, and you don't really trust yourself enough to know that it's not for you and so you kind of stick around but I guess ask yourself like what are you waiting for like what does the ideal perfect utopia world look like for you and then figure out if it's actually possible if not I think just you just got to trust your gut but again like I'm not really I feel like Britt you'd probably have a lot more. This is a great question. And I think this plays into the more tricky part of this modern day world that we are living in where businesses are on social media. Whereas, you

know, 10 or so years ago, like we didn't see businesses on TikTok and Instagram and the behind the scenes of their office. So I can completely understand it from both the employee side and then also from my side being that a business that also is on social media. And this is something that I've spoken about in depth on my podcast, but I'll absolutely talk about it again because I love talking about this. I think as amazing as it is for businesses to have these platforms to show their workplace online, just like we do at Fate, we show our warehouse, we show our office, we're doing dances, we're having fun, we're doing music videos. It looks like the most amazing place ever to work. And in my eyes, it absolutely is. But one thing that I always say

to people is you've got to remember that social media is a highlight reel. It is 110% fabricated, put together. It is all for show. When we're creating our content on social media, it's to entertain people. It's to make people like us. Like, so of course we're going to make our workplace look like this fun and amazing place. And it absolutely is. But I think one of the hard things from the employee's point of view is that's all they've ever seen of a company like that fun content on social media and I think it just makes the lines blurred because at the end of the day yes these workplaces are super fun and they have a great social media presence but they're a workplace for sure and you still have boring work to do there's no job 100%

and us this is what I say on my podcast is like those fun videos that we put out every single day because that's what we do on social media is a slither of our actual work day. Like the fun happens for five minutes while we're filming those videos, but then we go to our desks and our heads are down and we're working. And that's a really tricky thing in this modern day social media world. And that's one thing that like scares me as well when we are growing and we're hiring so many new people is we've had people say in interviews and I love it, but they're like, it just looks so fun on social media. And I just really want to get in there and get amongst it. And I absolutely love that. And we're like, we love that you love us, but we also want to let

you know, like, that is not what it looks like all day, every day. And so to the person asking this question, like, I really loved what you said. What is the ideal, like, what is it that you're looking for? I think that's a really important question to ask yourself. What is it you're looking for in a job? Maybe write those things down. What is it that you're looking for in a workplace? What do you want to be doing in your role? And they also mentioned that the workplace is toxic. Another thing I'd say to that is don't be afraid to speak to people who are your managers or the owner of the company, whoever you do have there to speak to. We are all about open communication in our workplace. And if anyone ever felt that way about us, like I'd want to be the

first person to know about it kind of thing. I feel like a lot of employees feel like they don't have a voice in a workplace. And again, I can only speak from my own experience in business, but with us, like if someone felt a certain way about our workplace or was having troubles with anyone, I would want that employee to know that their voice will absolutely be heard. So yeah, maybe my advice is obviously, you know, follow your gut instinct 100%, but also maybe talk to someone within that workplace and express your concerns. Like, is there potential for you in this company? Or, you know, are you more so leaning towards, I'm just done with this workplace. This is not the place for me. Yeah. And then maybe start exploring those other options.

Yeah. And it's okay to pull the plug. Like if you are somewhere and it is a toxic, I think, workplace, it takes a toll on you so significantly. And I think that can really bleed into other areas of your life and no job is necessarily worth the anguish that something can put you through. it is a really toxic environment. I was watching a really interesting TikTok from, I don't know if you guys know Maggie Zhao. I love her. She works a lot in the sustainable fashion space and she was talking about how social media has like fundamentally changed the way that we as humans interact with the world around us. And I think that that's really relevant to this person because, you know, you're talking about how you see other workplaces online and they don't seem as fun as your current

workplace did on social media and I completely agree with you Britt I think like social media is fake at the end of the day it is curated by the person behind it yes I will admit that a million times over like yes it's us and it's real and it's me in my content but also like we've set up that phone on that tripod and we are going out of our way to make it so it is fake in that kind of sense yeah I think like no matter how good a place is you're still putting out a polished thing like it's not a live stream moment that's captioned. Even if it is live stream, someone set it up and probably said, all right, guys, we're getting on the live stream. Yeah. If we did a live stream of our work day, it'd be boring because it's just work. People are like, oh, this actually

looks really boring because the TikToks and the reels are so fast and fun. Yeah. So I think keeping that in mind, I don't think that a company's social media platform is really the best measure of the workplace. I think that, like, I can understand that, you know, you can build an affinity with a brand or with the people behind the brand from, you know, I feel like a lot of people feel that way about us and the podcast. Like, so many people identify with us and say to us, same as you all the time, oh my gosh, I'd love to work at She's All The Money. It seems so fun. And yeah, absolutely it is. And there's all of these wonderful, great things that we've got going on. But same as you, like 90% of the time, it's hard work. Oh, 90% of the time,

it's shit hitting the fan, like trying to work out problems. Like someone's done this, this is happening there. It's not what you see on socials. And further to that, I would say, because they mentioned they've seen other companies' social media and they look more boring. Like that might be not the case at all. You might get a job somewhere that their socials seem a bit more boring and it might be the best group of people ever. And you might have the best time, it's really hard to judge a company based on their social media. Yeah. I just don't think that it's necessarily the most important metric that you should be considering when you are looking at workplaces, whether that be the one that you're currently in or other potential future

employers. I think there are so many other more important things than how fun it looks externally. It's about the people that you're working with. It's about the work that you'll be doing and how much you will enjoy it. Yeah, the role and the work-life balance. So I think exactly what you separate like what do you want figure out what's important to you and then use other aspects or avenues beyond social media to assess that talk to other employees have a look at their employee turnover rate that's always a really good good point gauge of how you know what a workplace is like if they're chewing through employees not necessarily the best sign so there are lots of other things that you can do to assess whether somewhere is good or not good but I think

definitely keeping in mind that social media is so curated and so yes you know not a bad indicator because you can have a wonderful workplace that puts out these videos that is it shows you exactly what the culture is like because culture is so important but just take it with a grain of salt I think is what I would suggest yeah and it kind of like sets you up for a bit of disappointment if you already kind of go in with it's like if someone tells you that a movie is so good like it's the best movie they've ever seen you go in with that expectation and even if it's just like a regular movie but it would have been good if no one told you anything yeah you kind of still go in you're like oh i my expectations were so high that there's nowhere to go down so yeah just like find

out what the root of what you want is and you can't go wrong like if you just follow that and if it's fun it's great if it's not fun it's still what you want to do whatever you know yeah perfect do we have a juicy juicy dm to get to oh you know that we do it's everybody's favorite time of the Louise. Yes. Let me tell you what our listener said. The DM goes, Hi, gals. I've been thinking for a while that I'd really like to start my own small business. Thank you, Business Bible, for the inspo. You're so welcome. But I don't know where to begin. I'm feeling overwhelmed trying to work out how much to invest into the business at the beginning or where to start with the nitty gritty things like finding suppliers and manufacturers.

I'm struggling to calculate what the actual costs associated with starting the business might be. so many things to think about, samples, packaging, et cetera, or how to even begin the process of connecting with the right people. Please help so I don't have to quit before I even start. To be completely truthful with you, we are a business, but we're not a product-based business. So I completely understand how this person is going. Where do you start? Because I really wouldn't know where to start either. The financial side of things, we can probably talk to a bit more, but how did you even figure it out you obviously run fate the label which is this incredible inclusive clothing brand that does something that not a lot of other brands do so I'd be

interested to know how you kind of figured that all out I think the first thing to remember when it comes to starting a business is it's okay if you have no idea what you're doing I think there's a lot of pressure and I can only imagine like I obviously started fate six years ago now and And it's different now to what it was back then. And I'm kind of glad that I started back then because now I can imagine someone wanting to start a business and seeing all of these established business owners online on TikTok and Instagram and all this and that. And you would feel like you in a way are comparing yourself to them at where they are at their journey now. And I always say to people like, don't look at me and compare you at the beginning of your journey to me where

I am now six years in, it can very much look like I've got all my shit together and then I know what I'm doing. And that's 100% correct. But at the same time, I still feel like I'm figuring all this out as I go. And I guess the beauty of business, especially like a startup and starting it yourself is you don't have to know how to do everything. No one does. No one when they start a business knows what they're doing. Like you're not born knowing how to be a business owner the same way you're not born knowing how to be a boss. You quite literally learn everything as you go. And the only way that you learn is by trying one thing, going, all right, I'm going to do that again, but differently. And that is quite literally what owning a business looks like. It is just

trying, trying, trying, making mistake after mistake after mistake, and then just learning to do better by the 100th time. And then you finally understand what you're doing. I can understand that it would be super overwhelming to start. And I think the good thing about me when I started Fate was that I was so naive to the whole thing and I didn't really have anyone that I was comparing myself to. I wasn't seeing all these other businesses online being like, oh, I want to be like them. And as for me, I'd always had the entrepreneurial spirit. I never really realized it at the time, but as I mentioned, I dropped out of school really early and throughout my teenage years and into my early twenties, I tried my hand at a million little business

opportunities, just to name a few. I was just wanting to do anything. I didn't know that I was wanting to start my own business, but I was just on this search. I was going through jobs and at the same time trying all these little side hustle things. So I started a beauty business at one point. I could do makeup half okay. So I was doing freelance makeup for like $35 for a full face and lashes. Stop, that's a bargain. I would come to you and do it. And then I was living in a shared rental at the time. And we had like this brick room underneath the back of the house kind of thing. And I turned that into a spray tanning studio. So I went to like my local beauty supplier here in Newcastle. I got the tent, the machine, all the supplies. And then I used my

Facebook account because I had what, two to 300 people on Facebook at the time. A lot of them lived in Newcastle. I would make little graphics with like palm trees. It was so bad. $15 spray tans. Come on down and get them. Even if you want three coats, still 15 bucks. And so I tried that. I did makeup. I did mobile makeup. At one point, I purchased a bunch of plain phone cases off eBay. And then I went to Spotlight and purchased a lot of decorations. I have photos of all this. is so embarrassing. Please send them to us. We would love to put them up because you don't see nobody talks about this. No one talks about the hard things that they went through to then be successful. So you being willing to share is I think so helpful to people. Yeah. Well, I purchased

the phone cases. I sat there gluing on all these like gems and stuff. And then again, I was putting them on my Facebook saying for sale, like I sold none, but that didn't matter because like I didn't know it at the time, but that was me having that entrepreneurial fire in my belly. And I was also the kind of person that would say yes to anything. I remember at one point, my friend's friend, this woman like owned this secondhand thrift store here in Newcastle. And she's like, do you want to come in, visual merchandise our front shop window? I was like, of course, but I've never done something like that ever. And then she also owned this hair salon and she asked me, can you please run our social media? So then I was like posting photos to this hairdressing

account for a while there. I tried so many things. And at one point as well, when I was more in my YouTubing days, I started this skincare business called NKD, like naked. And I was making coffee scrubs and stuff. And I had like a little business partner kind of in like the early Frank body days. I did that for a while, but then I gave up on it because it wasn't for me. So by the time it came to launching Fate and one of the amazing things about Fate, which I love telling people is it was just another one of those little ideas. It was just like the spray tans. It was just like the phone cases. It was just like running the social media for some random hair salon. It wasn't this grand big idea. It was like, oh yeah, I'll, I'll give that a go. Like, you know, cause I was just

always willing to give anything a go. If you had told me back then that it would lead to where I am today, I would say, no way. Like that's not going to happen at all. Like this was this tiny little thing. I had a double garage underneath my townhouse rental at the time. And I said to my partner, AJ, sorry, like you're losing your car spot. You have to park out on the street because I'm going to start this business under here. And I went to Bunnings and I got a bunch of plastic tubs and that's where my stock was going to go. And I put a table, I got a printer And I honestly just figured out all of those little things step by step. And you just figure it out. I quite literally remember the day I was Googling how to ship parcels in Australia.

Yeah. And then, you know, going on the Australia Post website, signing up, joining Facebook groups for women in business, trying to make connections there, jumping online, how to manufacture products. And the thing with business is, I heard someone say once and it's so true. Sometimes taking the first step is so embarrassingly small that a lot of people never take it. That's so true. Like you get in your own way before. It was exactly what our listener said. She didn't want to quit before she even started because she was feeling so overwhelmed. Yeah. But it's, there's no, again, I'm referencing my own podcast, but I do have an episode of every single step that you need to take to start a business in Australia. Perfect.

That's one of my very first episodes. If you want to hear it in depth, I'm obviously not going to run through that today with you being here for another hour. But it's just writing everything down that you think you need to do and just tackling those steps one by one. And when it comes to costs, which I'm sure you guys can talk more to as well, it's figuring out how much all those things are going to cost, writing them down and seeing if it is feasible for you. I've heard a lot of people say, you don't need much to start a business. And again, I think it depends on what you're doing. You know, if you're decorating iPhone cases like me at home, that's obviously going to be a lot lower of a cost compared to if you're actually

manufacturing something and you're needing to do samples and everything. So it's really hard to say how much starting a business costs, but I would say, especially if you are starting a product based business and you are manufacturing stuff and then you're sampling, you're going to need at least like $5,000 to get yourself started because it really all does add up all those little things. Like even once you've done your products and then you need your mailer bags and your labels and all those things that you absolutely need. Like that's where the costs will really start to rack up and you need racks in your house to put your products in just all those little things. Yeah. But I would just really map it out and you'll get a good idea from there

in terms of how much it is going to cost. This kind of like business idea never started, but I mean, I don't know how useful this will be to our community member, but my best friend did try to start a business like a few years ago she now has like a couple of coffee vans which is awesome so she could probably you know there's some insight I could probably take from that but basically when she tried to start the business this is something I kind of struggle with too there are so many ideas that I have and I'm like where do I even start like how do I create something that doesn't exist yet you know what I mean and so what she did was find businesses that are currently existing that are similar to the one she wanted to start and I feel like somewhere

on their page they have their manufacturer details and they kind of like google that and i guess like all the the little things like how do you actually where do you go what do you start with how do you create something doesn't exist yet find places that are similar to what you're trying to start see if there's any info on the actual website and exactly as you say brit like again like i'm no expert at all but and and you definitely are but i'm like yeah just trying to build those connections, whether it's like literally reaching out to a manufacturer or reaching out to a pre-existing business and seeing if anyone will give you some advice somewhere if it's in the same kind of like realm as what you're trying to start. But yeah, it is

all very confusing. I don't understand it. And that advice probably didn't do anything for anyone because I don't know anything. I think that's a good, I think it's a good point though. Like don't underestimate the power of networking. Yeah. And you'd be surprised how many people out there that are willing to help you or give you advice. And I know that's what I did in my early days. I joined every women in e-commerce Facebook group that I could find. And there's tons of them that have tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of members. And you can post in there and say, Hey, I want to connect with people. I'm looking to get custom packaging made. And one of the most amazing things as well. And something that I always think is we have this

thing at our fingertips called Google. And it is like, people will be like, how did you figure that out? I'm like, I literally Googled that shit and I figured it out. And now we have AI and we have chat GPT. Like we have all of this information right at our fingertips. And that's how I figured out my whole business. I didn't know anything. And now I know everything I know because I just did my research and I Googled the shit out of everything. And I continue to Google the shit out of stuff every single day. And people will often say like, how do I start a business? Like, what's the first thing that I do? And you know, you could quite literally jump onto Google and go, hey, what's the first thing I need to do if I want to start a business in Australia? I think

when people say like, what's the first thing that I do or where do I start? I don't think they're necessarily asking that question exactly. I think they're more so asking, I'm scared. I'm hesitant. I'm worried that it won't work out. I think that's what actually stops people because if you want to find out how to start a business in Australia, the world is your oyster when it comes to Google and the internet. I think it's more so them wanting reassurance when I get asked that question. It's not how do I start a business? It's like, I know I want to start one, but I'm really scared. Yeah. And it is scary and it's a lot and it's more than you would ever think when it comes to business. But that's like the beauty of it is starting from scratch and figuring

it all out yourself because I don't think there's any other way to start a business. Like you've got to do all that groundwork yourself in the beginning because let's be honest like I mean some people do have businesses handed to them but for the most of us you are there from that very first day figuring out how on earth do I set up a Shopify store yeah yeah 100% on the financial side of things I think that you're absolutely doing the right thing thinking about you know the finances looking into whether or not it's viable as you were saying I guess that's a really good tool for risk assessment if you need to invest 20 grand to get started you might go oh that doesn't feel comfortable or doable for me right now. And maybe you look at something else.

I would suggest looking into wholesaling. So if you're doing a product-based business, you know, like you said, you were going down to Spotlight and buying all your beads and decorations for your phone cases, which is absolutely a viable option on a small scale, but you'll find that you can save a lot of money purchasing things wholesale. So whether that's direct from suppliers, there absolutely are some things manufactured here. I know a lot of companies, you know, use suppliers and manufacturers. There's a lot of great ones in Asia and they're super close to us. Obviously, you know, doing your research into who you're working with and the ethics of those places, if that's important to you, is also

something that you might need to consider. But even from, you know, direct manufacturers on shore, a lot of the time you can purchase things in larger quantities at a much better price than just going down to your local store and buying the bits and pieces that you need as one-offs over the counter. The other thing that I would maybe suggest in terms of like finding suppliers and manufacturers, not that I have any experience whatsoever in this, but is just making sure that you're speaking to a couple of people, like anything, getting quotes from multiple places so you can compare prices, getting samples from multiple places so you can compare quality. Sample everything.

I've seen so many video nightmares of people like ordering stuff from Alibaba, which is like a massive website where you can find all the manufacturers in the world. I feel like everyone knows about Alibaba. Do you guys know about Alibaba? Yeah, but not in our mind. Let's not assume. It's a great platform. Yeah. So that's like a, essentially a hub where you can find manufacturers for anything and everything. But even if you are jumping on there and connecting with manufacturers and you can do research into their businesses, don't just go with one and then stick with them. Definitely explore those options, get samples made. Don't just order based on a photo that they've sent you I've seen some nightmare videos pop up on TikTok being like

this is what I thought I was ordering and then it showed up with like another company's logo on it or whatever I'm sure a lot of people have made really expensive mistakes there so yeah definitely shop around as expensive as it can be then sampling with multiple manufacturers like it's something that you have to do to ensure that quality yeah it's the equivalent of measure once well measure twice cut once isn't it like do yeah do the due diligence at the start to get what you need down the track and save yourself from a huge, very expensive mistake. And if you are ordering online where possible, I would just say pay using secure payment options because if you're dealing with companies or I can imagine it would be very overwhelming, you know, going into this pool of

people and within, you know, like anything, there will be people out there who are not doing the right thing and it can be hard to differentiate that, especially if you are looking at international places. So, you know, pay via PayPal, pay via a credit card that has some kind of protection on it, especially in those early days when you don't have the connections, you maybe don't know how to discern what is legit and what's not. Just that little extra step of protection, I feel like, might be kind of helpful. Yeah. If someone says, do you want to do a direct transfer or whatever, just be like, no, like I'm using PayPal 100%. Immediately nope out of there. Before we go, we did ask everyone on Instagram what they think. And if you want to participate,

we're at cheeseandthemoneyaus. We love putting our dilemma up every week and putting our feelers out for what you guys think too. The first question we asked was, do you have a small business? And we had 17% of people say yes, 54% of people said no, and 29% of people said, I want to, but I don't know where to start, which is a huge number. We said, if you do have a small business, what were the first steps that you took at the beginning of your journey? Somebody said they contacted as many potential clients as possible to put themselves on people's radar. Somebody else said they found a gap in the markets that they could see that they would be able to service people that weren't currently being serviced, which I feel like is

a little bit what you kind of did with Fate. We found that point of difference and really, you know, looked after so many people that didn't have people that were thinking about them. Somebody else said they budgeted their outlays and checked if they could afford to lose the money if they didn't work out. And I feel like that's a really great perspective. Look at it as a bit of an investment you're taking on risk starting a business and maybe it'll be amazing and maybe it'll take off or maybe you won't sell any phone cases and mind you the phone cases were hideous like I just want to throw that out there like I'll send you guys a photo it's embarrassing but it's like something I'm proud of because I was trying to do something a hundred percent

like it's something to be admired because like it's that was disgusting it's a good story now but it really like it taught you something that you're using and you're bringing up now and sharing with people. Somebody else said they figured out what exactly their services were going to be and what they could offer. Someone else said check all the permits and stuff which I think is a great point depending on what product, what industry, what whatever. Check permits, check copyright, all those kinds of things. Make sure you're not going to be infringing on something or in a little bit of hot water later. Somebody else said write a business plan. The common thread very much is do the work upfront to pre-plan. Yes. Which I think really

echoes kind of what we all were saying. I think I have one to add there as well. Sorry to cut you off. Another thing as well is to like ask yourself some important questions before even getting to the point of like then writing a business plan or coming up with your idea, or maybe you've already got the idea, but a really important question that I would ask myself if I was starting something new. And obviously I didn't ask myself this when I was starting FATE because I never thought it was going to be something grand. Like it was just this thing that I thought, yeah, that sounds like a good idea. Let's give it a go. But I'd really encourage people to ask themselves what it is they're wanting to do is something that they genuinely really want to do. I think because

of social media again, and how it is this highlight reel and, you know, even I make business look so fun and easy and la-di-da and TikToks and dancing around the warehouse. It can be very easy for people to go, I want to start my own business because it looks so fun. I can set my own hours. Like I can have a great work-life balance. And the reality of that is the absolute opposite. Like you will work more than you ever have. So I think it's really important to stop and ask yourself, why do I want to start my own business? Like what is my reason for wanting to do this? And if you already have your idea, is this something that I can see myself doing in five years time from now? Or is it something that I just think is cool or fun or interesting now?

because business is such a big commitment. Yeah. And once you're in, there's really no turning back, especially if that business then starts to scale. Like sometimes I step back and look at what I'm doing, like, oh my God, like this has gone really far. Like there's no backing out now, you know. If I wasn't, I'm just lucky I'm passionate about what I do

because, man, I've dug myself a really deep hole if I don't want to be in this anymore. So I'd really like ask yourself, you know, why is it that I want to do? What is my motive behind wanting to start this business? and am I ready for this commitment because it's the biggest commitment you'll ever bloody make, in my opinion.

Yeah. Yeah. So that's another thing I do too, like make sure it is something that you can see yourself doing for the long term or for at least for like a long period of time. That's awesome advice. And I feel like the perfect place

to kind of leave it off as well. The last thing I would add is listen to podcasts. There's so many resources out there. Follow Instagram pages. We obviously have the Business Bible series that we've done where we cover so much about small business. Britt, you've just launched,

obviously your own as well. Tell people where they can find that. Tell people where they can find you because I feel like you're so open with sharing your journey. And that's really what people need to kind of help them figure out is listen to other people and what's happened for them. Absolutely. If you want to come and listen to my podcast, it's called Big Business and you can find my podcast wherever you get your podcasts. And I'm only up to like episode six or something. So it's still really new and it is genuinely a great place to start if you are new to business because with my episodes so far, I've kind of taken it back to the very beginning

and I'm like going through all the phases and I'm being an open book on there. And I've had so many people DM me saying, I love how transparent you are being with this. I don't want it to be a business podcast where it's just like, oh, business is just so fun and it's really challenging sometimes, but I really love it.

Like each episode I'm going, this is what happens in business and this is how much things cost. I really want to try and share as much information with people as I can because I never listened to anyone talking about that when I started Fate and I would have loved to. So, yeah, feel free to look me up.

Big business. You can find me on Instagram and on TikTok. Just look up my name anywhere and everywhere. Amazing. We'll pop some links in the show notes for you guys. Definitely check it out. And, Britt, thank you so much for joining us and sharing all of your insight.

Thank you for having me. It's been great to be here. Come back any time. All right. I'll be back next week. Introducing our brand new co-host, Britt Sonners. Sorry, Victoria, you've been fired. Our producer will let Victoria know that she's no longer needed.

Yeah, I'm stepping in. You've been so great. Thank you so much, Brett. You're just amazing. You're so inspiring. So thank you so much again. Have a good weekend, guys. And Victoria, we'll see you bright and early on Monday for our Money Diary.

Bye, guys. The advice shared on She's On The Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She's on the Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision. If you do choose to buy a financial product, read the PDS, TMD and obtain appropriate financial advice tailored towards your needs. Victoria Devine and She's on the Money are authorised representatives of MoneySherpa PTY LTD ABN 321 649 27708 AFSL 451 289. Thanks for watching!