Brand Out Loud

Showing up, standing out, and saying what matters.

Hello. Here I am on Substack, the last place I expected to be. But that is somehow fitting, when I look back on the last five years.

In the coming weeks, I will share more of my story, but here are the cliff notes. Fashion was always my first career love. I became smitten in high school, when representatives of the now defunct Tobe Coburn School for Fashion Careers paid my class a visit. Suddenly, I knew what I wanted to do. Fast forward many years later, and I was a brand Vice President of Production at my dream company, Ralph Lauren.

But 2020 had other plans for me. I lost my job, and (living in NYC in the heart of the pandemic) I felt like I was losing my mind. I quickly realized two things: 1. My network was largely in the same boat that I was. They were either being let go, being furloughed, or laying off half their teams as lockdowns ensued, orders were being cancelled, and no one was buying any apparel other than face masks and yoga pants. 2. I was absolutely craving human connection. NYC was eerily quiet, as offices, stores, restaurants, schools all shut down. You could literally stand in the middle of Park Avenue (or any other) and not see a car. Little did I know that the solution to both of those dilemmas would be LinkedIn.

I literally reinvented myself in my 50s, going from a social media novice (my first LinkedIn post in 2020 was pretty dreadful) to a LinkedIn Top Voice. Along the way, I have helped executives, entrepreneurs, and professionals find their voice and build their personal brand on the platform. It is work that I absolutely love doing and that brings me joy. So why am I here?

I kept hearing (and eventually using) the phrase “building on rented land.” That’s what you’re doing on any social media platform. The warning signs and wakeup calls are all there. The frenzy over a potential sale of TikTok. People on LinkedIn getting locked out of their accounts. Decreased reach as more people join the platform and algorithms shift. The call to build something completely my own keeps calling. I started answering a few months ago with a newsletter on Beehiiv. That’s been steady growth, but also slow. I am above board to a fault, and despite the number of newsletters that show up in my own inbox unsolicited, I don’t believe in just adding my email list to my subscriber base.

What really brings me here? The thing that matters most to me. Community. I am launching this newsletter with just a handful of subscribers. And I can’t wait to see what happens. Thank you for reading!