Venture Capital For Your Business w/ Black Girl Sunscreen - YouTube

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- (Shontay) Most people don't answer unknown numbers but sometimes your intuition tells

you like "ugh I might need to pick this up."

And I picked it up, and it was a gentleman representing Target.

- (Hallease) As someone who didn't grow up understanding the importance of sunscreen,

I was really excited to talk to Shontay Lundy, the founder and CEO of Black Girl Sunscreen.

- (Shontay) We have changed the mindset around sun safety.

Does it continue to be a challenge?

Yes, absolutely.

Because we're changing behaviors.

In some people's minds, it's like we're stripping the superpower of black people away.

Our melanin protects us from the sun.

Sunscreen is a preventative measure for many different things.

Whether it's hyperpigmentation, premature aging, and of course later on down the road,

melanoma, that's what we really focused on.

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Hello everyone.

I am Hallease, a digital storyteller and video producer.

Welcome to episode 1 of Convos with CEOs, where we take a peak behind the shelved veil

to see what it takes to get a product in a store like Target.

For this first episode, I really wanted to focus on finding funding and let Shontay tell

you her story with Black Girl Sunscreen.

- Did you end up finding venture capital for Black Girl Sunscreen or did you figure out

a way to get it going on your own?

- So, a venture capitalist is a little bit later on.

It's so many different levels to this question.

Shontay started Black Girl Sunscreen with her savings from being in corporate America.

Started the business with about $35,000.

Right, that was my initial investment.

It got me quite a bit of product, but then I had to constantly reinvest my money and

then prioritize my spending because we didn't raise capital.

We raised capital just last year in 2020, during the pandemic.

The process is different for everyone, though.

I made vow to myself and to the company that I would put myself in environments that I

wasn't currently in.

So, if we're gonna raise capital, then I need to be in the room with whoever it is, high

net worth individuals, VCs, or people that can make those connections.

That's what I did.

I started applying for different grants.

I started going to different events that had those type of people.

I started participating in pitch competitions to get the practice to speak about the business

in a way that I hadn't before.

Right.

To understand what type of questions would be asked of Black Girl Sunscreen, and being

comfortable sharing financials and being able to give the support that's needed without

giving so much information.

My first pitch competition was, I was living in Miami, flew to Los Angeles.

I guess I bombed it 'cause I didn't win the money and that was probably the most discouraging

... I would say not pitch, but situation because I let three people make me feel as if Black

Girl Sunscreen wasn't going to work.

"Oh, it's not this, it's not that, it's not this.

So, yeah.

We'll pass."

But I had to quickly realize that that's three people out of this entire world.

Not everyone is gonna jive with what you got going on.

You only have three minutes.

Three minutes to get out what your company does is very quickly.

But you gotta be really precise.

We excelled.

Then from there we were introduced to another group, another community.

Right.

So I did another pitch competition.

After that pitch competition, the high net worth individuals and investors started to

roll in.

"Hey, we saw you here.

Hey, we wanna have a conversation."

Now, the thing is, there's only but so much time.

So, you can't talk to everyone.

So, it's like how do you vet who's going to align best with your personality and your

organization?

My process took probably about four months to get the contract signed.

I would do it differently now, though.

- Oh, really?

What would you change?

- Yeah.

I think that sometimes companies and even black female founders don't understand their

worth.

They don't necessarily know what they bring to the table.

Sometimes when you're raising capital, your back might be against the wall and you need

the funding.

So, it's kind of just like, "Okay, I'm gonna take what I can get."

But if you plan it out, it's not about taking what you can get.

It's, okay.

"This person aligns, or this group aligns.

We have similar goals.

They're gonna work best with me, and they are bringing these things to the table.

Things that I need, whether it's building top talent.

Whether it's understanding supply chain, I'm gonna select this partner for me."

That's what I would do differently.

I don't think I would rush the process.

- Yeah, the whole.

I know, for me, something I still struggle with, too, is having the scarcity mindset

versus thinking abundantly and kind of waiting for the right partnerships, connections, collaborations

to not necessarily come to you but you're taking the steps to find them and building

that bridge out, and hopefully seeing who will build the bridge and meet you halfway.

For sure.

At what stage did you start to factor in an accountant full time, or at least a contracting

accountant that works with your company specifically, and an attorney.

- Oh good questions.

The accountant came before legal.

Accountant is by far one of the most important pieces of the business.

Although they are hiding in the closet typing away on their spreadsheets, you gotta have

buttoned up financials to first of all raise capital, second of all understand if you could

even have a retail partnership.

Then it guides you on how to run the business.

Because they're pumping out profit and loss statements, balance sheets, forecasts.

If you don't have that, it's kind of like you're going through your business blindfolded.

That was within year one.

Legal came, I would say year two and a half, three.

I love saying, "Okay.

Well, we'll just toss it to legal."

I love it.

Because it shows the seriousness of it.

We want things to be done the right way.

Whether it's contractual, whether it's just how to handle something.

I don't think legal is necessary right away.

It's not necessary within the first year, accounting is.

- What would you say are some of the things that you wish you had known coming into this

business specifically.

I'm not sure if you've had businesses in the past, but, this business specifically.

What do you wish you had known coming into it?

- Nothing.

Because the mistakes that we're making now, helps us grow.

Make a mistake once, hopefully you don't make the same mistake twice, right.

Being on this entrepreneurial journey sometimes can be lonely.

You feel like you're walking in the dark.

There's no blue print.

I don't wanna come in here knowing all the answers.

However, I do like having the experience of different things that are impactful.

So, whether it's communicating with different types of people, motivating them to be their

best, understanding who our community is and how to grow that.

Those are the experiences that I like having and knowing.

But ... If I don't know it, I'll learn it.

- Yeah.

- And if we make a mistake it's okay, because a mistake can typically be fixed.

- Can you tell me a little bit about when you first found out that Black Girl Sunscreen

was gonna be in Target.

I remember it like it was just yesterday.

I was in Montreal shooting a commercial and I got a call.

Typically ... most people don't answer unknown numbers, but sometimes your intuition just

tells you, "Uh, you should probably pick this up."

And I picked it up and it was a gentleman representing Target.

"Hey, I'm calling form Target.

We are trying to do a story on sun safety and we wanna see if Black Girl Sunscreen will

resonate with the community.

Do you think you're ready for something like that."

And I put it on mute and that's when you have one of this like, "Oh my god" my crush just

saw me in the hallway and he noticed my hair and he looked at me in the eyes.

Whoever your crush is.

It's like one of those moments where you just kind of scream.

I legit put the phone on mute and screamed because corporate partnerships almost.

Not almost.

They give validation to brands.

The corporate validation for growing businesses is a real thing.

Consumers still think if you're not on the shelves of some retail store, then you are

making your product in the kitchen or in the bathroom.

That may very well be the case, but you're not legitimate in their mind.

But then as soon as you appear on any retailers stores, it's like, "Oh, okay.

This is a real company."

That was the first interaction with Black Girl Sunscreen in Target.

It was very memorable because they told me that, "Listen, they searched literally every

keyword and it just kept coming up, reoccurring Black Girl Sunscreen, Black Girl Sunscreen,"

And that meant to me that we were doing a good job with our brand presence.

I encourage other brand founders or just women on this journey, men on this journey that

you have to make noise in whatever space that you're doing because if you don't, then you

don't exist.

How do you bring the attention to yourself?

Black Girl Sunscreen, some of the things that we were doing were ... participating in local

events, a lot of word of mouth, jumping on radio stations, anything social.

We didn't have that many followers.

But even if you have five, ten, fifteen thousand followers, if you're pushing your product

free to people that may take a picture or may just talk about it: that's the best marketing

out there yet today.

Because it is word of mouth.

Those were some of the things that we were doing very early on to bring the awareness,

not necessarily for a retailer to pick us up, but just to talk about sun safety, the

lack of education, and the conversation: it was in the community.

There's been some sentiment out there that black girls are just trending, but we don't

have to be trending if we bring each other along.

Because once the attention goes off of one business it just goes on to the next, or from

one creator the the next.

If we're truly holding hands and it's not fluff, then we're just gonna continue to rise.

That's why these conversations are so, so , so important.

I'm excited to see who else you have on your series because now you're gonna be able to

talk to so many black CEOs just with this opportunity.

Right, but then it is more than just having the one conversation.

How do you stay connected?

Right.

Whether it's through socials, or whether it's kind of like, "Hey, let's do a live."

Let's just keep this momentum going.

You don't have to be besties, but just have that working professional relationship, I

think is more important than anything.

- Are you available for mentorship?

Somebody (laughing) asked that in the comments.

- Yeah, we get that pretty often.

Yes!

And the reason why I say yes very quickly without a fee by the way, is that when I was

coming up, I didn't feel comfortable or have anyone that I could reach out to as a soundboard.

Shontay does offer 20 minute sessions.

You can send an email to [email protected] to jump on my calendar.

What's also really cool is we have a professional team that are experts in their fields.

If you wanna talk tot someone within the marketing department or the finance department, they're

available to share their resources as well and their knowledge.

- Thank you so much for watching this video and discing around.

In the description box below, I've included a few extra links that I think would be considered

continued learning for this interview.

The first is a list of business grants, one of which I actually used last year for my

production company StumbleWell.

So, check that out.

The second is a link to the New Voices newsletter which is an organization that helps women

of color find venture capital funding.

I'm actually subscribed to the newsletter already and they give so much information

and opportunities in there.

Really check it out.

And the third thing is a link to Target’s accelerators program where entrepreneurs and

startups can learn the ins and outs of retail and work with Target executives.

Innovation is part of Target’s DNA as they continue to recognize teamwork, community,

and courage to challenge the status quo..

In the comments below, let me know if anything resonated with you from Shontay.

We have two more videos in this series.

If you're new here, consider subscribing.

Again, I'm Hallease and I'll see you when I see you.

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