Meet the Hardworking Self-Starters Behind Our First-Ever Business Event
Our first-ever business event, #BlogHer19 Biz, is just days away! Get to know a few of our most experienced speakers who will be sharing implementable financial, business, and creative tips and tricks for entrepreneurs and businesswomen on November 9th. These women, including Kate Somerville, Maggie Q, and Tika Sumpter, will be featured on our panels which will cover topics including how to pitch yourself to brands, steps for negotiating deals, taking ownership of your finances, executing brand building digital strategies, and so much more. Take a look at all of our speakers and our full schedule before Saturday to be in-the-know on all things biz. Still need to reserve your spot? Apply here!
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MEET KATE SOMERVILLE
Kate Somerville A trailblazer in the world of prestige skincare, Kate Somerville has been healing skin and transforming lives for two decades. Having grown up with eczema, Kate understands firsthand the pain of not feeling comfortable in her own skin. After finding relief in the healing powers of goat’s milk, Kate’s personal transformation fueled a professional passion for helping others. In her 20s, she worked alongside some of the world’s top cosmetic surgeons as a paramedical esthetician, finetuning her signature skincare style that blends the best of dermatological and cosmetological worlds.
In 2004, Kate opened her Skin Health Experts Clinic on Melrose Place in the heart of Hollywood. Soon, she became known as the Guru Of Glow among celebrities, entertainers and other high profile personalities who recognized the value of her visible results, zero downtime approach to skincare.
Today, Kate treats some of the world’s most famous and photographed faces, helping them get red carpet and camera ready. Whether treating a VIP client in the clinic or delivering visible results from the comfort of home through her prestige product line, Kate truly believes that everyone deserves beautiful skin and promises to help you get there. Her ability to custom cocktail signature solutions to quickly and visibly transform specific skin concerns is the art behind the science (and what keeps clients coming back!).
Since opening its doors in 2004, Kate’s Melrose Place clinic remains the heartbeat of the brand. It’s also an incubator where Kate and her team of Skin Health Experts innovate cutting edge formulations and targeted treatments proven to treat skin with a multidimensional approach. Meticulously balancing active ingredients for maximum results with soothing essentials for minimal irritation, each and every product or service Kate offers is independently tested, rigorously vetted, and clinically perfected, customized by skin type or skin concern.
With a passion for people and a commitment to the planet, Kate Somerville is certified Cruelty-Free by PETA and a passionate partner of the Plastic Oceans initiative committed to making Kate’s skincare packaging 100% recyclable by the year 2022.
Meet Tika Sumpter
Tika Sumpter stars on the top-rated new comedy MIXED-ISH as “Alicia Johnson” opposite Mark-Paul Gosselaar and Gary Cole. The heartfelt series, a spin-off of BLACK-ISH, premiered this fall on ABC and was just picked up for a full season order. Sumpter, producer of official Sundance selection SOUTHSIDE WITH YOU, can also be seen in Tyler Perry’s series THE HAVES AND THE HAVE NOTS, currently in its 7th season and confirmed for an 8th. Upcoming Sumpter can be seen in SONIC THE HEDGEHOG which will be released by Paramount Pictures on February 14th, 2020.
MEET Christina Stembel
Christina Stembel always knew she wanted to start a business that would utilize her creativity, solve a real problem, and having the potential to scale big. She dreamed up the idea for Farmgirl Flowers in 2010, quit her job at Stanford University, and launched from her dining room in San Francisco, which housed the company (and her very understanding fiancé!) for 2 years. She’s built Farmgirl from less than $50K in self funding into an 75+ person company generating $23M+ in annual revenue. She’s not stopping there though – she plans to grow Farmgirl’s annual revenue while creating a business you’d want to buy from, sell to, and work for — because she believes it’s just the right thing to do.
MEET MAGGIE Q
Maggie Q is an environmentalist, activist, actress & entrepreneur. She created QEEP UP™ to share her passion for the planet and empower all people to become a NATION of everyday eco-warriors.
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Meet Jennifer Powell
Jennifer Powell was a model agent for over 20 years and the head of the Woman’s Board at Next Models in Los Angeles for almost 13 of those years.She expanded into online and social media
talent unexpectedly 11 years ago after Rumi Neely of FashionToast.com approached the agency to bring her on as potential talent. Powell saw the value of what Rumi was doing – creating beautiful lifestyle imagery on her blog which linked out to ecommerce and therefore sold product. She saw an opening in the market and with her long term brand relationships, knowledge of the industry and understanding of the value trackable conversion brings to a brand, she started growing this into a valuable business. With girls like Neely racking up audiences of 75,000 unique views a week by 2010, Powell realized blogging was the industry’s next significant marketing platform. “When you have a person with 2 million Instagram followers posting an image with a product, that’s direct to consumer advertising,” Powell told CNBC. “It’s a no brainer.”
Powell was the first agent to turn blogs into immediate profitable businesses by orchestrating collaborations and endorsements with fashion and lifestyle brands. As time went by she realized the value of this business structure and started to build the influencer’s overall brand and create sustainable businesses using the foundation of the influencers blog and social media. She was responsible for the industry’s first influencer design collaborations with Rumi Neely x RVCA and Chiara Ferragni x Steve Madden. She was also responsible for putting the first influencer on covers of traditional print magazines- Chiara Ferragni (The Blonde Salad) for Lucky Magazine, Cosmopolitan and Spanish Vogue.
Powell headed up a portfolio of around 30 influencers at Next Models and started the digital/influencer division in the NYC, London, Paris and Milan offices. She represented a long list of the first significant fashion influencers in this space – Rumi Neely (Fashion Toast), Chiara Ferragni (The Blonde Salad), Danielle Bernstein (We Wore What), Julie Sarinana (Sincerely Jules), Kristina
Bazan, Negin Mirsalehi, Gala Gonzalez (Amlul), Shea Marie (Peace Love Shea), Caroline Vreeland, Lucky Blue Smith and Pyper America Smith etc.. Powell’s major successes in this space led her to leave Next and start Jennifer Powell, Inc in April 2017. Her focus being twofold influencer management/brand building and also consulting and creation of influencer marketing strategy for brands. She manages the businesses of Julie Sarinana, Danielle Bernstein, Bryanboy, Nikki DeRoest (Hello To Beauty) and Mary Lawless Lee (Happily Grey). She is representing and managing the creator of the first CGI supermodel, Shudu @shudu.gram which yet again puts her at the forefront of change in the influencer space.
Meet Kwanza Jones
Kwanza Jones is a fearless female who lives better than large, she lives SUPERCHARGED. As Founder/CEO of the lifestyle brand/app, SUPERCHARGED® by Kwanza Jones, she provides inspiring tools, boosts energy and confidence, and helps you take daily action to be you, but better. iamsupercharged.com
An accomplished artist (top 10 Billboard music charts), investor (over $15million in diverse/women founders) and philanthropist (over $4million to education/empowerment), she laughs at limits and makes Queen Moves Only. kwanzajones.com.
Meet Pia Baroncini
Lara Pia Baroncini (formerly Arrobio) was born in and raised in Pasadena, California. She attended Flintridge Sacred Heart Academy from 2000-2005 before moving to New York in 2005 to study Design and Management at Parsons, the New School for Design. Following Parsons, Baroncini was a freelance producer (Oyster Magazine), casting director (Diane Martel), blogger (Fighting the Ware Against Blowing It) and photographer (published works in multiple books and magazines) in NYC before a two year stint at People’s Revolution. In 2010, she expanded into brand-building, management, social media and design during a five-year tenure at Reformation. After accepting a job as womenswear designer at Zara in Spain, she received a counter-offer from Revolve clothing to launch her own namesake line, LPA. Baroncii is now the Creative Director of LPA, which launched in August of 2016. The line, which is a high-end contempory womenswear brand, is sold all over the globe and as been seen on such celebrities as Madonna, Kim Kardashian and Gigi Hadid. Arrobio was recently featured on the cover of The New York Times Style section, was the face of Glossier’s “Body Hero” campaign and is currently the host of “Pia’s Pod”.
