How licensing sports team logos became this jewelry brand's secret weapon (and how you can do it too)

14 Sep 2026 · 36 min · 18 chapters

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In short

Love AJ founder Amanda Thomas explains how licensing sports team logos (via Fanatics) enabled her jewelry brand to enter mass retail, especially Target, and how she markets “24-7” wearable sports jewelry. She also shares founder lessons on resilience, bootstrapping, cash flow, celebrity/PR strategy, and scaling systems.

Guest backgrounds

Amanda Thomas founded Love AJ at age 14; 25 years in jewelry. She sold through retailers like Urban Outfitters, Nordstrom, and Shopbop; did Beyoncé/Coachella 2018 (Baychella) with dancers; later expanded into fine jewelry and Target.

Key claims

Women are sports fans and sports jewelry is underserved; licensing creates a defensible “only jewelry license” advantage; Target success requires price/material choices (e.g., resin) and heavy marketing work; she stays founder-led and nimble by using contractors.

Notable examples

Bijou Sport by Love AJ (MLB, MLS, NFL launching September, NWSL); Target rollout to all stores by December; Beyoncé wore Love AJ during Coachella, driving sales spikes; 2015 “illegal issue” rock bottom led to a rushed collection still selling today.

Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.

Chapters

Tap a time to open that second in VO

Amanda's Journey in Jewelry

0:04 to 0:26

Amanda discusses her 25-year journey in the jewelry business.

“It can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50-page restoration block, or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks.”

Amanda's Journey in Jewelry

0:45 to 2:00

Amanda discusses her 25-year journey in the jewelry business.

“Aside from the fact that you've been at this for 25 years, which I think in itself is an amazing achievement.”

Milestones and Achievements

2:00 to 4:50

Key milestones in Amanda's career, including notable collaborations.

“I'm going to map out what this business is going to look like.”

Target and Sports Licensing

4:50 to 6:04

Discussion on how Amanda got into Target and sports jewelry licensing.

“So now we own the licensing to Major League Baseball, Major League Soccer, NFL, which we're launching in September, National Women's Soccer League, tons of different sports leagues.”

Target and Sports Licensing

6:10 to 7:21

Discussion on how Amanda got into Target and sports jewelry licensing.

“because let me tell you, when I was digging through and looking at what we're actually spending in our businesses on email marketing, I was pretty shocked.”

Navigating Target Success

8:19 to 9:39

Amanda shares strategies for ensuring product success in Target.

“And then you have a minimum guarantee you have to hit in sales.”

Resilience in Entrepreneurship

9:39 to 13:24

Amanda discusses maintaining passion and overcoming business challenges.

“One of the things that I love about your story is the fact that you have been at this for 25 years.”

Lessons from Failure

13:24 to 14:03

Insights on learning from failures and adapting in business.

“But I think it's helped me be more savvy and more nimble because I'm looking at our cash flow and I'm operating from that place versus, you know, having this big, expensive ship that I'm driving.”

Navigating Crunch Time as an Entrepreneur

14:03 to 15:45

Learn about the emotional challenges entrepreneurs face during tough times.

Bootstrapping and Funding Lessons

15:46 to 17:33

Discover practical funding strategies for growing a business.

“Because, you know, I felt like, oh, am I bad at my job?”
Show all 18 chapters

Defining Your End Game as an Entrepreneur

17:34 to 20:08

Understand the importance of having a clear end goal for your business.

“So three ways that I have found cash that's been relatively easy and painless.”

The Power of Celebrity Marketing

20:09 to 23:21

Explore how celebrity associations can elevate your brand.

“it's i feel like it also like changes depending on the season that you're in as well but i was um I saw that Alison from Poppy, you know, she's obviously on this massive exit.”

Time Management Strategies for Founders

23:22 to 27:24

Learn effective ways to maximize productivity as a business owner.

“Not even necessarily celebrities, but who are the micro or macro influencers that have like really, really deep like sub stack followings or they are doing really well on shop my and affiliate links like that.”

The Story Behind a Beyoncé Collaboration

27:25 to 28:04

Hear the inspiring tale of how the brand collaborated with Beyoncé.

“So I went on a double date and my friend had a new girlfriend.”

Beyoncé's Impact on Sales

28:04 to 29:24

Learn how a jewelry designer's collaboration with Beyoncé led to a sales spike.

Networking and Authentic Relationships

29:24 to 31:38

Discover the importance of building genuine relationships in business.

“Yeah, we definitely, definitely obviously saw a spike in sales specifically in the items that she was wearing.”

Generosity in Networking

31:38 to 32:44

Understand how being generous can enhance your reputation and business.

Effective Business Resources and Hacks

32:44 to 34:45

Explore useful tools and resources for optimizing business operations.

“So myself plus every single person in my company writes a full to-do list plus records a loom on how to do every task in our company.”
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Transcript

Automatic transcript. May contain errors.

0:01This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome? That's new. It can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50-page restoration block, or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it. Ready to make anything online make sense? There's no place like Chrome. Check responses set up required, compatibility and availability varies 18+. Amanda Thomas, welcome to Female Founder World. Hi, thank you for having me. You are the founder of a jewellery brand called Love AJ, which you started when you were 14 years old.

0:36You've been at this for 25 years. I'm going to ramble off some of the milestones that I have here of what you've achieved in this business to let people understand where you're at. Aside from the fact that you've been at this for 25 years, which I think in itself is an amazing achievement. Thank you. You have been won by all of the girls. Bella Hadid, Hailey Bieber and Kendall Jenner, you have added in a, you've like expanded up the line to have a fine jewelry line. When you look back at the last 25 years, what are some of those milestone moments that make you think, okay, that was a real achievement?

1:12I think first in my early 20s when I got into Urban Outfitters, Nordstrom and Shopbop all in one day off of an article. That's what really catapulted it to the next level. then doing Beyonce and all her dancers for Coachella 2018, Baychella. That was major Forbes 30 under 30 list. The day I got married, I found out. So that was exciting. And then recently getting into Target and launching Love AJ for Target. That was like bucket list. That is incredible. I've been working on that for almost 10 years. When you started this, obviously you're 14 years old. I'm sure you didn't have this all mapped out of where it was going.

1:52I sure didn't. But when did it become less of a like, I'm going to make some jewelry and into this thing where you thought, okay, I am going to launch a line into Target. I'm going to map out what this business is going to look like. When I was in high school and college, it was like my afterschool hobby turned side hustle. So I started making some good money for a teenager, but it wasn't my full-time job or career. I was like still in school. And I think once I graduated college, I was like, let's take this really seriously. And that's when I started doing real mass production. I got into a showroom, started selling to larger retailers.

2:32And yeah, I think from that point forward, it's just been brick by brick, building it bigger and bigger and bigger. And I'd say probably like 10 years ago, I really decided that Target was my number one retailer I wanted to get into. I have always wanted Love AJ to be an it girl brand, but incredibly accessible. I just think good design can be affordable. It doesn't need to be expensive. Like it really doesn't need to be. So I have always wanted to get into Target because I feel like it's, you know, would be a great opportunity to get to get in front of so many more faces and get in the hands of girlies across America that just want really cute jewels.

3:14So how did how to target happen? So really interesting. I had been calling them, banging their line, begging, and it was a no, no, no, no, no. While this was happening, I took a chance and I got the licensing from Fanatics for Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer. My sales director saw a white space in the market where there was no sports jewelry that was just like really cute, easy, wearable, and not like crazy looking. That is so interesting. Yes, especially with like Dodgers and Yankees logos becoming real like fashion marks so we got into the space in 2023 and within our first month we got through our entire first year projection of sales so we were like oh damn we're really literally go and you license to be the only person that can use that in jewelry I'm one of the people that can use the jewelry license but there wasn't there was not any really cool fashion forward and just like simple yeah simple sports jewelry so we launched with that and then target saw it and was like this is it so we got into target via our sports licensing and then after two years of successful sales and just like working and collaborating with them they gave me the opportunity to launch love ha for target which launched in june this year which was so exciting and we're rolling out to every target in America by December.

4:40Incredible. Yeah. I'm stuck on this sports thing because I think this is so interesting. So interesting. Was it separate to the main line or was it within Love AJ? It's part of the main line. It's called Bijou Sport by Love AJ. So now we own the licensing to Major League Baseball, Major League Soccer, NFL, which we're launching in September, National Women's Soccer League, tons of different sports leagues. Because we are entering this moment, I think, of a real understanding that women are sports fans. And I don't think that it's been, I think it's been really slept on. Like a lot of women, a lot of advertisers aren't trying to target women at these games.

5:20No. And it's been slept on. And so I'm very, very interested in this. And it's interesting because it's a real crossover for our customer because a lot of our customers are sports fans. And the best part about our designs that I love is it's not bold, crazy jerseys or something. You can wear it all day. You can have your little Yankee studs in your ear stack. You can have your really cute little Dodgers logo pendant necklace, like mixed in with your tennis necklace. Yeah. You know, it's supposed to be 24-7 jewels you wear all day, every day. That's the ethos of the brand. And that's what I try to bring to all of our products, whether it's regular jewelry, fine jewelry or sports jewelry or whatever it may be.

6:05And also like how giftable as well. So it's really cute. I love it. So how do these deals happen? My goal this month is to get every single one of you to switch your email marketing platform to OmniSend because you could save thousands of dollars a year on email marketing and still get all of the features that you need. because let me tell you, when I was digging through and looking at what we're actually spending in our businesses on email marketing, I was pretty shocked. And that's just on platform fees. It just feels so unnecessary. And the more that my businesses grow and obviously my email list is growing, the more those fees are bloating too.

6:42So I did some digging to find a smarter swap for a platform that costs significantly less, but is still intuitive to use and has all of those features that you need to run a successful online business. And I landed on OmniSend. For businesses that are around 45 ,000 to 50 ,000 contacts, OmniSend starts at$413 a month for 600 ,000 emails, whereas the comparable Klaviyo plan is over$1 ,000. Making that swap is so smart, it's so easy, and it's going to give you thousands of dollars back every year that then you can put into actually growing your business. And that cost reduction, that is actually before you even apply our discount code.

7:24So if you add the code FFW35, that code will give you another 35 % off. And I know you're thinking, Jasmine, it is such a headache to swap email marketing platforms. You're already set up. You've got all of your flows, all of your segmentation built. And I understand. But if you move to OmniSend today, they have agreed that the team will migrate you on to OmniSend for free when you get your paid plan. So you could be up and running in just five days, saving 35 % on the platform. It is an absolute no-brainer. Make the smart swap to OmniSend today. Use the code FFW35 to make sure that you get that 35 % discount.

8:07If email marketing is just quietly chewing up all of your budget, But check out OmniSend.com forward slash female found world. Use that discount code or go and head to the link in the show notes. So you go to Fanatics. Is that who licenses them? Yeah. So you can go to Fanatics. You apply. And then you have a minimum guarantee you have to hit in sales. And then you pay them a royalty fee. So interesting. Yeah. Let's talk about Target. Once you're actually in Target, what are you doing to make sure that your product sells and that you're a success? Yes, this is a very good question. Getting into Target, A, has been amazing.

8:44They're the best brand collaborators, but it's almost like starting a second business. I have to market it all myself. I have to make sure it gets shot. I have to do all the gifting, make sure it gets in the right hands. I have to be throwing the events. I'm the one that's making sure eyes are on the collection, people are shopping it. And also, I have to work with them to make sure a price point makes sense. because it needs to be right for the target customer. The target customer is slightly different than the Love AJ customer. She's a little more price conscious, so it needs to be sharper. So I'm trying to design within a certain budget, if you will.

9:22So I'm trying to use certain materials that lend itself to that. For example, our summer job had tons of resin, which is essentially just this really yummy, heavy plastic, but it was price conscious. So the stuff looked really cool and was still really affordable. And I think just marrying that design and price together is what makes it successful. One of the things that I love about your story is the fact that you have been at this for 25 years. I think that a lot of people who are entrepreneurial can really have shiny object syndrome. And they're like, this AI thing sounds really good. Let's go try something in that.

9:57Let's go do a course. How do you maintain the passion that it takes to be able to show up and lead in a business every day for 25 years? I think about this all the time and especially now in this modern era. We're seeing, not to break the fourth wall, we're seeing tons of podcast clips about how to be an entrepreneur. And it's very inspiring. Like we didn't have this access to business and information that we did before. Or I think you have to ask yourself, is this my life's calling? Is this what I'm set on this earth to do? I believe for me, this is what I'm supposed to do. I believe wholeheartedly.

10:37And so I've been able to do it for 25 years because every time I have completely failed and hit the bottom, I don't have a choice. It's like my life's purpose. Right. So I got to start again. Yeah. Okay. There's nothing else for me to do. This is what I'm supposed to do. So I think if you don't feel like that, that's okay. You don't have to have your idea be your life's passion. But I think it's important to figure out what is and go all in on that. Okay. I'm going to have to ask you now. When have you hit rock bottom and failed? Oh, God. A couple times. I'd say three times. Three times I hit like zero or negative, like truly not going to happen.

11:23Once was 2015. I remember I really hit rock bottom. I had an illegal issue that really took me down. I barely had any money, but I had enough to make one more collection. And I got really, really kind of bootstrappy. I did all the renderings myself I worked with my factory just to do one sample set not two I went through my Rolodex did the whole photo shoot and campaign for free launched it and to this day there's two pieces from that line that are still in the mix wow so I just you know you get knocked down but you you build the backup brick by brick it's just one piece by one piece And then I would say, honestly, recently I had a year where we missed our sales goal projections due to tariffs and political unrest, which is stuff that's out of your control.

12:25And I didn't kind of like shrink down our ship fast enough. And I'm still dealing with those repercussions. However, I learned how to be more nimble in business. So, for example, I think that now I have my business structured with less full-time employees and more independent contractors for projects and things that I need. And if at any given point I need to kind of have our spend be a little bit lower, I'm able to pause some of those contracts with people and come back to them at a later date when I'm ready. Yeah, I think that's really, really smart. You said you had six people. yes in-house in the team and the rest are contractors yeah i used to have like almost 12 full-time employees and now i have six and then now i have a bunch of incredible independent contractors which by the way there's like i think right now in this day and age so many people are doing that everyone wants to do that everyone wants to do that so there's a lot lots of options and i just have short-term contracts with people like three to six months and you can always renew You can always pause, come back, just maintain good relationships.

13:38But I think it's helped me be more savvy and more nimble because I'm looking at our cash flow and I'm operating from that place versus, you know, having this big, expensive ship that I'm driving. And if we're going through a storm, unable to dwindle it down so I get through the storm. take me back to that period where you realize you had to get from 12 to six to six i can imagine that would have been really crunchy time yeah that one that one stung yeah it's kind of an ego death you know you become an entrepreneur you know you have some success you think you're you know hot shit and you think you're set you're like surely this is it now yeah and there's just things that happen in business that are out of your control but it's about how you react to them that makes you a good business owner i think it's very easy to be successful that's the easy part that's the fun part but i think where we should be celebrating people more is getting through the hard and persevering that's what we should be celebrating like oh you went from that rock bottom back up like congratulations how did you do that we focus a lot on how did you grow your business and become successful which by the way very important but sometimes i think it's more interesting to see how people crawled out of the hole yeah that's so interesting a lot of the people that i talked to on the show maybe were in their first like six years maybe they haven't hit that yet yeah and it's kind of like everything has just been up because they've been on the they've been like on the trend wave and like on that like it's still the launch trajectory really like those first those first years then the competitors come in and the copycats come in and then you get to like the team size where things get really hard and that's kind of this like crunchy point where it's exactly what you said then the hard shit happens that i think is where we should be celebrating wait how you get through that yeah and i think when the crunchy stuff happens like the two takeaways i would tell people is first allow your ego to die which is a real thing.

15:53Yeah. Because, you know, I felt like, oh, am I bad at my job? The answer is no, I'm bad at my job if I don't figure this out. I was having a conversation with someone like literally three days ago and she's going through something in her business where she has to let people go and get rid of her office and work from home. And basically she's just grown too, she's grown too quickly and can't sustain it and I'm coming in externally looking at it being like actually what you have is all of these things are amazing you've just blown out on these other things it's on the other side of like four hard conversations is you actually having a really great business and being able to rebuild it but it's taken her so many weeks and months to be able to come to that decision I'm like if you don't do this you'll know you're not going to have the decision to make anymore, it'll be made for you.

16:45You're going to bleed too much. It's, it's two things. I think first off, it's just knowing that, you know, we get attached to people we work with. Yeah. I love, I love all the people I work with so much, but sometimes business is just business. And it's like, this doesn't fit me right now, but if it does later, we can circle back you know it's not a personal thing yeah and i think it's just it's the ability to kind of cut things when it's when it's time to cut them you you have to know that i want to talk about bootstrapping and how you're managing yeah and all the things because again you've you've funded this yourself yes how have you done it what are the lessons that you have for those of us trying to do the same thing and funding a target launch as well like oh i know so luckily i mean i started when i was a teenager so all the money and i was living at my parents house under my parents roof so all the money i made was just like profit in my pocket so it was easy for me to cash flow in the beginning because you know my my food and my home and all those things were paid for thank you mom and dad but i think that as you're growing and scaling sometimes you know you'll get a big purchase order and you're like, I can't, I can't pay for this.

18:03Like, what do I do? So three ways that I have found cash that's been relatively easy and painless. First and foremost is try to garner a good relationship with your bank. You should have a credit line. If you don't have one, you got to go get one, call your guy up. Like you got to have a personal relationship with someone at the bank. Um, I created a couple credit lines for love AJ, which we use all the time, which is super helpful. And also the interest rates are typically pretty low on those. Another really easy one is Shopify Capital. Shopify Capital is incredible. They give you rolling loans based on how much you're doing on e-com.

18:42What's so nice about it is the money just comes out from your daily orders. You don't have to think about paying it back. It just comes out of your payouts. So I really like that one. And then the third one, when you need larger chunks of cash, finding like independent funding companies. I found this one called Wayflyer and I think they're based in Ireland, but they're really incredible. And you know, you show them what POs you have coming in, where your business is going, and you can work with them on a loan. And it's also pretty good interest rates. So you got to get savvy. I never wanted to give away equity of my company.

19:17I want to be a hundred percent owner. It's important to me just because I do love AJ to live the life that I want. I don't want to necessarily be dealing with other people. So that's important to me to keep all the equity. That totally makes sense. Yeah. And you want to be your own boss rather than answering to investors, I'm assuming. Yeah. And I don't really have a dream or goal to sell of AJ because I really like my job. Is there an end game? end game is i would just really would love to be the household name for everyday jewelry yeah i love that i want to be available to lots and lots of girls all around the world i want good design that's accessible and affordable yeah i'm so curious when i ask people the end game because it's i feel like it also like changes depending on the season that you're in as well but i was um I saw that Alison from Poppy, you know, she's obviously on this massive exit.

20:20And then I saw her posting a couple of days ago to say that they were doing it again. They're launching another business. Yeah. And I was so interested by that because I just thought if I had gone through this. I think about this all the time. Would I be starting another business right now? And especially if I had little kids. Like, I'm like, girl, you've earned a break. But, like, obviously you don't want one. Like, you're in it for, like, the love of this. And that's why I always like to ask, like, what is the end game? because I do think that we can assume, okay, maybe I would like build and sell this thing.

20:49And even if I had like the best exit possible, would you just go and do it again? Because you just love doing it so much. I love working so much. I would never not work. Like I don't think about myself lying on a beach somewhere with a book. Like that's not me. If you know me, you know, that's not me. I've been, I like working. I like it. So that's why I don't have the goal of selling love aj because unless i got a stupid offer meaning someone offered me an incorrect amount of money you know what i mean which i don't i don't know if that will happen never say never but if i got the wrong offer i would maybe take it but if i got the right offer i'd say no because i could make the same amount of money probably just continuing it myself yeah and i like it yeah can we talk about celebrities and marketing because you've like beyonce what how can you tell me how that happened yeah I think celebrity marketing back in the day versus now so different okay it's been interesting being in this space for 25 years because I started pre-instagram pre-social media things are so much different it doesn't matter though in the term in terms of celebrity it's important no matter what era we're in back in the day it was always stylist relationships and also placement in certain boutiques and stores.

22:08Nowadays, I think it's still stylist relationships. However, I think it is important to try to have even like DM relationships with certain celebrities or, you know, big influencers. And then if you can't get access to them that way, PR firms, they really are helpful because Is getting a press placement so important because it is building the reputation of your brand? You immediately start getting associated with people who have certain level of style. Like when I got my baby Melfi hoops on Hailey Bieber, I immediately started getting associated with her. And that's the kind of girl that I want to be a love AJ babe.

22:57I do think that people can like really underestimate the power of exactly that when you're thinking about what is the brand that you're trying to build. We think so much about the aesthetic of the brand and like the colors and the logos and the fonts. But it's like actually who is using it and who are you associated with? Because anyone who has like a strong personal brand, they'll just like rub off on you. And that is so important. Another thing that I think is really important for anyone that's like, you know, launching their business right now or in the beginning stages is making sure your gifting strategy is really strategic and you are getting it on girls with really strong personal brands.

23:37Yes. Not even necessarily celebrities, but who are the micro or macro influencers that have like really, really deep like sub stack followings or they are doing really well on shop my and affiliate links like that. Like that's the kind of thing that can really drive serious revenue to your D2C business. Like it's kind of like untapped if I'm being honest. Yeah, I agree. yeah just making sure your associations are with you know like the girls who are on your vision board before we started recording you mentioned a resource recommendation a book and i actually want to spend quite a lot of time talking about this i think it's such a good one what is it so i read this book it's called buy back your time by dan martell and it changed the game for me tell me, okay, assume we want to read it.

24:32We don't have time. What do we, what do we be taking away from this book? TLDR is this, it is all about us as founders, figuring out ways to create more hours in our day so we can be doing the most productive tasks. Productive task means it's something that fills your cup, makes you happy and also makes you the most money. So there's four quadrants of tasks and you know some of them are you know soul sucking and don't make you money and then it you know goes up the ladder to the ones that you really want to do and really make you a lot of money and it's about being able to audit your own day and your own life to figure out where you need to be offloading tasks to your team additionally it's about creating a company where you're not just like telling people what to do yes you're teaching people you're telling people hey this is the outcome that I want why don't you you know try a couple strategies come back to the table with like three options for me and we'll go through it it's about kind of like making sure as you're growing as an entrepreneur like so is your team because they stay stagnant if they're just like told what to do do it and then get the next task and then you get frustrated because you're the bottleneck for everything as the business grows and then things don't get if you step away for five minutes, nothing gets done.

25:52He has this one rule called 10, 80, 10. So you do the first 10 % of a task. So you like set it up, tell, tell someone on your team, okay, this is what I want to do. This is what I'm thinking. This is where I want it to go. They do the 80%. Then you come back at the end, do the finishing touches, approve it, make sure it looks good. That's a really efficient way to make sure you have your hand in everything, but you're not getting bogged down in the minutiae of day-to-day that your team can probably do. Yeah, I love that. What are some of the things that after you read the book you changed? Oh my gosh.

26:27Auditing my time was shocking. Okay, how do you audit your time? Are we looking through the calendar or are we actually just through the day? How did I spend that time? So you're supposed to do it every 15 minutes? Yeah, I'm due ADD for that. Yeah, so I mean, me too. I can't do that. I would do it at the end of the day and I would kind of go through and I would just more like sit with myself. What brought me joy and what did it, you know, and then what brought me money and what didn't put those in different buckets and then figure out how can I have the joyless tasks go to other people on my team or even get outsourced by third party people.

27:05Yeah. So, yeah, I thought that that was super important. I think it's more about figuring out how to structure your day so that you can truly scale. Yeah. And the book has such good little tips. Okay. I'm going to put a link in the show notes. People can go and buy that or download it. I don't think we've heard the Beyonce story from start to finish. Okay. Can you tell me? Yes. Beyonce story is so good. Okay. So I went on a double date and my friend had a new girlfriend. we didn't know her and she comes to dinner and we're like what do you do she's like I'm a personal assistant halfway through the dinner I find out she's Beyonce's the personal assistant she's the Carter's personal assistant and I was like wow and then after dinner I was like god is it too thirsty of me but I'm like you know what I'm gonna do it I was like look I I love Beyonce so much I'd love to send her stuff I'd also love to send you stuff like please let me shower you guys in jewelry do do with it what you will so she was like thank you that's so sweet so I sent her a big box of jewelry and then crickets like nothing for eight months then I get a call from this girl she's like my boss found the box she's obsessed with everything she's scrapping her entire Coachella accessories look and she's asking if you have 40 to 50 more of each style because she wants to do the dances as well so it was like um yeah okay so I did not have 40 to 50 of each style so I called my factory begged them to rush the pieces we were able to do it I got her everything and then I watched weekend one and it was unbelievable she wore love AJ the whole time and she even like changed the jewelry out when she did uh outfit changes oh wow so she wore like three different jewelry looks and then she sent me a note that was so nice sorry beyonce sent you a note yeah she did and then she sent me is that on a wall somewhere i have it in my i have in my special blocks yeah and then she invited me for weekend too so then i got to go see it in person which was like to die for that is amazing like most pinch me moment ever what happened in the business after that?

29:23Did it change? Yeah, we definitely, definitely obviously saw a spike in sales specifically in the items that she was wearing. But I like took that press and really ran with it. I made sure to like tell Vogue that this happened, tell who, what, where this happened. Sometimes when you get placements, the second part is making sure you place them. People need to know, outlets need to know, and outlets love, they love this information. So yeah, I just made sure to try to like squeeze out as much as i possibly could from the incredible moment what this says to me as well as someone who has just like flown in from sydney and lived in new york for 10 years and is there any more is like this is one of the one of the reasons why sometimes living in a big city like new york or la even london can be so beneficial to your business because these moments of just serendipity don't happen in small towns yeah just like yeah media yeah i went to dinner with this girl you went to dinner with the with beyonce's assistant yeah also like i went to high school with at one point the accessories editor of vogue you know yes i'm like hey girl yes we were sailors together at marymount um could you feature me yeah i think what has been so helpful my career is you know i'm born and raised in la i've lived here my whole life and i've had a long time to make real relationships.

30:44I think it's important to have real ones. I don't need to tell you my deepest, darkest secrets, but ask people questions, be inquisitive, talk about things besides work. Yeah. Like make sure it feels personal and authentic. I think it really is helpful. I had one of my bosses and mentors in my career was Hillary Kerr from Who What Where? and I remember just watching her as a boss move in the office and she treated everybody with the same kindness and curiosity like the USPS guy or Nicole Richie they were treated the same and I just remember clocking that and being like that's the woman I want to be yeah so I try to do that and I think it is helpful because you just never know when a contact is going to come back around and be and also how people are going to speak about you in rooms that you're not in you know yeah it matters and the way that you treat everyone matters because they at some point you don't know who they're going to be speaking about you to yeah what situation they're going to be in and you want them to say good things about you another tip for people if they're just in early days of their business obviously this is like cogs dependent but my ethos is generosity times 1000 anyone and everyone gets love aj i meet someone i'll give you the bracelet off my wrist we go to a dinner party we connect i'm going to send you a box of jewelry it doesn't i don't even care who you are or if you're an influencer or if you have affiliate links like i do not care word of mouth and reputation goes a long way yeah and i think if you can be endlessly generous it always pays off i actually think that's a much better way to think about networking i think that word networking has been used actually like really incorrectly and the way that you're talking about relationship and reputation building is actually what a network is built on yeah being kind being curious and being generous i love all of that yeah so we've got an amazing resource from you are there any other resource recommendations that you want to share before we wrap up the show okay this is a really specific one but i am obsessed with this girl she's called the lazy millionaire okay she has a sub stack and also she's got social media but she does the best clawed hacks to optimize your business and if you're wanting to start a sub stack she has just the 101 and all the secrets on how to start it and optimize it and i just find her information it's like pithy actionable and like legitimately good brilliant the clawed hacks oh i'm obsessed did you say that you can now have Claude Cowork watch you and hear you as you're teaching us something in screen like sharing your screen so the same way that if you train someone remotely in your team and you're like recording yourself and talking it through or like sharing your screen on a call that will teach Claude a skill now that's amazing isn't that wild I have one more hack more okay share I did this like founder's course during COVID and the biggest takeaway was I set up this thing called help docs.

33:51It's help docs.com. So myself plus every single person in my company writes a full to-do list plus records a loom on how to do every task in our company. Oh wow. So if someone is out sick that day and we're like, we have to order stickers for urban outfitters. How do we do, you know, it doesn't delay anything. You hop into help docs, you search for it and the information's there. it's also bought back so much of my time when I'm training new employees wow I bring them through all their tasks and then I send them the help docs so they can review it and then also if they're doing a task and they forgot oh how did Amanda do it they can just go back and re-watch the video it's a game changer wow that it takes a lot of time to set it up it is worth it yeah and then do you have your team like constantly updating always yeah always if something gets changed Just go and help docs change it.

34:43Make a new one. I love this. Yeah. Amanda, thank you so much for coming on Female Founder. I've loved your story. You've had like the most actionable advice that I've heard in a long time. So I love that. Good. I'm happy to help. I like, I just love being helpful and, you know, trying to save people from some of my mistakes and give some hacks. Where can they find you? Where can they find the brand? You can find us at loveaj.com, L-U-V-A-J, and also at loveaj on Instagram. Amazing. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me.

From the publisher

Amanda Thomas is on the podcast! She started Love AJ at 14. Twenty-five years, three rock-bottoms, and one Beyoncé Coachella moment later, she's about to be on shelves in every Target in America.

In this episode: the licensing loophole that got her into Target after a decade of no, why she cut her team from 12 to 6 and called it "ego death," the three low-drama ways she's funded growth without giving up equity, and the exact DM-to-Coachella pipeline that got Beyoncé's dancers in her jewelry.

Thank you to Omnisend for sponsoring the show. Our goal is to get every single one of you to make the smart swap to Omnisend this week and potentially saves thousands of dollars on email marketing every year. Use the code FFW35 for a further 35% off your email marketing: omnisend.com/femalefounderworld
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