Skimm'd from the Couch: Kendra Scott

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Kendra Scott built her jewelry brand (also called Kendra Scott) with a $500 dollar investment out of a spare bedroom in her house. And now, it’s a billion dollar business. That didn’t just happen overnight. In this special live (on Zoom) episode, Kendra told us how she’s been able to turn her biggest failures into her greatest successes. And how she turns a 'no' into a 'yes.'

On Getting Told "No"

Kendra: It's scary when someone says no to you, right? But I think you can use it as fuel and say, "How am I going to turn this on or learn from that," and say to them, "What was it about my interview today? What was it that I could have done differently? I want to learn. I'd love feedback from you." How many times do people have that asked to them? And maybe they may not respond back, but they may say, "This is one thing I was concerned about or that you can learn from." And then take that and use that for the next thing that you're going to do.

On Money

Carly: Before you made money, what was your relationship with money?

Kendra: ….I built this business on lines of credit and credit card debt. No one would invest in my company. I would try to go pitch to different people and they almost laughed me out of the room…. My whole life and my children's life was depending [on the fact] that this business wasn't going to fail, like my first business. And already having one failure under my belt, that reality of what that felt like and what it is was really close. Like I can still taste that moment and what that felt like. 

And so I think, for me, it was scary. My relationship with money was fear-based. It was: will I have enough to do the things I need to do to take care of my family, to be able to keep my employees, to pay my rent, and to sustain another day. 

On Failure

Kendra: We’re going to hit a lot of obstacles in our life. Life is not easy. This year for all of us, we know that this pandemic has been so hard and it's so hard on everyone. But I think we have to think about these moments...and I always say they're kind of like moments of impact. We have a choice in those moments to give up - that's a choice - or to say, "Okay, I'm going to dust my knees off. I'm going to stand back up. I'm going to remember who I am. I'm going to find that fire in me. I'm going to find that fire to fight and to fight hard."

And sometimes it's those struggles, it's those things in our life that force us to have to be even tougher, stronger, right? To do the next, most amazing thing that is waiting for you. But you have to be brave enough to get up and go for it because it's not just going to come to you.