There Can Still Be Lunch
Even in the thick of startup culture, I kept one hour sacred.
If you ran a small business at any time between 2010 and 2019, you know the dominance of venture-backed startup culture that pervaded.
From tech to consumer products, every great idea was suddenly the incubator for a potential “unicorn,” or billion-dollar brand. In response to cultural demands for equal access, we saw the rise of the movement to fund female-founded and Black-owned businesses, sending investors running to “underserved” founders to round out their portfolios. This was an era ripe with possibility and promise. The American Dream was alive and well for anyone with a pitch deck.
I started Golde, my superfood-powered wellness brand, smack in the thick of it. It was around 2016, and my partner, Issey, and I were blending up turmeric latte mixes by hand and fulfilling orders from our Brooklyn apartment. Our goal was humble: net out $2,000 a month, enough to make our monthly rent at the time. But it wasn’t long before the investors, big-box retailers, and Instagram followers turned up — all begging the same question: are you dreaming big enough?
