How do you merge the idea of a high-growth company with a personalized, individual counseling service?

That’s the drive behind owner and CEO Lauren Schifferdecker’s entrepreneurship journey with her company, Inspire Counseling Centers. She believed so strongly in providing a better counseling experience that she started in a literal broom closet – offering her services to whomever walked through the door with the goal of opening centers across the area to bring affordable and accessible therapy to everyone.

With multiple centers now under her direction, Lauren has her eye on growing Inspired Counseling Centers to 50 locations within the next 5 years. Her mantra – “Whenever you are ready, we are here. You deserve to life a full and fantastic life!”

Listen in as we talk with Lauren about how she is able to scale her business, how she is making friends with her failures, and how she helps her employees avoid the burnout that is so common among therapists.

Most entrepreneurs were not jumping in headfirst in 2020 - but Pim Alley and Kate Holland are not your typical entrepreneurs. When the rest of the world shut down, they saw a need for women to have a separate space for work and collaboration - and Suite Escape was born.

Based in Lake Forest, Suite Escape is a place to gather - physically, but also through the gathering of thoughts both intellectual and emotional. They aim to connect women who believe in the power of supporting one another, and to provide a space for these women to grow personally and professionally.

Listen in to hear how Co-Founders Pim & Kate have created an 'escape' that enriches the lives of its members and inspires women to be a positive influence on their communities.

When more women have a seat at the table, everyone wins. That’s the philosophy that drives this week’s guest, Brooke Skinner Ricketts.

Until recently, Brooke served as a Chief Executive at a publicly traded company. She has enjoyed a 20+ year career defined by growth and accomplishment, but through her own experiences in a male-dominated industry Brooke saw the importance and need for support for our future female leaders. So she traded in corporate life for entrepreneurship by becoming President and Co-Founder of Beyond Barriers. Their proprietary methodology is designed to disrupt hard and soft-skill barriers that limit workplace advancement for women, while also building a support community for women with tools, training, and networks they need to become future-ready leaders.

Results are more powerful when everyone is empowered – listen in to hear how Brooke and her team are making the world more inclusive and innovative.

Being nimble in an ever-changing environment is what sets most successful entrepreneurs apart – and Melissa Carter is no different.

A life-long fashionista and a native Chicagoan, Melissa spent most of her adult life working with high couture brands in New York City. But when COVID arrived and shuttered the city, she came back to her roots to reinvent herself and launch her own brand. Leaning on her passion for supporting women and women of color, combined with her love of circular - upcycled vintage - clothing, she founded iamthecarterprojekt and Kameo Vintage. Her unique style and ability to craft the perfect outfits set her apart and has captured the interest of the Who’s Who in the affluent North Shore.

The quick pivot to follow her true passion, along with a “dress up, look chic, and go for it” attitude, makes this stylish entrepreneur one to watch!

Serial entrepreneurs lean on their passions and their experience to see where there are gaps to fill. When Emily Mackie examined the challenges she was facing in interior design with her company, Inspired Interiors, she decided to use that insight (with a little motivation from the naysayers) as inspiration to forge her own way into the real estate development industry.

In 2020, Emily extended her Inspired brand to include Inspired Luxury Homes, a custom home building company that utilizes innovative 3D technology to tailor-fit residences to her clients’ specifications prior to construction. And as a female-led company in a traditionally male-dominated industry, Inspired Luxury Homes brings an unparalleled perspective to the custom home building experience.

Listen in as we talk with Emily about the how she got started, balancing family and work-life, and how her hallmark approach to design is carving a new path for more female entrepreneurs to follow.

When entrepreneurship is in your blood, you are always looking out for new opportunities. That’s exactly what happened with PR maven Mika Stambaugh and her newest venture, Acannability.

Mika is the CEO and Founder of The Mas Ink, a company that has broken the mold on what PR can look like. Her goal with clients is to offer accessible opportunities for them to tell their stories – and when she came across cannabis, she knew that was a story she needed to tell too. Now, as a Founder and Director of Marketing & PR for Acannability, Mika is using her years of media knowledge and storytelling experience to educate others and help to create a set of standards within the CBD industry.

Listen in as we talk with Mika on managing multiple businesses, what growth looks like, and where she sees herself in 10 years.

This week we are debunking the myth that you have to be a “starving artist” as we talk with Martha Nippert, CEO of Marnani Designs.

Martha started down her creative path with Michael Kors as a lead designer in New York City during the height of the company’s growth trajectory. But she started to feel the desire to strike out on her own and knew that her passion for art was the key to building her own brand. Now, that art lifestyle company she grew from the ground up has been featured in multiple Fortune 500 companies. Listen in as Martha talks about ‘knowing your value’ and the power of believing in yourself.

How do you take an old-school skill and scale it for today’s market? We are talking today with fashion designer and entrepreneur Elena Victoria, CEO and Founder of Elena Victoria based out of Chicago and Detroit.

Elena’s passion for fashion, combined with her rigorous standards about who delivers her vision through her business, makes her a budding entrepreneur to watch. Her company starts right at ground level, teaching classes that introduce children to sewing with a second arm of her business also catering to brides-to-be with beautiful custom couture wedding gowns. Hearing about Elena Victoria’s grind mindset and her ability to scale her business beyond the current market is an inspiring and fun listen. Tune in now!

Have you ever wondered how some people end up dominating multiple geographies in super competitive spaces? Dawn McKenna, CEO and Founder of The Dawn McKenna Group executes a half-billion in luxury real estate sales annually, making them the #1 team in Illinois and the #1 large team in Naples. She had a long play as #1 in Illinois with reach from Hinsdale to the North Shore but she didn’t get to Naples by accident - she listened to her clients and after many failed referrals to local brokers in Florida, she decided she own that market too. Hiring, social media engagement and marketing strategy are some of the differentiators that help DMG come out on top in the real estate market.

How do you raise capital and manage an active board while keeping a growth mindset? We are talking with Robbie Ventura, CEO & Founder of Vision Quest and Velocity.com, the only SAS business in the sport of cycling.

Robbie graduated with honors from Lake Forest College with a double major in Business and Psychology. While working towards his bachelor’s degree, he played on the Forester hockey team, which advanced to the NCAA Tournament. He was also named to the All-American Collegiate Cycling Team, and in 2008 he was inducted into the LFC Athletic Hall of Fame for his accomplishments in both hockey and cycling. Robbie has raced professionally for 12 years, including 3 years in the United States Postal Service Cycling Team, accumulating over 70 wins. Now, he’s turned his passion and years of experience into a successful business that keeps on winning.