From Corporate Fixer to Fresh Flower Entrepreneur with Talia Boone

Check Out Talia Boone Online!

• Instagram - @TaliaBoone

• LinkedIn - @Talia-Boone

• Facebook - @PostalPetals

• Website - postalpetals.com

Full Transcript:

Note: This is an original transcript–edited for sense, length, and clarity.  If you have any questions or concerns, please email our host, Doria Lavagnino, at doria@sheventurespodcast.com.

Doria Lavagnino: She has nearly two decades of experience in brand strategy, communications, marketing public relations, [and] promotions. The principle of Inter: Sect, a tactical solutions agency, serves as a catalyst for pioneering ideas, collaboration, and creative opportunities to promote relevant conversations that result in measurable social impact. During the pandemic, she started a fresh cut-flower delivery business called Postal Petals. Here to talk about her pivots and dedication to creating social change is Talia Boone. Welcome to SheVentures!

00:00:53

Talia Boone: Thank you so much, Doria. I appreciate you having me. Thank you.

00:00:58 

Doria: I am really excited to talk to you! One of the overarching themes in your work and your life is your commitment to creating social change. I wondered when or how this activism was awakened.

Talia’s Life Lesson/Being Intentional

00:01:17 

Talia: That’s a good question. I would have to be honest and say that I think it’s always been there. It’s something my dad instilled in me very early on; just this idea of everyone needs somebody. Don’t be afraid to be active and intentional about giving access to other people to help them whenever you can. I’ve always been the type [that] when I see a need, I do what I can to fill it. It’s always been there and I began to see it materialize into action really once I got into college and start[ed] my career. It’s one of those things that came naturally. And I gravitated toward it and appreciated the opportunity to meet people from different walks of life, become more culturally fluid, and understand the issues that exist outside of my experience, my upbringing. 

00:02:28 

Doria: Absolutely. Would you say that you found your voice in college or was that voice always developing?

00:02:38 

Talia: I think that voice was always developing. I was raised to be made to believe that my voice had power; that what I had to say was important. You choose your words carefully and words are power, action is power, and your position that you have in the world is power. I’ve always felt the weight of my voice and that what I could bring to the world [mattered]. I never doubted myself. I think I started to figure out almost like a puppy [or] baby learning to walk. [On your first] step, you’re a little shaky, until you kind of get the hang of it, right? The more I started to be out in the world and the more I met people, the more I started to understand experiences that I didn’t experience as a youth. [I] kind of really [started] to get to know people [and] their circumstances [and] how they came to be in [them]. I think that’s, to be honest, where a lot of the strength [and the knowledge] came from — just good old-fashioned getting-to-know people and empathy. 

Racial Reckoning

00:03:53 

Doria: Empathy, I think, is so important these days and can’t be overstated. I watched, as I was telling you before we went live, the video on Inter: Sect. It was incredibly powerful and it was played at Cannes, the film festival. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe it was played live there to promote conversations. I was about systemic racism in our society and brands and how they positioned themselves or lack the ability to walk the walk, so to speak. How did that all come to fruition?

00:04:37 

Talia: Thank you for bringing that up. That was a piece that we produced actually for Cannes Lions, which happens in France, which is the same place where [we] filmed. Cannes Lions is kind of bringing together global brands, global marketing agencies, and ad agencies. You know the Nikes of the world, the world’s massive global brands, and their marketing and advertising agencies of record and bringing them together to kind of sell in the space of brand marketing and advertising the year prior and what are the trends coming in the year to come. 

So, because I’ve been doing work in brand strategy, partnerships, sports entertainment, and all these different spaces for many years — I was very familiar with these worlds. A lot of what we do with Inter: Sect is working at that intersection of sports and entertainment, corporate and consumer brands, and social impact. What that means is that we will work very hard to mobilize the resources of corporate and consumer brands. We pair them with the social equity of sports and entertainment assets for measurable, tangible social impact. What that’s rooted in is data research that shows that today’s consumer (more than they care about a product or service that a brand provides) cares that the brand is socially and culturally aligned with the issues that are important to them.

I had been communicating with Cannes Lions for a couple of years about doing a session of this magnitude relating to this type of picture. It just so happened that the stars unfortunately aligned with 2020 during the pandemic.

Typically, it’s a global festival because it’s something that has to appeal to the entire world. They are careful about focusing on issues that feel irrelevant to one country, one culture, or one person. What happened for us in 2020 is that 1) because of the pandemic Cannes Lions was supposed to be an in-person weeklong festival at the end of June. They had to move that festival to virtual, instead. [Then] 2) What happened that created a perfect opportunity for us to have some of these important conversations was the unfortunate murder of George Floyd and the civil unrest. 

What they call the “racial reckoning” that happened around that time [was what did it]. What it did was it took a lot of the fight that we were having in the U.S. and made it a global issue. You started to see people in cities and countries all around the world, protesting in solidarity with Black lives in the United States. It instantly took some of the issues that I had been talking to Cannes Lions about really wanting to make sure that we were bringing to the forefront. This [became] where the brands were identifying where they’re meant to spend their money, where ad agencies and marketing agencies are meant to spend their messaging resources and those kinds of things. It just kind of worked out that where we were going in the U.S. was happening on a global scale; the eyes of the world were on us.

00:08:23 

Doria: You recognized the opportunity.

00:08:24 

Talia: Absolutely, and they came back and said “Hey, let’s try to make this happen.” We pulled that together in a very short amount of time. It ended up being one of the festival's most-watched sessions. It was really powerful. 

Corporate Responsibility and Black Lives Matter

00:08:25 

Talia: We had just had a very honest and raw conversation about what it means to be not just Black in this country but also what the corporate responsibility is, right? You would see at that time so many corporations raising their corporate fist in solidarity with Black lives. A lot of what the conversation centered around was, “Hey, we appreciate that you are supporting us at this moment but we need to figure out ways to make sure that we are holding you accountable. [We need] to make sure that the things that you’re saying, you’re going to do six months down the line, two years down the line, etc. We can come back and see that you have been what we call a ‘good corporate citizen’ and that you have done what you could to make sure to equalize the playing field for now.”

00:09:39 

Doria: It is an incredible video, and I recommend anyone who’s listening to this podcast to watch it. What I took away from it, other than the raw conversation, were the three steps at the end that people or corporations can take. The first one was: Make a pact to act in a manner that requires you to own your responsibility to advance social justice. Use your voice to identify measurable milestones, which is so important. And then, hold yourself accountable to achieve those milestones. With that backdrop, how would you say we are doing in 2022, or even going into 2023? 

I do remember all the Instagram Black Lives Matter [posts]. It kind of feels a bit like lazy activism.

00:10:35 

Talia: Performative.

00:10:39 

Doria: That’s a great way to describe it.

00:10:47 

Talia: If I’m being completely honest, we’re not doing nearly as well as we would be if all of those brands that stood up and said that they were going to do all [those] magnificent things, allocate all these large amounts of resources, had [done] all of those things and [they] had been done in that way that it was presented, I think we would be quite a bit further. When we start to go back and look at the reporting for how resources are spent, how dollars are allocated, and how they met up against the commitments that they made, unfortunately, quite a few brands have fallen short. At the same time, there are also quite a few that have stood up to the challenge and stepped up to the plate. Hopefully, the audience will get a chance to see the video itself and hear the conversation. 

Who’s Doing it Right?

00:10:51 

Talia: The video featured Ben[jamin] Crump, who was the attorney for George Floyd’s family. He’s also a civil rights attorney in this country, in general. [He] helps a number of different families who have experienced similar circumstances. It also featured Malcolm Jenkins, who co-founded the Players Coalition. Also, Jabari Paul works with Ben & Jerry’s. I’ll tell anyone who will listen to me that Ben & Jerry’s is my number one brand when it comes to apologetic corporate activism. They are doing things that have absolutely nothing to do with their bottom line; they’re talking about anti-recidivism, reparations, legalizing cannabis, and releasing people from prison who were convicted of nonviolent drug offenses. [When you look at] brands like that and seeing that they’ve been very effective in that way. I think that if a lot of different operations looked at Ben & Jerry’s, you’ll see that they are wildly successful. It’s not just because they have delicious ice cream. I think it’s because they have captured the ethos of what their audience wants to see, what they believe is important, or what they believe in. 

00:13:30 

Doria: They have, and they have been that way since they came on the market. It’s not as though they did it because they thought it was trendy to do. To your point, this is the root of what the company is about. Are there any other companies that you want to call out positively?

00:13:50 

Talia: Yeah, I know Unilever has — which is now, I believe, the parent company of Ben & Jerry’s, so that fits. Unilever has made a full commitment to addressing issues of social injustice, issues like environmental justice, and those kinds of things. So basically saying that every company under their umbrella has to have an active and measurable campaign initiative and focus [on] uplifting the communities in which they serve. They’re doing some really interesting work in a way that I really like. 

JPMorgan Chase [has] an initiative called advancing Black pathways. It’s interesting because I’ve done this work for so long. I have seen so much performative activism. I’ve seen so many hollow promises, where they are [using] initiatives that don’t do much. It’s just a glorified marketing campaign or marketing initiative. What I really love about JPMorgan Chase is that they are doing the work, really finding ways to deploy resources; not just mentorship, but money resources. [They’re trying] to help advance Black business owners to increase and encourage financial literacy and marginal communities to fund community programs that will uplift and give opportunities to youth. Marginalized communities [have] seen a lot of really incredible impacts come from the work that they’ve done. From what I can tell, based on what they’ve done so far, it’s been really impactful. I’m also just really impressed with what they’re doing with them. 

00:15:51 

Doria: It’s good to hear that some big brands are doing things to make a difference. When we talk about recent data from the labor statistics — I’m not talking about just women but people of color — in general, 12 percent of them are in management positions. It’s interesting if you’re in media and you look at headlines that can be so misleading. It’ll say “record number of women in Fortune 500” or “record number of Black” because they’re are six. 

00:16:25 

Talia: Exactly, but there are two, so what about it?

How to Keep Companies Accountable

00:16:29 

Doria: Yeah, exactly! What I watched really made me aware of this idea of corporate giving and how it can be very hollow, as you said. So what can decision-makers do to continue to level the playing field? And what can people do? What can I do? What can my audience do?

00:16:52 

Talia: What I would say for corporations to do is to make sure that their leadership, their executive teams, and their staff look like the audience or customers that they’re serving. To your point exactly, there’s a record number of Black women — there’s only 6 percent, so that’s not impressive. If you see that the makeup of your country is 30 percent Black, and 10 percent Latino, you need to look at companies that mirror that makeup. Make sure that the representation is there because representation is key — without [it] you honestly can’t have a fully well-rounded product. 

Representation Matters

00:18:29 

Talia: I think that seems like a really small thing but I think about this every time I travel, at a hotel, or even a restaurant bathroom — where they have sensors that make the water come on when it senses movement. What a lot of people don’t realize is that those censors are created for lighter-skinned hands. They don’t pick up the same way for dark skin as they do for fair skin people. A lot of people don’t realize that because they don’t have to. 

00:18:30

Doria: I had no idea.

00:18:31

Talia: It’s this idea of what the default is that needs to change. I remember about a year or so ago, I think, a Black medical student [Chidiebere Ibe] created a pregnancy photo that shows the baby in utero and the stages of growth. He created that picture but with a Black woman and a Black baby in utero. It was so incredibly impactful because we didn’t even realize that we didn’t see ourselves in these images. It’s the small things like that where we have been “other” for so long. 

We have been the default and ignored for so long. I know people don’t necessarily see it as a default or ignored but when the default is whiteness and not brownness or blackness, you have to think about what that does to your psyche or what that does to you even subliminally; the things that you might not even realize. I always say you can’t be what you can’t see. There has been such a consistent world that we’ve lived in, particularly as Black women, where we are not seen in the representation of things — even the things that we utilize. 

That’s one thing that I really appreciate, going back to my upbringing, that my mom was always intentional about — making sure that we had dolls that we looked like. She would go [and] search high and low to make sure that she found brown-skin dolls for my sister and me. 

00:20:09 

Doria: Right, which are prevalent now but they weren’t — 

00:20:11 

Talia: When I was a kid. 

00:20:13 

Doria: Yes!

00:20:13 

Talia: It was very hard to find that. I think that representation with the doll and the water censors is because the people at the top, who are making the decisions, don’t have people in the room who have a different experience or a different outlook on the product. By doing that [differently], you can better serve your consumer because we know we are in a world that is not default anymore. We are such an incredibly culturally, and ethnically diverse people — not just in this country but globally — and if they had people at the top who represented the people they’re serving, I think you would see quite a bit of difference. 

Make Sure You’re Heard

00:22:18 

Talia: Then to your question, what can we do as consumers is demand it. Demand it from the businesses that you patronize. Demand it from the companies that you use for all of your services, insurances, financing, where you’re buying your clothing from, your food, [etc.]. 

I always talked to my friends about getting on like Robinhood and making sure that you’re investing in the companies or buying stock in companies that you love and use. The other side of that is you can buy stock and become an active shareholder. You can put like 20 or 35 percent in a company [and] have a voice, if you own one little stock or portion. It’s so important to make sure your voice is heard — and make sure that you are [heard] if there’s something that you want to see or inequalities that you’re noticing. Speak up. 

00:22:26 

Doria: It’s so true what you’re saying. A lightbulb went off for me when you were talking about knowing your customer and that is advantageous to the brand. That shouldn’t be a hard thing, because you know it means then that you’re going to appeal to more people — in addition to the racial aspect of it and just being more inclusive.

Misrepresentation in the Conference Room

00:23:10 

Doria: Before we pivot to your entrepreneurship, I wanted to ask you how you experienced corporate America. We just glossed over your 20-year career before you became an entrepreneur as a woman of color.

00:23:11 

Talia: Interestingly enough, because I started in the sports industry, I worked for the NFL for years when I first started. Then, I kind of branched out into other sports and then into entertainment and, to be completely honest, I had a much easier path than a lot of people on the corporate side. I had access to an asset that they all themselves wanted access to. I was able to get a lot of things done but because it was being done in a space where it would kind of serve everybody because [in] sports and entertainment the social equity there is so significant. 

I will say something that I did notice was I was oftentimes the only woman in the room — many times. In the NFL and the NBA, there’s a majority of Black players. I was often, particularly in executive-level meetings, one of the only Black people in the room. Other colleagues of mine talk about this experience in a similar way. Oftentimes, I have to defend my experience as a Black person. I could say “I think this messaging or type of initiative will resonate more with this particular community that you’re trying to reach, maybe a Black community, Latino community, or a community of young women.” I’m speaking from a position of authority, not just based on experience. I would be told by white counterparts — oftentimes white male counterparts — that that experience doesn’t ring true to them and that we should adjust the campaign or initiative. 

00:25:13 

Doria: Oh my God.

00:25:14 

Talia: I [found that] to be fascinating. How is it that someone who has not lived that experience or been in close relationship with people who do say to you that it hasn’t? What you’re telling them is the experience doesn’t ring true. What that says is that what we say is what we understand to be our lived experience and does not match up with their perspective and their limited experience. I don’t know if I’m answering your question, but that was my experience. 

00:25:48 

Doria: You are, and the other thing I’m thinking of was just kind of trying to envision [that]. It’s

not hard for me to envision because I’ve been through similar situations as a woman but not as a woman of color. The white male standard, which everything seems to be accepted by [seems] to be slowly changing. I could easily see how someone might say, “Well, show us the data.” A brand is not willing to be forward-thinking, other than Ben & Jerry's. It’s not even hard to come up with data to substantiate your position. 

00:26:36 

Talia: Yes, you're correct which, again, takes me back to why it's so important to have leadership represent the community that you’re serving. There needs to be, at the executive level, someone who is in the room and doesn’t make them the only person. Don’t make it where this one Black woman or one Black man is responsible for defining what the Black experience is. We are not a monolith. There are so many different lived experiences within our culture. 

In the same way that you’ll get a room with executives, eight or nine of them are white men. Their experiences are going to be different. They’re going to vary in the ways they think a campaign or initiative should move forward. If that’s the case for them, imagine what that would be for someone from the Black community, Asian community, or Latino community. That’s why I talk about how important it is to have the same balance in the boardroom, the same balance in the C-suite, the same balance in the executive wing, in the leadership team. That represents the audience you’re serving because otherwise it’s disingenuine and it’s counterproductive. 

00:27:57 

Doria: I don’t think it's a pipeline problem. I’ve heard that argument before and I just don’t believe it. 

Starting Postal Petals

00:28:48 

Doria: So you transition from corporate America to entrepreneurship. I also want to tell the audience that before we went live, Talia was in the dark. She had woken up at like three o’clock in the morning so she is serious about her business, Postal Petals. You created it at the height of the pandemic. She was on the West Coast and was in flower markets, getting cut flowers. Can you tell the listeners where the idea came from? How was it to create a business during the pandemic?

00:28:48 

Talia: Oh my gosh, Doria. I’m going, to be honest – I still can’t believe that I get to run this company. It’s still so incredible to me to even comprehend what’s happening with this company. I’ll tell you kind of the origin story and how the company came to be. 

I actually started arranging flowers several years ago, and it’s just like a friend activity. I have a friend of mine and she and I just vibe so well because we love doing random things. We love always trying something that we haven’t tried before. I hadn’t arranged flowers before and she was like. “Oh, I think we should [try.] For our next hang out, let’s arrange flowers.” So we did that and I really enjoyed it. I also very oddly [found] a sense of peace while doing it. I just kind of started arranging flowers more and more. I started to really lean on flower arranging as a way to kind of decompress.

Inter: Sect is very much an agency for a perfect company. We are very much rooted in activism and social impact. We focus on any matter of human and civil rights issues, voter engagement, voter suppression, immigrant rights, LGBTQ+ rights, women’s rights, all these things. When you truly care about these issues, the closer you get to the mechanisms of power, you realize that the system is not at all broken. It’s functioning exactly the way it’s supposed to. Whenever you start to work and strategize around fixing those systems, you meet a significant amount of resistance along the way. It can be incredibly demoralizing to anyone who is trying to advance the work and bring about change. 

What I started to find was that when I would begin to get stressed out about this roadblock that I was experiencing or something else that was going on, I would just arrange flowers. I would go down to the flower market, kind of mill around, and find flowers that I thought would look good together. [I’d] go home and arrange them and maybe I’d pour a glass of wine and put on some nice music. That time that I would spend focusing on flowers and not focusing on myself or my day or what obstacle I’m up against; it would just calm me down in a way that I just really appreciated. I came to look forward to it. It’s funny because my therapist would joke — she was like, “I wish all of my clients were like you. You have the most healthy coping mechanisms.”

00:31:46 

Doria: She would go out of business, though!

Postal Petals and the Pandemic

00:31:47 

Talia: Yeah, you’re right! Exactly, because that’s where I would find my peace. So, fast forward to the pandemic about mid to late April. We went on lockdown like the second or third week of March. It was only meant to be two or three weeks in the house; they were going to get this thing under control and we were going to all get back to our regular lives — no big deal. 

By the end of April, we had been locked up for five, or six weeks at that point. It was becoming very clear that this was not meant to be a temporary situation; they did not know what was happening. I had no idea what was happening. There was a lot of uncertainty. It started to become a lot of anxiety for me. I was like “what does this mean for my family,” “what does this mean for my company — my life?” I said all of these things and just kind of started sort of freaking out; the walls in my house were closing in on me. 

It was my therapist who said, “I haven’t heard you talk about arranging flowers in a while. Why don’t you give that a try? Let’s see if that works.” I was like, “That’s a great idea.” I thought, “Okay, I’ll go get myself some flowers.” 

Well, the problem was that the flower market where I would usually go to get my flowers closed down because of the pandemic. That sent me kind of on a search online. I’m thinking at this point, you can get everything delivered. I thought, “Oh, I can look for a company that can ship me a box of fresh-cut flowers and I can arrange them myself.” It’s perfect.

The Blossoming of an Idea

Talia: I looked and looked and I could not find a company that did what I was looking for — which was to ship me bundles of cut flowers, that I could break apart and arrange them on my own. In that search, I ended up stumbling upon this wholesale flower distributor. [He] shipped large volumes of flowers to his retail clients all around the world. I called him, really just with the audacity to see if I could convince him to reduce his global minimum to just enough for me to get half the flowers. He very quickly told me ‘no,’ that was not possible. He was so kind and gracious that he and I ended up being on the phone for about two and a half hours. In the process of that conversation, I learned about why they couldn’t do it and what was happening with the flower farms and the floral industry because of the pandemic. If it’s not in your industry, you don’t pay attention to it. 

Going back to what we were talking about very early on, your worldview changes the more people you talk to [and] the more you open yourself up to other people’s experiences. He just shared with me about how events had been canceled, weddings had been canceled, and a lot of the large orders that farms were depending on. Flower farms were now desperate to find new ways to get their product to market. They were suffering; they were laying people off and uncertain about how they were going to be able to sustain themselves. 

It was by the end of that conversation I realized two things: 1) what I was looking for did not currently exist in the marketplace the way in which I was looking for it, and 2) I saw an opportunity to enter an industry that typically had a gatekeeper culture. The pandemic essentially became a great equalizer. I was able to enter this industry that may have been more difficult for me to enter into [previously]. 

I saw an opportunity to support domestic flower farmers by helping them find new ways to bring their products to market. [The flower vendor] and I are on the call and my mind is spinning. By the time we got off the phone, I said to him, “Hey, do you think something like this could work?” and I kind of pitched to him a rough version of what is now Postal Petals. He kind of sat for a minute and thought and then said, “If you would have asked me this four months ago, I would have said ‘no way’ [but] now actually something like that could work.”

Springing into Action

Talia: That was the week before Mother’s Day 2020. I immediately went to work building a wireframe sketching out what the company would look like. By July of that year, we launched Postal Petals in beta [form] with nearly 20 farm partners signed up to ship for us. We were in beta for six to eight weeks, then we launched fully in September 2020. 

The way I describe us is: We partner with domestic flower farms to ship bundles of fresh cut flowers to customers nationwide for them to create their own ‘do-it-yourself’ flower arrangements as a way to express themselves creatively. Also, as a way to practice self-care, mindfulness, and as a meditative practice. It’s been really great. It started as def-con-summer. [We] got a really strong presence in the corporate space and we’ve got a baby audience that’s continuing to grow. We’re building out a whole wellness component curriculum. 

To your point, my therapist risking being run out of business, the flowers [are] working with mental health practitioners and mental health providers to build out curriculums. The flowers are being used specifically for relief of anxiety, stress relief, to practice mindfulness, and kind of allowing yourself to have a healthy escape [or] release of tensions and anxiety. 

It’s been really beautiful. Every day I wake up so grateful to be able to build a company that was an outlet for stress and anxiety for me. The idea is I’m getting the same emotional benefits from building this company that I was from just arranging flowers. It’s just a gift that I cannot stop being grateful for. It’s amazing. I can be so much more creative in so many different ways and have cool collaborations. We do workshops and community wellness events. We’re beginning to deploy our flowers into the community and use them as a way to introduce mindfulness, wellness, and self-care to communities all around. It’s a really beautiful evolution of this company. I’m excited about a lot of things that are coming down the pike. I’m just so truly honored. That’s the only way I can say it — like honored to be chosen as a steward. This vision could not have been my own. There’s no way I would have ever thought that I’d have a flower company. I consider us to be more of like an immersive self-care and wellness company that uses fresh-cut flowers as a tool for mindfulness and flower arranging as a creative expression for self-relief. 

Postal Petals’ Services

00:39:34 

Doria: Yeah, so corporations are beginning to partner with you. This would be a wellness offering.

00:39:41 

Talia: We have three to four main corporate offerings. We do our workshops either virtual or in-person — it kind of depends on what the current operations of the corporation are. We will do the workshops as part of their employee team-building activities. We’ll do it as part of their corporate health and wellness. With those, usually, we will integrate meditation — sometimes like gentle yoga and breathwork. 
We, also, now have a shelf-stable product in our gift kits. We offer them for sale to our corporate partners. We’re able to customize those gift kits. Those gift kits include one of our floral design tool kits, which is like an apron, garden shears, floral tape, and all the things that you need to arrange your flowers once they come. Then, it comes with a voucher that is redeemable for one of our three box sizes. When they get their kit, they get all the things they need, instructions on how to go to the website, and they [can] go select the flowers they want to receive and tell us when they want to receive them. Then, we ship those out. That falls more into corporate gifting, employee gifting, client gifting like with real estate companies [for] closing gifts.

00:41:00 

Doria: That’s lovely. 

00:41:09 

Talia: Then we also do immersive floral art installations and activation. We were at a music festival and did [one] where we built out a floral installation and then let people try on flower crowns and engage with the flowers more directly. What we’re doing is evolving people’s relationship with flowers from a ready-to-use product to an interactive wellness experience. We’re finding so many different ways and creative ways to encourage people to take a look at how they’ve been using flowers. [They’ll] say, “We’ve been using flowers all wrong. We had no idea that they [could] be a tool!”

00:41:58 

Doria: Yeah, this is incredible. It’s opening my mind in so many ways listening to you. What was the most difficult and the most rewarding part of starting your business?

00:42:12 

Talia: The most difficult part, to be honest, [was] learning a new industry. I’m a great strategist, I know how to build brands. This is an industry that I had never touched before. During the times when I was just flower arranging on my own, I never knew the names of flowers. I would just see what looks good and grab them. There was very much a learning curve. I’m one of those people who enjoys learning and experiencing new things. While that was difficult for me, it was also really exciting for me. Now, to hear me talk, you’d think I’ve been with flowers all my life, right? It’s meeting the farmers and learning about the new flowers and meeting other florists. 

I say to people all the time, “We are not a florist shop. We ship flowers for people to essentially become their own florist.” We do a lot of partnerships with florists, not just local florists but all across the country. We’re always finding ways to support and collaborate with local florists. 

I would say the hardest thing was learning about the floral industry. I’d say the most rewarding, for your other question, was learning about the floral industry. It’s just been so cool. There are so many ways that we can build the community, that we could serve the community. There’s so much opportunity for creativity. It sounds so odd to say but I feel like I have found my perfect retirement. I’m so happy working in this company. I’m so happy because I feel like more. 

I am obsessed with thinking about not just the recipes but how can we get more people engaged with flowers. I’ve almost gamified it, if you will, of how can we better tell the story of why flower arranging? I love the idea that this is such a new company, a new concept. 

Being Strategic

Talia: There’s just so much that goes into messaging and reaching your audience and figuring out the best message that resonates and what really is the trigger that gets people to convert all of those things. I find that to be fascinating. I’m probably nodding out your audience right now. Like, girl, this is nerdy but — 

00:44:45 

Doria: No, no, no, believe me. Marketing is so key to entrepreneurship and knowing exactly what the message is and that is going to reach someone so that they become interested. 

00:45:02 

Talia: Exactly that! You mentioned earlier [that] I’ve been up since three this morning at the flower market. That’s because we’re in the process of doing a major refresh on the website where we can better tell the story of what we do in a way that helps people more effectively understand [it] and how to engage with our product. We have a full-day production shoot with brand videos, new product images, and all of these things. It’s those things [that] are fun for me. It’s just the strategy of it all. 

00:45:35

Doria: I love it.

00:45:43 

Talia: This is the thing, Doria, that for me [is] the win. It’s effective communication. Whether it’s selling a product, figuring out what the needs of my community are, figuring out strategically how we can turn out more voters in America where voter suppression has run rampant — that’s where all of it goes, back to this kind of game. A lot of these issues are very serious but it’s figuring out how to reach people where they are, and how we can be where they need us.

00:46:18 

Doria: Of course, meeting them where they’re at. 

Filling Your Vase

00:46:25 

Talia: Right, we were having a meeting with our branding team yesterday around messaging because they’re scripting out our rough scripts for the brand vibe. That was so exciting for me — just thinking about the language and how powerful words are; how one simple little word can change one’s entire perspective. 

00:46:39 

Doria: Oh, yeah. 

00:46:51 

Talia: We came out of one of the sessions with one thing that I just love. It was like how do we get people to be thinking about flowers and wellness and someone on the call said, “What the message is is: You have filled your vase.” I was like “Oh my God, that’s amazing.” There’s messaging around it but it’s thinking about the vase and putting the flowers in the vase that you’re pouring your wellness into. 

00:47:09 

Doria: I love it. Yes, it’s a metaphor. 

00:47:14 

Talia: It’s a perfect metaphor. Then the beautiful thing about the flowers has been thinking about self-care so many times. You go for a massage, go for a walk, do these things. What’s different about the flowers is that you then have a tangible physical reminder of that. It kind of forces you or, at least, reminds you of the importance of centering your wellness. This idea of messaging around that metaphor of “Have you filled your vase?” wins. It’s the thing that gets me so geeked and gets me so excited. 

00:47:47 

Doria: I love it. 

00:47:49 

Talia: It’s just really finding out how we can use language to help as many people as we can. I’m just happy. 

00:48:02 

Doria: Oh, you’re getting me all like — I’m ready! I’m going to fill my vase!

00:48:09 

Talia: I love that! I love hearing you say [that] because it sounds so right. 

Talia’s Advice

00:48:15 

Doria: Yeah, it does! Oh, it’s great! We’re getting close to wrapping up. I wanted to ask you what tips would you give to women of color who want to start a business?

00:48:29 

Talia: First and foremost, just do it. Just start. There is no perfect time. There is no perfect answer. There is no perfect moment. There is no perfect way to do it right. So much of my time with this company and especially in the last nine to 12 months — funny, I was just having this conversation earlier this week. My first two years, and in particular the last nine to 12 months, [have] been just proving concepts and showing that it can be done. It does not have to be perfect. If you see the opportunity to start, just start. Just make your first sale. Pick the name. Then go and pick all your social media. It’s just one thing at a time but just start. Once you start the first step, then the second step, third step, and fourth step, [it] gets easier and easier and easier. You will never be able to build if you don’t even begin to engage. So just start…

The other piece of advice I would give is to center your wellness. Make sure you take care of yourself. Entrepreneurship is very tough, it’s very hard. I say to people all the time, I don’t ever want anyone to think that — my friends call me a chronic optimist, which is true. I can’t help it because I think that’s the best outlook to have on life. I also have times when I get scared, I get self-doubt — it will creep in and those are the times when I need to give myself a moment to just feel how I’m feeling. I don’t push it down. You need to cry it out but center your wellness. 

For example, I have been almost non-stop for the past two-plus years building this company. I’m excited because, at the top of the year, I’m going away on a 10-day silent meditation and retreat. That’s my way of really centering my wellness, centering myself, going quiet, and allowing me to just fall into myself fully without any distraction. 

That’s something that I had to kind of work myself up to do because you get so into your company and feel like, “Oh, if I leave, it’ll all fall apart. They need me.” This is all true but the reality is that if you have a company that can’t run if you’re not there, you do have to find ways to prioritize your own emotional and mental health.

00:51:02 

Doria: Thank you. I love that. The one thing that I would add that helped me a lot is the mentorship of other incredible women. In fact, I think on your website, you list an African proverb: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together,” which is really touching and true. 

Where can listeners learn more about you and your company, Postal Petals?

00:51:37 

Talia: Yeah, so we are PostalPetals.com. Across social media platforms, we kept the branding pretty consistent. Anywhere that you want to look for us, we’re Postal Petals. If you hear something in this interview and you have questions, shoot us a dm. If I don’t get it directly, someone on the social media team will get it and make sure that it gets to me. Yes, please look us up. Follow us on social media. We’re on LinkedIn. We’re on Instagram. I’d love to hear from you guys so, please, definitely message me if you have questions — or just go online and order some flowers! You need some flowers! You’re ready for an immersive floral experience!

00:52:21 

Doria: If you want to fill your vase!

00:52:23 

Talia: Yes, fill your vase! I’ve got to get used to saying that!

00:52:25 

Doria: Thank you so much for coming on SheVentures today.

00:52:31 

Talia: Absolutely, Doria! Thank you so much for having me. I truly appreciate it!