Rebecca Minkoff, Fashion Designer

On how she thinks about the brand: “Our clientele as far as the ethos is: I'm a California girl who moved to New York, and there’s a little bit of Bohemian. There’s a little bit of rock and roll. And so that’s kind of the spirit we’re going for. We’ve largely targeted millennials. I am the same age and sex as my consumer, and so she’s hopefully grown up with me from when I launched at 26…. And so really going on these journeys and these important milestone moments: your first job, your first interview, your first marriage, your first divorce – all these key times in your life where your bag is your anchor.”

On the mission of the Female Founder Collective: “There [are] 12 million women-owned businesses in the US alone. There’s 1,800 started every day. And so, what if we could galvanize the power of not just the collective itself, which is over 5,000 women founders now that we have as part of the collective, but also get the consumer to give her money to women-owned businesses?... Could we get you to say, ‘I’m going to go one block out of my way to get coffee because it’s her store or buy from this female designer.’ And rather than have 50 women at Fortune 50 companies all making $20 million. How about 12 million women-owned businesses all getting support from the consumer and really making a true example of the gender pay gap being closed?”