SYDNEY SIMONE

In this interview I speak with Sydney Simone, a Black entrepreneur who saw the global pandemic as an opportunity to start an online company on her own terms. Pivoting from her former career and taking a risk to explore her passion, Sydney founded Simone The Label. Her company not only sells beautiful jewelry but strives to bring together Black creatives with a shared goal of garnering relationships and furthering the success of social justice causes within the Black community.

Where are you from?

I’m from New York, I grew up right outside the city in White Plains. My dad is from Harlem so I spent a lot of time in Manhattan immersed in New York fashion, which I love. My mom’s family is from Boston so I actually went to school at Boston University near them. After Boston, I moved to LA and it’s a completely different vibe and feel, but I love it!

What did you do for work before starting Simone The Label?

I studied hospitality and business and ended up working in event planning when I moved to LA. I worked for Los Angeles Tourism and Discover La planning corporate events. Then I worked for an event firm called Spring Place doing smaller-scale events for companies in fashion, wellness, tech, and entertainment.

Spring Place was located within a co-working space, so between the other companies in the building and the clients we worked together with, I was able to network and see how all these young entrepreneurs worked on a day-to-day basis. Just from watching them work I was like, I love doing these events but I want to do this for my own brand. 

So about a year before Covid, I decided that alongside my full-time job I want to get into e-commerce. I wanted to build a brand and didn't want it to just be about drop-shipping or only the e-commerce side of things. Interestingly enough another girl who was working with me at Spring Place was also interested in doing the same thing so we ended up starting a jewelry company called Eclatant. 

We laid all of the groundwork together and launched the company right before covid but quickly realized we had different styles. I ended up selling my half to her and decided to start Simone The Label independently. 

I knew covid was going to end eventually and I would have to return to events so I wanted to get myself up and running asap. We launched STL in August of 2020 and it was awesome. Working on the launch was amazing and there was so much great energy from everyone we worked together with from the photographers, models, friends, and people within my community here in LA.

What did you do differently when launching Simone The Label compared to the first company you worked on?

It was a number of things the main big thing for me was making it charitable and making it have a purpose beyond just the business. I think that was somewhere she wanted to get eventually but it wasn’t in the forefront of her plan. Regardless of how feasible it is or how much sense it makes, I just really wanted these morals at the core of my business. That’s also what drove me to start the Jewelry for Justice Collection, especially in light of everything that was going on at the time. 

I launched in August when the BLM movement was going strong as a result of all of the police brutality that happened that summer. It's an ongoing problem and it's not new but to have this newfound media spotlight on Black Lives Matter, police brutality, and injustice in our justice system it felt like the perfect time to highlight that. I've never wanted it to be about the sales, it's a genuine effort and a first step for me towards something I would eventually like to do every quarter highlighting a different charity. 

I have found ways to do that on a smaller scale like for example, I did this Black and minority business expo called NoHo BMBE which is basically a local indoor market at Fusian Force Studio where they bring different Black and minority-owned business owners together to shop. There was one Black-owned business called 8-1-Great, the founder is a high school student from the 818 area. She has t-shirts, hoodies, and sweatshirts elevating unity in diversity in the 818 area. She came up to me at this event and asked to do a photoshoot collaboration and I thought, this is the kind of thing that I definitely want to do. 

It was the perfect opportunity to continue to help and work with other people so we put together a photoshoot for her with a few STL pieces and her clothing pieces. A lot of things that I learned from my first experience launching and putting together photoshoot I was able to share with her, so I'm hoping that was helpful to her and now she’s able to take it and run so that next time she wants to put together a photoshoot she knows exactly what to do and it’s very easy.

Do you feel like because Simone the label is primarily online you've been able to move at a quicker pace during the pandemic and avoid certain obstacles and challenges now that there is such a big push to online shopping?

I have definitely been able to avoid hiccups with opening a store in general. With the online store, once you're up, there are only a few things that you have to maintain outward-facing so you can be figuring things out and making mistakes behind the scenes and no ones gonna know. Because your products are online and available to sell, as long as people are able to place their order for what's there and their order ships and they get it like… you're good.

Do you feel like you received any kind of extra press or support during 2020 compared to what you may have received previously because you’re a Black business owner and people are making more of an effort to lift up Black-owned businesses and voices? 

I don’t necessarily feel like there have been any white-run companies that have been like oh let me highlight you. I’m a part of this mentor program called RAISE Fashion which provides opportunities specifically for Black-owned businesses. They match you with industry professionals, so my mentor for digital marketing and advertising is the head of growth and digital marketing at Moda Operandi and my merchandising mentor is the head mentor for Intermix so it’s been an amazing resource. 

My dad always growing up would say with scholarships and everything, “make sure you look because there are different opportunities” and I always felt a little bit weird taking advantage. I'm also mixed so my mom is white and my dad is Black. I think getting in touch with who I am as a Black woman has been a journey and there are a lot of times that I felt confused or conflicted. I think even with the scholarships I remember feeling like “okay but should I really be... I know I’m a Black woman but should I really be applying for this?”. I definitely feel like there have been opportunities like this mentorship program where I’ve found this helpful community and felt supported and guided through it. But I don't necessarily think I’ve gotten extra press.

“RAISE Fashion—an acronym for “Respect, Advocate, Inspire, Support, and Empower”— was founded in the wake of global Black Lives Matter protests...” -Vogue RAISE Fashion Is a New Mentorship Program for Black Creatives in Fashion By Steff Yotka

Do you feel like you’ve experienced any obstacle through your journey because of your identity as a woman of color? 

Working with LA tourism, in my event professional career, I didn't realize how lucky I was. I worked with all women and we were 90% women of color/minorities. We were all women, and my head boss was Black, the CEO was Black, it was such a comfortable and amazing environment and I just didn't realize that that wasn't the norm because that was my first job out of college. So I was like “ok go team, we’re all women”. 

Then I transitioned to working at Spring Place where the owners there were majority white. Naturally, in the hiring process there, they hired predominantly white because that’s what people are comfortable with. But I think that in my role at Spring Place, there were definitely perks, well not perks but opportunities given to people who had more of a rapport with the leadership team and not necessarily based on the work. 

There was a point in time when my boss left and no one stepped in so I was the only person working on the events team, I was running everything by myself for a few months. From there I was doing all this work and received no raise in pay, no title change, nothing and there was no plan in place to hire more help. So I was like, forget the pay I just want to be a manager. But it was always a run around of “oh but it’s only been this amount of time” even though there were other people and other women specifically who had worked for xyz amount of time where something similar had happened and they were promoted. It’s crazy that we have to fight so extra hard as women and as Black women to get what we deserve. It seems like x plus y should equal z but there’s just such a disconnect between the facts and what should be. 

@simonethelabel simonelabel.com

Photo credit- @francoisjoseph & @seewantwear