Meet Sarah Lynch of Mama Gaia Co

If someone told Sarah Lynch that she would be building an app & AI for her own business a few years ago, she would have run in the other direction. A Massachusetts born creative living in Colorado, Sarah studied English in college and for many years dreamed of becoming a journalist. As many do after graduation, though, Sarah found herself working a few different jobs to pay the bills—waitressing in a bustling restaurant and working for a small startup called Mama Gaia. At the time this business was owned by another woman and was comprised of a few refrigerated vending machines doling out healthy food options, along with a food truck to prepare the food and labels to package and market it. Sarah mostly worked in the food trucks to start out, whistling away while cooking up concoctions and then bringing them to the nearby apartment complexes and office parks where these vending machines lived. Sarah loved this little side-gig, not knowing that she would soon receive an email that would change her life. Suddenly, at 24 years old, she was offered to buy and own the company. Even though the original owner gave her a week to decide, Sarah immediately knew she would do it, despite what anyone might have told her. She took the offer and she took her time, slowly building Mama Gaia into what it is today.

A refrigerated vending machine company featuring goodies from local producers, Mama Gaia seeks to shorten the supply chain from creator to consumer. Local restaurants and food makers get prime real estate in these sleek and slender fridges, housed in larger building complexes where the hungry hover at every corner. This wasn’t always the business model, but was rather born out of the time Sarah took when she was starting out to determine what Mama Gaia was all about.

Taking the food trucks and label making out of the business altogether, Sarah simplified, and jokes that for her first few years she was basically a vending machine stocker. Walking to local food vendors down the street in Denver and taking their treats a few blocks over to the machines, where she’d happen upon a customer looking for a bite to eat, Sarah had her hands in every step of this localized food chain. She was building this community, step by step, and started to realize that she was really tapping into something that could grow. Throughout this time, Sarah saw problems within the current state of the food system—sourcing products from faraway lands, having them sit in warehouses and freezers before getting to the consumer, and then being thrown in landfills when not put to use—and created solutions with Mama Gaia. Not only are the products in her vending machines sourced locally; any leftovers are put back into the community and donated to food shelters.

While Sarah never thought of herself as a business owner, looking back she realizes that she had been fantasizing about starting something herself for years. Every time she walked into a restaurant she would point out what she would have done differently, but never imagined she would actually do it. She saw herself as a creative, not a CEO, and yet once Mama Gaia was in her hands, she was able to put those very skills to the test. It was her journalistic impulse at work when she talked to restaurant owners and community members, constantly seeking out stories from the people around her to figure out what they needed and what wasn’t working. Through years of trails and tribulations, learning each lesson step by step, Sarah started to turn this business model into something she could really scale. With the help of her two co-founders, a small team and some tech companies, Sarah began to build the technology behind these vending machines so that it was no longer in the hands of a third-party conglomerate. Again, something this creative writer and music enthusiast never would have predicted for herself in a million years. If she has learned anything in business, it’s that there are always going to be hurdles—like the time she broke a fridge while transporting it across town and had to put it back together herself—and you have to learn to be both resilient and patient.

Hearing Sarah speak about her business is both comforting and familiar, a story you hear from entrepreneurs world-over who happened into an industry, were thrown challenge after challenge, and just didn’t give up. In a week, Mama Gaia will be launching onto the market, to be featured in residential communities, universities and healthcare facilities, and eventually franchised to meal kit companies and scaled nationwide. While Sarah may not know exactly how she will get to that final step, she knows that all she needs to do is take the next one, and the path will unfold. Sarah gives me hope—that there’s no rush, that all of our creative impulses can find home in something successful, and that one day I will get a taste of this Colorado-based business myself, grabbing a fresh and healthy snack out of the vending machine on my way through my mom’s apartment complex.

Find Mama Gaia online and on Instagram to learn more!

Meet Heather Carroll of Rare Bird Aesthetics.

When Heather Carroll started making earrings, she didn’t know she’d be starting a business. A long-time fashionista and collector of beautiful objects, Heather was on the hunt for eye-catching jewelry. She looked on eBay, in thrift stores and at vintage markets, yet everything she found left her ears in pain. The weight of most statement jewelry was too much to bear, and so instead of looking outwardly, Heather turned to her own craft box. Handwoven textiles she had collected years ago were slowly transformed into loud and lightweight ear candy. Pops of gold, deep purple and muted earth tones brought color to her already eclectic look. Initially, these earrings were just for her. But as she continued wearing them, people started noticing them, and the rest is, well, history.

If you look at Heather’s family history, it’s no surprise that she ended up in the jewelry industry. Her late grandfather ran a jewelry store on Long Island, where Heather would go after school and sports practice to help him with the shop. One might say Heather learned her love for both order and flair there, meticulously organizing the jewelry displays and wiping down the cases while developing an appreciation for jewels of all kind. Her grandfather was a mentor to her in all things style and business, hammering the entrepreneurial idea into her mind that if she wanted to make something happen, Heather would have to make it happen.

And, she did, going on to manage a bustling cafe in the heart of Porter Square, to turning her jewelry dreams into a reality. She now is the artist behind Rare Bird Aesthetics—a jewelry and decor line transforming colorful handwoven textiles into beautiful goods that can spice up your life, your home and your look. Heather’s many talents have found a home in Rare Bird—not only does she make gorgeous things, but she also takes gorgeous product photography, and has a knack for working with her customer base in a real and personal way. You can catch her on Instagram, selling her earrings in a flash story sale, or at a local market, where she’ll help you find the perfect piece to match your outfit. Heather knows her customer, because initially, she was one.

If Heather has learned anything about entrepreneurship, it would be in not limiting yourself. While originally thinking that Rare Bird was solely an earring business, after a conversation with a good friend she soon realized that she was just scratching the surface. Her materials—handwoven natural fibers sourced from a woman-owned sustainable business—soon became the raw material for adornments of all kind—hair clips, necklaces, tissue boxes, mirrors. Even the scraps she has get turned into something, whether it be one-of-a-kind collage earrings, or weavings to frame and put up on the wall. Heather does it all, letting nothing go to waste and leaving no stone unturned. When she does take a moment to slow down, it is the makers behind her materials that keep her going. Knowing that 50% of her purchase goes directly to supporting women in need helps fuel the work behind Rare Bird, which at times can be tiring. But, with a pair of scissors in hands, who knows where Heather will go.

Heather is open to possibilities when it comes to what the future will hold. She plays with the idea of running Rare Bird full-time—selling at markets and online—and of opening up a funky cafe with her partner, where her love of coffee and creativity will meet. If and when that place opens up, I know I’ll be the first to be there.

Find Heather on Instagram and on her website to learn more!

The Importance of Slowing Down.

I wake up this morning, do my morning routine, and choose to throw my agenda away. It is snowing, the flakes falling softly on the hard earth, and for the first time in a while I feel permission to pause. To sit on the couch and watch the world go by. To dream in my journal, talk to my mom, and think about all the things that lie ahead. I know I will get to them eventually, reach my hands out to that infinite future, but today is not for that. Today is for slowing down.

I think so much in the business world is about achieving. About doing—as much as you can, as often as possible, as quickly. And in a corporate environment, where you are inherently subject to your employer’s schedule, this is literally your job. But, for those of us who have taken the leap to forge out on our own, we get to create the rules. We get to set our schedules, determine what is important to us and how we wish to achieve it. And we get to do that in our own way.

And yet, still when you listen to entrepreneurs and change makers, it’s all about the hustle. The outreach. The output. But for the creatives among us, this scrapes against our fundamental need to take our time, and let our creation guide the process. A few months ago I joined a greeting card business group, of other people in the industry working to hone their product and get it in front of more folks. In many ways this group was great and incredibly educational, but ultimately left me feeling like a hamster on a wheel, struggling to keep up. And so I decided to step away and take my time. And maybe that means that right now, my business is not thriving by conventional means—I do not have a huge following, and I am not raking in money in sales every week. But, when I think about it, I think that that is where I should be at the beginning of my business. Like a runner going too fast and tripping on your own shoelaces, I think too much too soon can leave you with nothing to fall on when things go wrong. Instead, I am interested in the slow start, in which I put the necessary building blocks beneath me before I get to wherever I’m going, and then trust that I’ll get there, in time. And at that point, I will have fully arrived. This means slowing down to create, and play around with what it is I am creating. Slowing down to meditate on my purpose, and how I want to put it out into the world.

While I did throw my agenda away today, slowing down does not at all mean stopping, or overly analyzing every move to the point of stagnation. It just means making less moves initially, and valuing the time that it takes to get through the initial growing pains. It means committing to process over results, and finding joy throughout that process. It means slowing down and staring out the window, sometimes. Who knows, you might even end up getting inspired.

Just do it.

Got something you’ve been wanting to start but don’t know where to begin? Here’s my advice—the stuff you won’t find in business books and how-to guides: don’t write a business plan. Just do it.

When I started the poetry open mic, I did not sit down and decipher how I wanted to advertise, what our brand would be, or who my target audience was. I was sitting on a swivel chair sharing with my boss about my love for spoken word poetry, and he suggested we start an open mic, and boom, a seed was planted.

Sometimes it isn’t something you’ve been longing to do for years. Sometimes you had never even thought of it before, it just as well could not have happened, but by some stroke of luck the stars align and a seed gets planted and you go with it.

And I went with it, collaborating with local artists to build a stage, create a poster and determine the details. Heck, I didn’t even have a cohost (I knew I needed a cohost) by the time we set the start date. And yet, by some stroke of luck she showed up weeks before and joined in. We planned, we prodded, and then we just ran with it.

Sure, this thing that we created is not alive today—thanks, covid—but it speaks to the creative spirit that I believe is the start to anything great—the willingness to start out good enough. I stuck the signs up with duct tape. I advertised on Facebook, Instagram and word of mouth and that’s it. And somehow I grew this thing from a fledgling bird—events had never been seen before in this space—to a fully attended, shoulders-bumping-into-each-other gathering. Just by doing it.

I knew there were things to be tweaked—better signage that didn’t fall off throughout the night, larger outreach, a way to generate income—but I also knew that if I did all that before getting started, I never would.

I think the worst thing you can do as a creative person is sit still. Think. Plan, even. The best things happen by jumping in, getting your hands dirty, and figuring out to kinks as you go. Same goes for my greeting card business. Did I sit down and determine my brand and marketing plan before getting started? No. The idea was given to me after a long line of creating cards without even knowing I was, and then I made a website overnight. The user experience wasn’t great, I didn’t know how to accept payment, but I did it, and that made all the difference.

Today, as I continue going on, I still hit walls when I want to strategize my way to success. When I try to find answers in instructional guides, and even in my own mind. But I have to remind myself that that is not how to get there. I have to remind myself that instead of thinking my way into what I want my aesthetic to be, I should create it. Rather than discerning my target audience in my head, I should talk to the people on my block. Instead of sitting top heavy, trying to be what I think I should, I should get going, and become whatever I already am. Willing to start imperfectly, all my kinks exposed, and iron them out along the way.

Will you join me?

My story.

As I said last week, I might not be qualified to tell you how to run a business. But, at this point in my life I can consider myself a certified risk taker, soul searcher and creative problem solver—all things that I believe are the building blocks of entrepreneurship. This is my story.

It all started on the 4th of July after my first year in college. House music bumping, ping pong balls flying, friends throwing up in bushes. I looked around at these people around me—classmates who all seemed to wear the same clothes and tell the same jokes—and felt strongly that I was not one of them. I didn’t know who I was instead, but in a matter of months I had un-enrolled in my sophomore year at Trinity, and bought a ticket to East Africa on a service learning trip. To find myself.

And from there the searching didn’t stop—I went to an ashram in the Bahamas, an intentional community in upstate New York, a hippie school in Vermont, spiritual center in Hawaii, and Buddhist college in Colorado. I won’t bore you with the details, but over the years I got comfortable in the uncomfortable, I asked a lot of questions, and was clearly not on the path that most people my age were walking.

Now, what the heck does that have to do with entrepreneurship?, you might be wondering. Isn’t that just an entitled rich girl traveling the world to avoid taking responsibility for her life? In many ways, yes, it was. I made a lot of decisions I regret over the years—I prioritized my own journey over my relationships with others. I lost friends. I stunted my education and professional growth multiple times, like a blooming plant continually cut at the node, unable to fully grow. I got rid of everything I knew of home, seeing myself as somehow more enlightened than the people in my past, at that party and elsewhere. But I wasn’t. And now, now that the searching has ceased, I have my regrets, but I have to look for the silver lining.

While I have, since returning home, uncovered a newfound loyalty to all things I left behind—family, sense of place, staying—I have also found a home for the skills that I built in all my wandering, in building my own business.

I did not learn to process data in Excel, nor to improve my website for SEO. I did not learn how to blend watercolor or draw architectural designs. But I did learn how to go against the grain. I did learn how to dig deep past what everyone else thought I should do, to find what I really wanted. I learned how to get by with no mentors, no teacher or boss telling me what to do. I learned how to start things completely from scratch—a book display in a cafe where I worked, a spoken-word poetry performance, a blog, a monthly community meal, a monthly open mic in another cafe where I worked—and to figure it out as I went. And I learned, through it all, to keep going.

I don’t know that I believe we are made or destined to do certain things, but when I look back I can see how my roundabout path got me to here, and I am grateful for it. And now, I am making the choice to use that all as fuel. To keep going.

What experiences in your life have primed you for stepping outside the box, taking risks, and doing it yourself? I look forward to turning this into a space to share stories of grit, creativity and transformation for others on a similar roundabout path, slowly finding their way.

Dream small.

January 4th, 2021. I want to be more intentional about my life, my relationships and my business. They say “start where you are,” so I pull a planner for 2020-2021 out of the recycling bin that my mom gave me in case I didn’t like the other one she gave me. It is covered in flamingos and will only cover half of the year ahead and it is what I have in front of me. I write down five goals for my business—improve product quality, improve business systems, educate myself, build wholesale relationships, and start advertising and growing business. My desk is covered in designs for Valentine’s Day cards that I may or may not use, along with paints, paintbrushes, a ruler, and a list of people to thank. This is where I am, and where I want to be feels huge and imperceptibly far away.

They say dream big, but I wonder if it should really be to dream small. Every day. In bite-sized-chunks that you can digest. Do what is in front of you. Write one page. Reach out to one person. I am glad that I have these goals in front of me—to make my life better—but I also know myself. I know I won’t be able to make them happen if I don’t even know where to start. And if I can’t show up to them in small, tangible ways every day.

And so I break them down. Into questions. How can I improve my marketing today, by setting up my social media posts for the week, reaching out to a friend, and watching an instructional video on Youtube? How can I trick myself into feeling like I am growing things, by propagating plant cuttings that have been sitting in water all winter, or putting on an outfit that makes me feel artsy and interesting? How can I use my day off to put my head down and work, and also open up my heart and play?

These are questions I am here to ask myself, in front of you, on this blog that I am re-beginning in 2021. This is a place for creatives, dreamers, and people who feel like there is something more out there for them. Because I’ve been there. I’ve been the scavenger, leaving everything behind to find my purpose. I’ve gone to three different colleges, I’ve worked for many different people in many different places, and the best part—I still haven’t gotten where I am going. I am not here to sit on an ivory tower and tell you how to be successful, because honestly, I don’t know. I am just here to share the ride. `

One letter at a time,

Sage

My mother always taught me to write thank you notes.

Whether it was for a bracelet from my grandmother that I didn’t really like, a trip to stay at a family member’s home, or a fun night at a friend’s house, I was always taught this simple lesson: write a thank you note. I used to think it was formulaic, dry, disingenuous—why would I thank someone for a present that I didn’t really like, or a family trip I didn’t really want to go on in the first place? Wasn’t this gesture just a forced product of my WASPY upbringing—full of dinner-table-niceties and smalltalk—and not an actual, genuine response to the gift? I was a cynical, always-questioning-authority-young-person, who didn’t like being told what to do. But for some reason, when it came to thank you notes, I did it anyway, despite my grievances. On sage colored stationary monogrammed with my name, on lined notebook paper, on collaged magazine cutouts, I would craft letters of gratitude to grandparents, relatives and family friends. I would thank them for their thought, share a small anecdote, and express hopes to see them again soon. I would sign my name at the bottom and send it off, checking an item off of my to-do list. And for many years, thank you notes were just that—the completion of a task.

And yet, somewhere along the way, my thank you notes started to merge into something more. Letters sent back-and-forth with my aging grandfather, as pen pals. Father’s Day cards sent to my dad as my annual opportunity to open up to him. Thank you notes sent to hiring managers to show them that, though I might not always have the perfect interview responses or resume, I do have it in me to do something thoughtful, and genuine, and from the heart.

These days, in our fleeting digital world, greeting cards are all we have left of that genuineness, and sometimes all we have left of each other. They are a way of sidestepping the screen—that constant influx of images and information and words coming at you one after another after another—and entering into the tactile, the tangible, the real. Someone had to touch them. Had to take out a pen, press it into a piece of paper and make those interesting shapes we know of as letters. Had to hope for enough ink. This person, this real person, comes through to you in a greeting card—comes through in their swooping handwriting, their smudges of ink on the side, their lopsided stamp application. Sending a greeting card is sending a piece of yourself.

And so, it is for this reason that I am so grateful to have stuck it out with greeting cards. I’m so grateful for every time I have had the opportunity to send a thank you note to my boyfriend’s mom (who now jokes that she could offer me a tissue and I’d write her a thank you note). I’m so grateful for every time I get to make a friend a birthday card with an inside joke, or tuck a small love letter under my boyfriend’s pillow. And, I’m so grateful for every time I get to help my customers do the same.

A thank you note is not just a thank you note. A greeting card is not just a greeting card. It is a reaching out, a hand outstretched in the dark, a flag planted in the moon. It was our way of saying “I was here.”

I guess I have another thank you note to send.

When I started this whole thing it had nothing to do with greeting cards.

It was January, it was my birthday, and so I bought myself a set of watercolor paints with money from a gift card I had received. I was going through some internal struggles at the time and just needed some inspiration. So I started to draw these small, simple, caricature-style self portraits, depicting myself in a way that was strong, creative and empowered. Things I felt about myself but was having trouble gaining access to at the time. So I drew them into being. I had no formal training; I didn't watch instructional Youtube videos; I just drew. And slowly, over time, I started developing a style that was mine.⁠ ⁠

It wasn't until months later, in the middle of the pandemic, lying on the floor, that the idea came to me to turn these little drawings into greeting cards. It didn't come to me in a dream, it didn't come to me in a vision from my higher self, it came to me from my sweet boyfriend who had seen me sit in my room for hours bent over these small card-shaped paintings, only to complain to him later about not having something to do that felt like mine. I had been searching for it for months--something that would give me purpose and joy and meaning--as if it were some faraway thing. But, when Matt said that to me, to make my paintings and sell them as cards personalized to the customer, it was the tiniest tap on the shoulder, showing me that that thing had actually been right in front of me the whole time.⁠ ⁠

They say necessity is the mother of invention. They just don't always say that sometimes, the necessity lies in the inventor herself.

“I Think I’ve Always Been an Entrepreneur,”

I thought to myself the other day, on a run down my favorite street in the neighborhood. Just as I had that thought, I heard a quiet voice from behind me, yelling out “Water! Water! Water!” I looked and, yes, there was a little boy sitting in front of a table selling bottled water to passersby. Sweat was pouring down my face and I wanted to keep going, but I had to stop to say hello to this little boy. I didn’t have the money to buy a water from him but I wanted to take the time to encourage him for his efforts. I told him to keep it up. What I didn’t tell him was that he reminded me of myself.

I too used to set up shop on my front lawn, yelling out sales calls to passersby. It began on Nantucket, selling powdered lemonade and Chips Ahoy cookies taken out of their package and put on a nice plate. Sometimes I would even paint shells and sell them. Sometimes I would end the day with cups filled with cash, others I’d leave with pockets full of sand. But every summer, I would get out there with my little stand and wait.

I’ll never forget going into the shoe store in town one year and paying for a pair of blue flip flops—worth $20—all in coins. While the cashier looked at me like I was crazy, I could only beam back pride, for I had earned every penny I put on that counter. It went on from there. I started babysitting, and put up posters around ‘Sconset advertising my skills. I remember walking around with a wallet so fat with cash that it couldn’t even fit into my back pocket. I started a savings bank in my early teens and have slowly been adding to it, bit by bit. I have almost always had a job and I have almost always brought my entrepreneurial sense to that job—finding a way to make whatever business I worked for just a little bit better.

I think I’ve always been an entrepreneur.

Which is why, I thought to myself running down the street drenched in sweat, I’ve always struggled in the mainstream. It’s why I went to three different colleges, why I wandered the world looking for my purpose, and why I’ve still struggled to find it. I’ve struggled in the mainstream idea of success—that classic “go to a good college get a good job make a good living” notion—not because I am not meant to be successful. Not because I don’t have talent, or creativity, or a solid work ethic.

I’ve struggled because I’ve been trying to use that talent, creativity and work ethic in the wrong places. I’ve been trying to shove myself into someone else’s box or business, rather than thinking of what I uniquely bring to it. Rather than creating my own.

So, I am grateful to be here doing just that—whacking through the weeds of what it means to be an entrepreneur, a small business owner, and an artist, all at the same time.

This blog will uncover just that, and more, in my journey of building a business, one step at a time.

Thank you for coming along for the ride.