Behind Her Empire: Lia Valencia Key on Going From Homeless Shelter to QVC Mogul
Yasmin is the host of the "Behind Her Empire" podcast, focused on highlighting self-made women leaders and entrepreneurs and how they tackle their career, money, family and life.
Each episode covers their unique hero's journey and what it really takes to build an empire with key lessons learned along the way. The goal of the series is to empower you to see what's possible & inspire you to create financial freedom in your own life.
This week, I sat down with Lia Valencia Key, the founder of the jewelry brand Valencia Key.
Lia was born and raised in an impoverished part of Philadelphia, and grew up in a homeless shelter with her mom and siblings.
Lia's mother made it clear that her family could not give up hope, telling her children, "your predicament doesn't determine your destiny." Lia describes how her mother planted a number of seeds within her despite the hardships they both endured, pushing her to be a leader and giving her the power of choice in her own life.
Inspired by her mother's words, Lia went on to get a master's in education. She realized she had a passion for beauty, and went on to cosmetology school.
For Lia, it is important to always be aware of where she is headed, to reach for completion and to be open to asking for help. These values eventually landed her a QVC, where she was able to launch and sell her own jewelry line.
In our interview, Lia is candid about how hard she had to work to reach her goals. She describes five years of rejection from QVC, only to eventually meet someone with the network that connected her.
"No does not mean always no," Lia says. "It means not now. It means gear up. It means train more. It means sharpen up. It means — maybe even — shift a little of perspective." It was this mindset that steered her towards her vision.
We also discussed dealing with and overcoming fear at length. Lia says that some fears never get vanquished, you simply know how to address them when they come up. She talks about how writing is a major hurtle for her to this day, but it's something she knows she can handle. She also highlights the importance of being authentic and showing up as yourself, because it leaves room for people to appreciate and love you for who you are.
On the rest of this episode, Lia and I discussed her career at QVC, her mentality and values, why she chose jewelry and why she keeps choosing joy.
Lia Valencia Key is the founder of Valencia Key Jewelry.
"If you choose life, that means you choose to keep going, and you choose to find that sparkle even in the valleys. And when you find that spark, when you get back up, and you find it again and you go by that. That, to me, is true wealth." — Lia Valencia Key
Want to hear more of the Behind Her Empire podcast? Subscribe on Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio or wherever you get your podcasts.
dot.LA Engagement Intern Colleen Tufts contributed to this post.
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Yasmin is the host of the "Behind Her Empire" podcast, focused on highlighting self-made women leaders and entrepreneurs and how they tackle their career, money, family and life.
Each episode covers their unique hero's journey and what it really takes to build an empire with key lessons learned along the way. The goal of the series is to empower you to see what's possible & inspire you to create financial freedom in your own life.
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College Savings App UNest Taps New President As It Dives Into Crypto
Since its founding in 2018, UNest has focused on helping parents save money for their kids. Offering customers flexible accounts to go toward things like college tuition, wedding expenses or a down payment on a house, the North Hollywood-based fintech startup might seem like more of a low-risk institution.
Yet in the next few weeks, UNest is jumping headfirst into the world of cryptocurrencies.
On Thursday, the company announced it has hired Jon Walker as president to help lead the app’s expansion as it looks to hire more people, grow its product offerings and raise more funding. In the newly created post, Walker will work alongside UNest founder and CEO Ksenia Yudina.
In an interview with dot.LA, Walker said his first job is to spearhead the launch of UNest Legacy—its upcoming product allowing users to invest in crypto and individual stocks—as well as expand the company’s presence in Utah, where he resides.
“Our goal is to help families build a lasting financial legacy,” Walker said. “Crypto investors tend to be younger and more diverse than retail stock investors, and we believe that this is becoming more and more mainstream.”
Before joining UNest—which counts former NBA player Baron Davis and actress Laura Dern among its investors—Walker served on the leadership team at KPMG Spark, the accounting giant’s bookkeeping and tax preparation service for small- and mid-sized businesses. He joined the firm after KPMG’s 2018 acquisition of Salt Lake City-based online bookkeeping startup Bookly, where he was a board member and part of the founding team.
He also participated in exits at Utah-based startups EcoScraps and GroSocial, and held positions at venture capital firms Signal Peak Ventures and Kickstart Seed Fund—all based in the “Silicon Slopes” area south of Salt Lake City, which earned that moniker thanks to its booming tech startup scene.
Walker hopes to poach from the region’s deep tech talent base as part of a hiring binge for UNest this year. The startup plans to double the size of its workforce to 70 employees by the end of 2022, including new engineering, marketing and operations personnel.
“Utah has become quite the vibrant ecosystem in regards to startups and the VC community,” Walker said, adding that there are no plans to move UNest’s headquarters there.
UNest is aiming to grow from 400,000 users currently to 1 million by the end of the year. The company is fresh off a $26 million Series B funding round last fall, led by Houston-based The Artemis Fund, which took its total capital raised to $40 million.
Walker said he is tasked with executing an even larger Series C raise by the end of 2022, and laying the foundation for a possible IPO in the years to come. “That’s definitely on our roadmap,” he said of a public offering.
Walker said that UNest also plans to partner with one of its investors, asset management giant Franklin Templeton, to introduce a product focused on ESG (environmental, social and governance) stocks.
UNest isn’t the only family savings startup on the fintech scene; its competitors include Chicago-based EarlyBird and San Francisco-based Backer. After it bought out two similar apps—San Francisco-based Littlefund and New York-based Kidfund—in recent years, Walker didn’t rule out more acquisitions for UNest.
“Right now, our focus really is on hyper-growth mode,” he said. “If the right opportunity comes along that makes sense for both parties, I think it’s our fiduciary responsibility to shareholders to look at opportunities that present themselves.”
TikTok Stars Like the D’Amelio Sisters and Addison Rae Are Earning More Than Many S&P 500 CEOs
Eat your hearts out, CEOs: TikTok stars like the D’Amelio sisters and Addison Rae are banking more money than many of the S&P 500’s chief executives.
A recent Forbes ranking placed sisters Charli and Dixie D’Amelio as the top-earning content creators on TikTok, after they raked in $17.5 million and $10 million, respectively, in 2021 through sponsored content, brand endorsement deals and other business endeavors. As the Wall Street Journal noted this week, that puts the sisters’ earnings on par with most S&P 500 CEOs, whose median earnings were $13.4 million in 2020.
As the highest-paid TikToker, Charli D’Amelio made more last year than Exxon Mobil CEO Darren Woods ($15.6 million) and Starbucks CEO Kevin Johnson ($14.7 million) earned in 2020, according to the Journal, while her sister Dixie banked more than Southwest Airlines CEO Gary Kelly ($9.2 million). Fellow influencer Addison Rae—who like the D’Amelio sisters became a viral sensation for her dancing videos—made $8.5 million last year, more than Costco CEO Craig Jelinek ($8.3 million).
Culver City-based TikTok, which is owned by Chinese tech company ByteDance, now has over 1 billion monthly active users. The social media giant curates recommendations using a cryptic algorithm that pushes certain content to the top of a user’s “For You” page. The D’Amelio sisters’ and Rae’s highly aestheticized content—which ranges from silly dances, to provocative lip-syncing, to vlog-style “unpack with me” videos—have drawn tens of millions of followers, if not more, to their TikTok accounts. (Charli D’Amelio is by far the most followed TikToker with more than 133 million subscribers.)
Outside of TikTok, the app’s top earners have begun monetizing their cult followings in the form of lucrative sponsorships. In 2020, coffee chain Dunkin’ partnered with Charli D’Amelio to create a drink called “The Charli”, while Rae has parlayed her massive following into her own makeup line, ITEM Beauty and a starring role in the 2021 Netflix movie “He’s All That.”
As TikTok has grown, so have the earnings reaped by its highest-paid stars. Forbes noted that the highest-paid TikTokers on its list collectively earned $55.5 million last year—up 200% from the 2020 edition of its ranking.
Still, even Charli D’Amelio’s bank account can’t compare to very wealthiest Hollywood celebrities or S&P 500 CEOs. Kardashian clan celebrity Kylie Jenner reportedly made $590 million in 2020 after selling a controlling stake in her cosmetics brand, while Apple CEO Tim Cook earned nearly $99 million last year.
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Trendy Wellness Brand Moon Juice Is Raising $7 Million As It Targets Middle America
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Harrison is dot.LA's senior finance reporter. They previously worked for Gizmodo, Fast Company, VentureBeat and Flipboard. Find them on Twitter: @harrisonweber. Send tips on L.A. deals to harrison@dot.la. Pronouns: they/them.
Moon Juice—the Los Angeles wellness brand known for its juices, skin care products and adaptogenic Sex Dust—is in the process of raising $7 million in new funding.
The Culver City-based company recently secured $5.1 million in fresh capital and intends to raise another $1.9 million, according to an SEC filing. In October, Moon Juice landed a $10 million Series C round from New York venture firms DGNL Ventures and Able Partners, according to PitchBook data. That previous round is being used to fund the brand’s expansion and marketing efforts targeting the “interior of the U.S.,” the Wall Street Journal reported at the time.
Founded by CEO Amanda Chantal Bacon in 2011, Moon Juice has evolved from a Venice juice spot into a trendy supplements purveyor stocked on shelves in Sephora beauty stores. In an Insider profile of Bacon last week, former staffers criticized the founder—who has become a prominent lifestyle guru—for her management style.
Moon Juice, DGNL and Able Partners did not immediately respond to a requests for comment.
Though loosely defined, adaptogenic supplements are herbs, botanicals and mushrooms that are believed to relieve stress, boost focus and improve your mood. While ingredients such as ashwagandha and ginseng have roots in traditional medicine, some experts say the broader adaptogenic industry lacks evidence to support its claims.
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Do you know something we should know about L.A. tech or venture capital? Reach out securely via Signal: +1 917 434 4978.
Harrison is dot.LA's senior finance reporter. They previously worked for Gizmodo, Fast Company, VentureBeat and Flipboard. Find them on Twitter: @harrisonweber. Send tips on L.A. deals to harrison@dot.la. Pronouns: they/them.