Behind Her Empire Podcast: LIVELY's CEO on Recognizing Opportunity and Building a Brand

Yasmin Nouri

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.

Michelle Cordeiro Grant
LIVELY

On today's episode of Behind Her Empire podcast, meet Michelle Cordeiro Grant, the founder and CEO of LIVELY, a direct-to-consumer company that makes lingerie and more with a focus on style and comfort.


Grant grew up with immigrant parents, thinking she wanted to become a doctor or a lawyer, but her true passion lay in working with products and building brands. At the end of a long and extremely successful career at brands including Victoria's Secret, Grant came to the realization that the $13 billion lingerie category was being dominated by a single brand and had a very narrow point of view.

This led her to go out on her own and create LIVELY, with the goal of building a brand that strived to reflect real, authentic, everyday women like herself. Grant watched the women walking down 5th Avenue in NYC, "and you could just see the confidence oozing when they had this handbag or the shoes."

She said she wanted to bring that kind of confidence, coupled with comfort to women. In 2016, she launched LIVELY,, which now has four stores and fosters a network of over 140,000 brand ambassadors whose online content embodied, "passion, purpose and competence."

She grew the business from its concept stage to a recent $100 million acquisition in just three years, beating the odds that many female-founded companies face.

On this episode, you'll hear from Grant as she describes the tactical steps she took to leave her career and build a company that she was passionate about, what it takes to build a brand from concept to acquisition and how she built a community of 140,000 ambassadors.

Michelle Cordeiro Grant is the founder and CEO of LIVELY. Previously, she was VP of merchandising at Thrillist and director/ senior merchant at Victoria's Secret.


Want to hear more of the Behind Her Empire podcast? Subscribe on Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio or wherever you get your podcasts.

Subscribe to our newsletter to catch every headline.

Why Women’s Purchasing Power Is a Huge Advantage for Female-Led Leagues

Samson Amore

Samson Amore is a reporter for dot.LA. He holds a degree in journalism from Emerson College. Send tips or pitches to samsonamore@dot.la and find him on Twitter @Samsonamore.

Why Women’s Purchasing Power Is a Huge Advantage for Female-Led Leagues
Samson Amore

According to a Forbes report last April, both the viewership and dollars behind women’s sports at a collegiate and professional level are growing.

Read moreShow less
https://twitter.com/samsonamore
samsonamore@dot.la
LA Tech Week Day 5: Social Highlights
Evan Xie

L.A. Tech Week has brought venture capitalists, founders and entrepreneurs from around the world to the California coast. With so many tech nerds in one place, it's easy to laugh, joke and reminisce about the future of tech in SoCal.

Here's what people are saying about the fifth day of L.A. Tech Week on social:

Read moreShow less

LA Tech Week: How These Six Greentech Startups Are Tackling Major Climate Issues

Samson Amore

Samson Amore is a reporter for dot.LA. He holds a degree in journalism from Emerson College. Send tips or pitches to samsonamore@dot.la and find him on Twitter @Samsonamore.

LA Tech Week: How These Six Greentech Startups Are Tackling Major Climate Issues
Samson Amore

At Lowercarbon Capital’s LA Tech Week event Thursday, the synergy between the region’s aerospace industry and greentech startups was clear.

The event sponsored by Lowercarbon, Climate Draft (and the defunct Silicon Valley Bank’s Climate Technology & Sustainability team) brought together a handful of local startups in Hawthorne not far from LAX, and many of the companies shared DNA with arguably the region’s most famous tech resident: SpaceX.

Read moreShow less
https://twitter.com/samsonamore
samsonamore@dot.la
RELATEDEDITOR'S PICKS
Trending