To cut a long story short, Madam C.J. Walker was the first American woman to become a self-made millionaire. Orphaned at 7, married at 14, and widowed at 20, she was a single mother earning $1.50 a day as a washerwoman. Two decades later, she owned a million-dollar hair-care empire. How did she do it?
Born Sarah Breedlove, she was the first in her family to be born into freedom, but it hardly made her career any easier. According to Time magazine, even the idea that launched her entrepreneurial success arose out of hardship: she realized she was losing hair. In the 1890s she relocated to Denver and developed a hair growth formula which she turned into a lucrative line of hair products: “Madam Walker’s Wonderful Hair Grower.” Off the heels of her products’ success, she expanded into more cosmetic markets from shampoos to cold creams to hot combs. All the while, she went door to door, placed ads in newspapers, trained specialized “Walker agents,” invested thousands in her company when others wouldn’t and displayed the kind of business acumen most MBAs would drool at. It’s safe to say she got her life straightened out.
💻: thestoryexchange.org
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#veera #fearless #confident #brave #womenshistorymonth #leader #feminist #glassceilings
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