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knew it was time to get back to work? Let's drop it up at career Builder. Are simple, customizable search tool let you search for part time, full time, and even work from home jobs so you can find a job that fits your lifestyle. Get started now at career builder dot com. Hi everybody, I'm Bozma St. John and you're listening to Back to Biz with Katie and Bows. Except I am by my damn self, okay, because Katie is sprinting towards her book deadline and so she's left
me all by my lonesome. But today I'm not by my lonesome. You know why, because I've got the fabulous Ashley Graham with me. I am so happy to be here. Thank you so much for having me on, Ashley. I love you. I just love you. You know, since day one, I think it was um a love affair. Do you remember the year that was? Oh? Girl, I don't know. I know I should have actually done like the research on what year it was because it was Glamor. It
was Glamor Woman of the Year. Yes, and then they just kept putting us together and stuff, and then it was that was it. They just knew. I feel like we kept seeing each other at places, yes, and then we were like, you know what, I think we should just be best friends. That it was. That was it. That was the universe was telling us. And then plus
I love justin you know, he looked I was. I was showing him tough love though, because I kind of felt like your cousin who needs to give him a hard time, you know what I mean, So you can't know he's all the way in, you know what I mean, because you have it, you know what. That's that's the best because just in such a teaser he I mean, all day long, teasing and joking. But then lay L Lael and I are like, I mean, she's my little sister.
That's it's it's, oh my gosh, Isaac, we have so much to talk about, like because honey, we we were having jokes um, you know, prior to this conversation about you, um, because we as in like the producers myself, we were having jokes um, because girl, you have done so much. Okay,
you are so much. At one point, Lauren said she just had to just go ahead and google Ashley Graham launches because it just felt like you kept uncovering launches, you know what I mean, Like you are not just a mom, even though you're a factless, amazing, wonderful new mom, but you're fashion and beauty icon, girl, icon, changemaker, rule breaker, a TV host, a producer, an activists, a wife, somebody's daughter,
my bestie. Come on titles did you cause a spirit feel like because yes, yes, yes, but all of the titles because you are so much and you mean so much, and so I'm going to give all your flowers right now, okay, because I truly feel that you have absolutely not just disrupted the way that we look at fashion beauty. I'm talking about like shattered, disrupted, changed everything. Nothing was done the same afterwards. Okay, let's just go ahead and claim that, amen.
But also the fact that you're an entrepreneur who keeps going, who keeps launching, and even in this time of COVID. So we're going to talk about all of that well as much as we can in this time. But okay, so we we got to start though, from the beginnings of time, Okay, because you're you're in Nebraska right now, right I am in Nebraska, justin Isaac and I came with my mom to Nebraska the second week of March and we were like, we left New York because we
just didn't know what was going to happen. I thought we were going to be gone for three weeks. I didn't even and pack everything, and um, it's been four months now, and it's it's it's been a very interesting time as everybody has been having. But um, I'm in Nebraska. I'm in the same home that I grew up in that I went to high school in, um with you know, a little bit of different furniture because my mom has
a boyfriend now that's living with us. Yes, so it's my mom, my, her boyfriend, me and Justin and Isaac and Isaac, Justin and I have taken over the whole basement and then they have upstairs, so it kind of and her basement is bigger than my New York sized apartment. Putting that out there, so we have been able to breathe, but it has it has brought me back to like, wow, this is where it all started. This is where it all began. Was like here in Nebraska. These are where
my roots are. And so much of me has been like New York, New York, New York, New York until I die. And now I'm like back in a suburb. I see green out side of me. Isaac loves the grass,
and I'm like, okay, do I want the suburb? Like also, because I'll never give up my apartment in New York, So it brings a lot of perspective and I kind of I love it because I like to be a person who can go back and look at what I've done, where I've come from and be excited for myself and the same for the people around me and um, and that's exactly what this has done. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about that though, your beginnings in Nebraska, because you know, I feel that all of us like
our our own origin stories. Yeah stories. So I mean listen right here, Colorado, right or die. There have been so many assumptions, you know, I mean about Midwesterners, Yes, and the way in which the middle behaves or thinks this is true, This is true. Talk talk a little bit about about you there? Then? What was that like? Who? Who was Ashley? Then? What were you like? Are you like? You are? Now? Different? Yes? No, nothing has changed, and
this lap hasn't changed. The crazy thing is my mom has the same laugh, so if you hear her laugh and hear mind, you don't know the difference. Anyways, I moved here in eighth grade from Texas, so it wasn't a culture shock, but it was very different Texas to Nebraska and um, and when I got here, I was in eighth grade, I was incredibly curvy, Um, I just started modeling, and I I remember um my mom. My mom is from Nebraska, and one of her things that always growing up was she said, you have to be
a hard worker. Hard work will pay off. And that is something that people in the Midwest really stand true to, is their hard work at And I come from a family in a lineage of farmers, and they have worked their butts off and um continue to this day. And I feel like that's in my blood. And I feel like that's how the people of even even just the Midwest. I can say it broadly, but Lincoln, Nebraska, you meet incredibly nice people and incredibly hard working people. And I
really love that about the Midwest. Yeah, oh my goodness, Well did you feel like that helped you as you then left me? Still has been the ethos of who I am in my career. If it weren't for the fact that I stuck to my guns and bulldozed through any boundary that was put in my way, Um, that was because of the ethics that my mother gave me. Um,
the niceness I mean I was. I was dropped into an industry that was known as the mean girls club, the mean everybody's club, really and if you're not this, that or the other, or than you're out and forget about next season. You're definitely out. And I was nice throughout the whole thing. I my mom always told me kindness, Um, we'll get you farther in life than anything, and it has proven in my career. I think that a smile, a genuine how are you, and played by the rules, Um,
we'll get you incredibly far. Yeah, yeah, I know that's so true. Okay, so we're going to get back to your career for a second, but do you want to talk about your mom and this intergenerational living arrangement that you're in, because clearly COVID has disrupted all of our lives.
Like you said, you thought you were going to be in Nebraska for three weeks and here you are four months later, and we don't even know how long the hell we're gonna be in these in our situations, And so what has that been like, Like, you know, returning back to Nebraska and living in the house where you grew up in with your mom and her man and your man and your new little man. That's a that's a lot going on there. So I think that we must, we must be very abnormal because it's working. Nobody has
gotten into a fight. There hasn't been any issues. We've had friends come and go. Um, we had we had family come and go, and all through the midst of all of it, we have really been working. Like everybody kind of knows their role, Like my mom is the nanny when I'm on a zoom or a podcast. Um, Michael is mcgiver and he's been doing house projects. Um, they just redid a bathroom. They put up a stone wall on the porch. Justin has found every coffee shop
in Lincoln, and he's been editing films. Um. And I have just been like feeling so just incredibly happy that I can have these precious moments with Isaac, that I'm not on a plane. I knew that to three months after having him. My team would probably have been like, hey, you got this, you got that. In fact, I had things planned. But silver lining is I have got to I have been able to spend every waking moment with him, and it is such a blessing. Oh god, it is.
It's so true. It's such a blessing. Similar to you. My mom um has been living with us during this quarantine time. YEP, and so it's it's of course her myself and Layel in the house. Um, so it's just female energy that's announced, intergenerational female energy, and we are we're making it. I don't know if we're as perfect as y'all, okay, but we're doing our best too. I grew up with two sisters. I get it. Mm hmmm mm hmm. Yeah. But you know, it's all a learning.
That's just you know, I'm just I'm gonna put that silver lining on it. It's all a learning, Okay, it is, it is. And also you'll look back on this and you'll be so happy that you spent this time with your mom, your grandma for right, right, That's how I'm looking at him, Like I get this time with my mom and my mom and I talk about death like it's really not a like it's a conversation that we have. And she's like, okay, when I die, Like she tells me where her things are and this and that, and
we talk about it. And she told me, she was like, just think about this time that when you look back, we're gonna have had this. And it just it's always like, yeah, that's a good way to think about it. When we come back, Astley and all those damn labels. Whether your event needed one room or an entire conference center, hoppin
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and get started. That time you got home from a week of double shifts and your dog didn't recognize you. He hates me, hates me. Do you want to treat? You want to treat? You knew it was time for something new, Let's drop it up. At career builder, you can find jobs with the work life balance and salary you want, plus build a resume and apply to multiple jobs in just one click. Start your search at career
builder dot com. Still living in and manually taking notes, start the new year with auto dot ai to generate automatic notes for meetings, interviews, or lectures. With auto dot ai, you can search the meeting notes, insert images, playback the audio and share them with your friends or coworkers. You can capture action items, remember meeting details, and keep everyone informed. Auto dot ai works for in person or virtual meetings
like Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet. Sign up for free at auto dit ai or download the app for free auto dot ai. That's O T T E R. Dot Ai. You're listening to Back to Biz with Katie and Bows and I'm chatting with my friend, model mom entrepreneur Ashley Graham. Let's get back to it. Can you talk a little bit about when you began modeling and what actually made you think about how to innovate and change within that space, Because it's enough to just be
who you are in the space. I mean, listen, there are lots of people who are in the spaces, are the industries they are in and trying to achieve just being different in that space. It's like that just that's enough work, Like you get all the all the trophies and metals just for having broken barriers being who you are. But then girl, you have to go ahead and just go ahead and innovate too. Can you talk a little bit about that, Like you're you're modeling. But where where
did those thoughts come from start off? Well, I think where it really began was knowing that after a certain amount of years of modeling. I mean I started when I was twelve years old and I moved to New York at seventeen. I left Nebraska. It was an oh five and my mom and dad said, if you don't make it in New York, you're gonna have to move back, and you're gonna have to go to college. And you're talking to a dyslexic a d D barely like like I just kind of like slid through high school with
seats and whatever it took. I did not want to go to college, so I did whatever it took, and um, I worked my butt off. I took every job. I said yes to everything. Um and that was the beginning of my agency realizing, oh, this girl's down, she's like, she's actually ready and we can throw her into anything. So then it was probably about four or five years later when I was married. I had I think it was just a year that Justin and I had been married,
and my career was great. I was top of the line catalog girl, Lane Bryant model just had a commercial that was banned from TV and it was Remember remember it wasn't necessarily like my name was put on the map, but people in the industry were like, oh, that's that girl, and um, Justin came home and there was it was. It was maybe a year after that and Justin had come home and I was still on the couch where he had left from the morning that he had gone to work. He's like, why are you still in the
same position on the couch. I was like, it was one of those really proud wife moments, like, yeah he was. And around that time he said, what do you want? What is it that is going to make you happy? And because he knew that, I felt really stagnant in the career that I was at at that moment, and it got my wheels turning because I thought that from that commercial, I could um really capitalize off of it and turn it into something. And although I did much later,
I thought it was going to happen faster. And I think that for me, everything has been a building block on top of the other and it hasn't come just so quickly, but it's come with time, and it's also come with having my ears open and so When Justin said that to me, it was like, you're right, what do people know me as? How can I really amplify? By the way, haven't we been saying the word amplify so much? I love it and I'm sure we'll get
to that. Um and and how to amplify my voice and to really into not not just my voice but my name. And what I really wanted to change in the industry and um and that was start a lingerie line. So I went to a company. I went to a few companies and I said, Hey, I want to do a lingerie line. I'm known as a lingerie girl. Because that was a question, I asked myself, what what who do people know me as? Oh, they know me? Oh,
you're that lingerie girl. So I started my lingerie line and I went to a few CEOs, but it ended up being CEO of Additionel Rosalind Grinder, and I said, I want to make bras that look like this, and I lifted up my shirt to her and I said, but you see this spillage and you see that And I said it's just it's not cute, and she's like, great,
let's do it. Within a couple of months, we had the contract written up and the next year my capsule collection launched because who knew there's twenty five components to a bra and it took a year to make, I don't know. So that was the beginning of, oh, this is more than just modeling. But through that also I had always been called the plus size model. There was always a label kind of looming over me. And here we are. We're in a day and age where label
are disgusting. Nobody wants to be labeled. Yet people still put you in a box for who you are and who you stand for, and who you're rooting for and who you're not rooting for. And all I simply wanted was to just be accepted for who I was Ashley
the model period. So I just kept talking about it, and I think now looking back, that was the best thing I could have done, was just continue to talk about the change I wanted and my experiences through my own life, like with cellulite, like with dating, like with eating, my experiences around my body, my insecurities. Who knew everybody
else in the world also had insecurities. I think, Um, that's it was, really it was really then, and it was it was justin kind of knocking on my door and and pushing me, but also me realizing that I needed to have patients throughout this whole thing, because um thirty two now, so here we are twenty years in the game. Besides justin, were there any other allies or how did you find the gosh? I don't know the wherewithal to be like, you know what, yeah, I know
some companies. I'm going to go figure. Let's tell you. You know, as a model, you think that your agency is going to hold your hand through a lot of things. And I tell a lot of young models do it on your wrong. You know, they had an agent tell me, we're the ones who opened the door for you. You're the one who's invited back in. And when she told me that, it was an eye opener because it was like, oh, you're just telling me that you can call them, but
I need to do the work. And that's with any career, any any category that you want to actually get into, because nobody's going to do the work for you, nobody is going to sign up for you. You have to take a leap of faith. You have to get uncomfortable in a new situation. And that's the only place you're
going to actually find growth. And that's what I did, and I just I mean, I would be on set talking to the CEOs, to the president's and being like, hey, let's have a you know, over lunch, over catering, and it's like, so I've been thinking about it's amazing and that's it. Because I told my agency at the time, I said I want to do a lingerie line. They said no, no, no, no, no, they said no to me, and then I came to them and said, well, well
I'm going to be doing this. And of course they got to collect a check because that was the contract that I had, and those are also learning curves that I had to learn. It's like, you know, who am I signing my name away to? What? Am I signing my name a way to? Um? So I'm glad that I had the right people in my court as far as attorneys and advisors like that. Yes, but you're telling us and that's wonderful because I think I think part of it is also sharing, you know, sharing the knowledge
that you have as you as you go along. And as I said before, you know I I obviously am I am a fan, not just your friend, but a fan of your work because of how relentless you are in the pursuit of continuing to create. It's a very impressive trait. Thank you. I'm not tired. I wanna. I want to change the world. I think that there's just that's it right. So as a mother, there's like a
new strength that builds up in you. I believe, and um, and there's just so much to be done, and it's like, okay, checklist, check check check, Okay, what are what are my new what's my new? Checklist? And um, And I'm not afraid. I'm not I think that a lot of and I don't want to speak for every woman, but I think that there are some women who maybe even just people. Maybe I'm maybe I shouldn't just say women, but I just work with so many women. It's like I don't
want to ruffle anybody's feathers. Oh I can't do that because of X, Y and Z or do you think that that's the right idea. I think it's always the right idea. Go for what you want, go you know you always will hear like, go after what you believe in and and what you see for yourself. But if you're not actually going to put into action those things, then they're just not going to come forth for you. Yes, suh, yes suh, it's like put forth into action. Yes, let's
snap it up, snap it up, because it's important. It's important. It's so important. Now, you know, like I said, you you've had quite a few launches. And I'm a I'm a also a big fan of bragging on myself and on other people. But because this is your moment, okay, I want you to tell us, all right, tell us tell us the people all the things did you have
launched and created, because I just think it's so inspiring. No, we really need to hear it, because, like you just said, you know, you could have continued to be successful as a model and girl, not just the you know, the commercial which was banned, but also you know your s I cover just a little bit ago, you know what, like there there have been some breakthroughs on the modeling front, but you have done the extra work of being on
a set and talking to somebody. Okay, not just there to do the job you're doing, but doing the job that you want to get. Also, tell us, girl, tell us, give us, give us launches. Just do it, Just do it. Let let us, be let us be let me just let me just try to go. Oh my god, there's lingerie swim then, um, clothing, clothing of all sorts. I have a book, Um, I have a barbie. Um. I'm a producer of a few different shows. I have a workout series on YouTube called thank Bod. I have a
show called Fearless on l M tube. UM. I have a podcast called pretty Big Deal because you are a pretty big deal. Hello. I'm I've had a lot of amazing covers, a lot of amazing covers. Um. Gosh, I hate talking about myself like this. This is very weird. I love it. This is the thing which is also really cool is that a lot of things is I'm the first curvy model to do a lot of it, which which I mean, you know, but this is the way it should This is the way it should be.
We should be having representation of everybody at the table period um. But I was just thinking about Revlon and being um a a an ambassador and having a contract with them, I mean like beauty contracts. You know, I always had somebody tell me, you know, you're skinny from the from the neck up, so who cares? And I'm like well, what like, what's that supposed to me? I know, what is that to me? I've heard it all. If you've heard it, I've heard it and that's it, you know.
Oh my god. When we come back, Ashley and I talked about the change that's in the air and on the grounds. Here's another podcast you should add to your listen list. All Worth Financials Money Matters. Every week, host Scott Hansen and Pat McClain answer calls about investing, social security benefits and retirement with straight talk that's straight up entertaining.
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kids for co workers, Kay, team, I'm taking now. What was the moment you knew it was time to get back to work. Let's job it up at career builder. Are simple, customizable search tool let you search for part time, full time, and even work from home jobs so you can find a job that fits your lifestyle. Get started now at career builder dot com. You're listening to Back to Biz with Katie and Bows and now Ashley and I are going to talk about share the mic. Now.
This was an initiative created by me and three other friends where we asked white women on Instagram to give up their platforms for twenty four hours too black women with powerful story who could share their narratives with a new audience. I'm so proud that Ashley Graham was one of the white women who said yes, and she gave up her platform to Opal to Matty, who, by the way, has been a guest on this show before, and it's the co founder of Black Lives Matter, So let's pick
back up with Ashley right now. I do want to talk to you about this rule breaking person that you are, because diversity just does come in all kinds of ways, but we are in a specific moment right now where we're talking about all kinds of racial unrest, things that need to change. You have been such an advocate, such a voice in fashion and beauty specifically, but of course across many entertainment spectrums that we've just discussed. Talk to me about what you are thinking right now, like where
is your heart, where's your head? Where's your spirit? You know, as we think about all of the things that are coming to the surface and this moment of reckoning that we're in, especially in the industries that you're in. Thank God, this is a very tough time to be in right now. UM. I think that it's hard for a lot of people to hear some of the stuff. It in some ways is surprising, which I think is wild, but that it's surprising, um, and it needs to happen. Everything that's happening right now
needs to happen. And UM, I am so glad that there have been so many conversations. I'm so glad that I've been having those conversations prior to all of this coming out, UM, with my husband, with my best friends. UM, you know, because these are the conversations that now people are saying, oh, you have to have these conversations. But where my head is right now is that, Okay, how can how can I, as a white woman continue to
educate the white people around me? Because, UM, I have seen and I'm sorry, I'm just going there with you right now. Yes, I mean, okay, UM, I have seen so many of my black friends and even my husband who it's it's like they get off the phone and or they've gotten so many text messages and they're just exhausted by having to have explain and talk and the
and and and explain what's happening. And I'm not saying that I'm an expert or I know much at all, but what I do know, I'm able to talk to my family about what I do know, I'm able to talk to my white friends about and I'm able to say, Okay, this is what you can do to help because I think that there are a lot of people who don't know what to do right now, and they are feeling, um, nervous or like they don't want to say or do the wrong thing. But in reality, being silent is doing
the wrong thing. Being silent is being a part of the problem. So right now my feeling is discussed. My feeling is I'm I'm horrified, but um, but I'm also so glad that things are happening because it feels like real change is here and I can even just see like there's a different kind of hope in some people's eyes. Yes, it's true, there is, and I do feel that I
feel like this is different. I really do. Maybe it's the optimist in speaking, but there's you know, the initiative that we did with share the Mic, which, by the way, thank you for asking me to do that. Can we pause on that for a second, though, because I also have to tell I have to I have to say this, which is that UM, very much like justin or any of your other you know, black friends. UM, I was
so exhausted, so tired. You know. It's like it was as if there was like a call that went out that said, check on your black friends, and I was like, your black friends, just hold on. I don't I don't. I don't need you all to call me because I'm tired, okay, and I don't want to talk right now. And I was sitting in my house, unbathed, without brushing my teeth, exhausted, I didn't want to talk to anybody, and it was blackout Tuesday, and I talked to the only people I
really want to talk to. Was the only person I really want to talk to, you was lovey at Gi Jones was a good girlfriend, and you know, she's a she calls herself the professional troublemaker, and that's the only person I really want to talk to, because I was like, girl,
how can we start some trouble? Okay? Um? But through that conversation and talking to Glenn and Doyle a you know, and Stacy bend it Um, we came up with the idea and the idea to find white women who had big platforms, you know, who have followings who may not actually be very diverse in their own curated social channels, right, because not even so much about you, but it's like, you know, the people who follow you, who have decided who they're following, and perhaps it's not as diverse, and
so how could we insert a different narrative into those platforms. And what I have to say about you, sister, is that I think I texted you maybe like three lines, like I was like, girl, this is what we're gonna do. You down, and you didn't. You didn't ask me who else was gonna do it. You didn't say what do I have to do? You didn't say when do I have to do it? And what did you say? No? You just said yes. You just said yes. And I don't think we have actually had that conversation of how
what that meant to me? You know how how much it meant because your simple yes, without any qualifiers, was affirmation that not only as your black girlfriend, but just as a human being who you support and love and that you trust. And I was not feeling that in the world. So thank you for doing that. Well, you're welcome. I mean, honestly, I can't give myself a pat on the back, because, first of all, I want to be a part of anything you do, because you're badass. You're
badass bows. Second of all, I think that I had a feeling. I was like, Oh, she's about to do some she's about to do some wild ship. Let's go. I don't know what it is. But and sure enough we did some wild ship and then everybody followed suit. It was like, and that was great, Like oh my gosh, so many other hashtags and things like that that Mike came out and I thought that was great. But um, it was my honor and my privilege to be a part of something like that. I'm so glad you guys
put that together. It was so wonderful. And I really do love seeing the generation and you know that have come out of it. Like I think yesterday somebody tags me and like, uh, you know, share the mic now doctors. I was like, oh, we got we got doctors sharing the mic. That's that's fantastic. Go ahead, John'll do it. So did the birth of Share the Mic come out
of just purely your exhaustion through everything that was happening. Yes, yes, And I this is what I actually told Glennan, which was that, like, I was so tired of screaming into the wind. That's what it feels like. I was, like, I have been saying this for years. I have been talking at the top of my lungs, and it feels like I'm just screaming into the wind and just coming back in my face, you know. And so I was like,
I need some new spaces. I need I need different places where people haven't heard this before and that's going to make the difference. And so yes, it was you and Arianna Huffington and Julian Robbert. Don't you just say the zoom? The first zoom we had, I was looking through and I was like, oh, we're Bree Lawson, like, oh, we'd athlete Judd, Yeah, right like and then and then it was just like and then the athletes and yes,
Mandy Moore, Yes, this is us. And then it was and then it was just so funny because Glennon was there and we were all just kind of like, oh, hello, this is so normal, Like we're all here, very normal, casual. It's just a cassual day where a bunch of powerful black and white women get together to change the world. Yes. And then of course I was looking up a lot of the black women. I was like, oh, I already
followed her. That's like Rachel Cargole, Oh my gosh, because she's just like, spit it to you truthfully and directly, and I love that. I love her page and even Opal, who I did share the mic with, such a sweet, kind, soft spoken woman who has so much fire in her that has done so much with Black Lives Matter. I
was honored to have her take over my Instagram. So, I mean, I just think that you guys did a fantastic job and I'm excited to see where else it goes and um and how this just continues to change people's perspective and how they're continuing to learn and grow from this, because this was a great tool, I think for black women to get things off of their chest that they wanted to that they've been saying on their own socials, but they could say it on a white
woman's social Who those followers, we're probably not following her? And I thought that was I thought that was just that was the key thing there, and that was fantastic. My followers loved it. They thought that they missed opal. They were d M me me, like, did Chicaroty come on? Like where was she? I've been waiting all day? And I'm like, sorry her timing. You're like, I'm sorry, It's just me, you know, Like I think I think it's
just it was so it was so wonderful. It was really a great exercise, and um, I shared the mic with UH, with Courtney Kardashian and so even on her you know socials and with her followers who definitely weren't in my space, you know, and I wasn't in theirs. UM was really fascinating, you know, to to be on
the live and to see their comments and to interact. UM. And I really do hope, I hope that it it opened up, you know, a window that we are going to be able to see more people who are willing to listen to people who are not like them, you know, and to hear opinions that they didn't know were even you know, founded. And so I really truly hope that that's happening. UM, we'll sign me up for the next one. I'm ready, girl, Okay, you know I got I got
your phone number. Girl, I'm willing. UM. But actually speaking of that, speaking of hope, can you talk about what is hopeful? Like? What are you hopeful about? What are the things that you know, even in this time as we've talked about COVID and all your businesses, I'm sure there's you know, some changes that have been made because of it, you know, and the ways that you're going to try to innovate in this time. Um, what are your hopes for the near future even as we continue
on in this space? You know the biggest thing. I mean, I think every every category has a different hope, and like in businesses, I really hope that a lot of the people who have lost their jobs come out of this and find success on the other side. I think for me as a mother right now, UM, I am so incredibly hopeful for my son who is black and he is now in a an era where things are shifting and changing. And when I got pregnant, I thought about how I'm going to be raising a young black
boy in this era, in this generation. What does that mean? And now knowing what I know and seeing a change that's happening, and it may not be happening as quickly as we may all like it to be, but it's happening. Gives me hope and it gives a perspective of clarity that he may be okay later. He's going to have a great life regardless of everything that's happening. And I'm
hopeful for America. I'm hopeful that COVID is going to um that we're gonna fight it, and that we're going to come on the other side of this because it has been incredibly detrimental to to the world and also to America. Alright, y'all, that was my friend, home girl model producer. I mean she does everything. That was Ashley Grant and does it for this week's episode of Back
to Biz with Katie and Bows. But you can check out more of our episodes and our roster of very impressive guests at Apple Podcast, the I Heart Radio app, or wherever you get your favorite shows. And for more of what Katie and I are up to, as well as our favorite moments from these conversations, go find and follow us on Instagram. I'm Bozemus St John and this is Back to Biz with Katie and Bows. Thanks so
much for listening. Back to Biz with Katie and Bows is a production of I Heart Radio and Katie Currik Media. The executive producers are Katie Currik, Bozemans, St John, and Courtney Litz. The supervising producer is Lauren Hansen. The associate producers are Derek Clements, Eliza Costas, and Emily Pinto. Editing by Derrek Clements and Lauren Hansen, Mixing by Derek Clements. Special thanks to Adriana Fasio. For more information about today's episode,
go to Katie Kirk dot com. You can also follow Katie Kirk and bosmus St John on Twitter and Instagram. For more podcasts. For my Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Hi, my name is Lindsay Louis. Cal Hope is here for you with free mental health resources. Go to cal hope dot org to chat with a live person called their warmline at one eight three three seven Hope