Women in Fashion: 5 Female Entrepreneurs to Know Now

Over the past ten years, the ability to create influence and power has evolved— and this is especially true for women. According to the National Association of Women Business Owners, more than 11.6 million female entrepreneurs are making a positive impact on the business landscape. Since 2007, that number has grown at five times the national average, with 1,072 new start-ups surfacing every day.

Today, I want to highlight five of those women who have left a lasting impact on today's society and continue to inspire and lead the forefront for female workers across the globe.

1. Yunha Kim

Former investment banker, Yunha Kim, experienced first-hand how "extreme stress" at work can affect mental health. She turned to thought work and meditation to counteract the busyness of her day to day life and found great ease and enrichment in doing so. This led to her quitting her full-time career and birthing her multimillion dollar startup, Simple Habit.

With more than 2,000 sessions based on situations like sleeping, morning anxiety and lack of focus, Simple Habit offers a practical solution for modern lifestyles. Busy people rely on Simple Habit’s short meditations and audio therapy sessions from world-class experts to reduce daily stress.

2. Mariam Naficy

When Mariam Naficy co-founded the first online cosmetics retailer, Eve.com, her journey as one of America’s most successful female entrepreneurs began.

After selling her $110 million company in 2000, Mariam found herself getting the entrepreneurial itch once again. She noticed how people were starting to pay attention to bloggers, now coined influencers, for the discovery of new products and inspiration. This observation led to a giant lightbulb gleaming over her head—crowdsourcing. This aha! moment led to her most successful startup, Minted.

Minted is an online design marketplace that uses technology to allow consumers to discover creative talent— making it a platform where artists can learn, gain exposure, and build their business.

3. Marah Lidey

Everyone needs some support and self care in their life, and that's exactly what female entrepreneur, Marah Lidey, set out to do with the help of her colleague, Naomi Hirabayashi. Her creation of Shrine, an online space where users can sign up to receive messages of actionable tips and content on confidence, daily happiness, mental health, and productivity, holds the title as one of the worlds leading self-help platforms for millennials.

This idea of a "daily pep talk" was inspired by their ability to be kind to their friends when they went through hard times or dealt with difficult emotions. This gave them the idea to create something that made it easy and habitual for people to treat themselves better and to essentially practice daily self-compassion.

4. Emily Weiss

Emily Weiss had her eyes set on a successful future from the get-go. As a high schooler, she interned for major companies such as Ralph Lauren and Teen Vogue before attending college at New York University for studio art. Years later she landed a job with one of the world's leading magazine publishers, Vogue, as a styling assistant.

During her busy years at Vogue, Weiss decided to launch her beauty blog called Into The Gloss that would soon lead her to her multimillion dollar startup company. After only 6 years, the site began to reach up to 10 million page views per month and had a small team and corporate partnerships to back it up. Weiss then decided that it was time to leave her position at Vogue and place all of her focus into her site platform.

Weiss’s blog eventually served as a springboard for Glossier— her unicorn makeup and skincare company that she launched with just four products. From it's minimalist packaging to it's simplistic beauty regimen routine, Glossier seemingly became an overnight sensation for young millennials who strive for that "no makeup, makeup look."

Today, Glossier is one of the top leading cosmetic brands in the beauty industry.

5. Tina Sharkey

Destined to be an entrepreneur, Tina Sharkey has proven herself a force to be reckoned with in the business world. At the young age of 22, she began her career as part of the team that introduced HDTV to the US media industry and was one of the first people to use the term "social media"— but it doesn't stop there. Sharkey also co-founded iVillage, a leading media company for female-oriented sites, which was later sold to NBC Universal for $600 million.

Her most recent project was her role in co-founding a unique and innovative startup called Brandless; yes, the name says it all. Brandless is an American e-commerce company that manufactures and sells products under—you guessed it!—a brandless label. Their mission is to provide healthy and environmentally conscious products at an affordable price without the ego of product labels.