NotYourWife is a media platform focused on amplifying and celebrating the voices of South-Asian women, and discussing the experiences of diasporic South-Asians. We launched over the lockdown period, and in just six months have built a community of over 20k women.
How did you come up with the idea for the company?
So to give you a bit of background, the two of us actually met in 2014 as strangers in the Arrivals Lounge of JFK International Airport, New York. We remained friends throughout our travels, and since moving back to the UK.
Over the years, we struggled to find an online space that we could really relate to. A space where we could bond over our love for our culture, but also openly and honestly discuss the complexities and unique experiences faced by South Asian women and diasporic South Asians.
The South-Asian diaspora is estimated to be around 24 million, so we could only imagine how many others, like us, were feeling the same way and lacking relatable content. They say that you should create the things you wish existed, so, NotYourWife was born. Our growth, and the feedback we receive daily has only indicated how much of a necessary project this was for us and our community.
More from Interviews
- Meet Stephen Kines, COO And Co-Founder Of Goldilock
- Meet Henry Wilkinson, Co-Founder at Drop-in, Ahead Of The Opening Of Drop-in Richmond
- Meet Oli Cook, CEO and Founder of ekko.
- Meet Marko Maras, CEO and Founder of Trustfull
- Meet Jeff Warren, Chief Technology Officer at Netwrix
- Evgeny Filichkin, Investment Advisor at Keytom & FinTech50 Judge, Tells Us What He’s Looking For From Entrants
- Tracy Prandi-Yuen, VP, Global Partnerships at Boku Inc. & FinTech50 Judge, Tells Us What She’s Looking For From Entrants
- Valentina Drofa, Co-Founder and CEO at Drofa Comms & FinTech50 Judge, Tells Us What She’s Looking For From Entrants
What advice would you give to other aspiring female entrepreneurs?
#1 Don’t fall into a trap of endless planning and no execution. Just go for it, take the first step and start up! Trying to plan everything to perfection rarely works in early-stage business, so just start and learn as you go along!
#2 Don’t feel discouraged when you see competitors bringing something similar to the market – if the problem you’re trying to solve still exists, it means that there’s still room for healthy competition.
#3 Build a founding team that shares your vision, but isn’t afraid to challenge your ideas. At NotYourWife, we have one shared mission, but bouncing ideas off each other and challenging one another is how we have our best breakthroughs.
#4 Believe in yourself and your concept more than anything; it needs to be something you’re truly passionate about. You’ll need to be your own number one fan, because that passion and determination will be the thing that drives you through the long hours and the obstacles that come alongside building an early stage business. Believe in yourself and others will believe it too.
What can we hope to see from NotYourWife in the future?
We’re still a very young company, but the future is exciting! We’re continuing to grow and expand our consumer base as well as our community of contributors; and our mission to amplify and celebrate the voices of South-Asian women remains at the centre of it.
We’re launching our first online event series this November. These were initially supposed to be live events, however, we had to pivot (quickly!) to an online format due to the recent Covid restrictions. We’ve been working on these for such a long time – so we’re excited that they’re finally here.
We’re also working on a number of really exciting collaborations – so watch this space!
