688 Julie Allen:

We’ve all grown up bombarded with images of what we should look like, now amplified a million times over as we compare how we truly feel inside with the filtered-perfect images of other women on Instagram. It’s a losing battle, and one my guest today – Julie Allen – is on a mission to change. Like many, her growing sustainable and size-inclusive fashion business, was sparked by her own painful personal journey.

MELINDA

Hi, I’m Melinda Wittstock and welcome to Wings of Inspired Business, where we share the inspiring entrepreneurial journeys, epiphanies, and practical advice from successful female founders … so you have everything you need at your fingertips to build the business and life of your dreams. I’m a 5-time serial entrepreneur who has lived and breathed the ups and downs of starting and growing businesses, currently the game changing social podcast app Podopolo. Wherever you are listening to this, take a moment and join the Wings community over on Podopolo, where we can take the conversation further with your questions, perspectives, experiences, and advice for other female founders at whatever stage of the journey you’re at! Because together we’re stronger, and we soar higher when we fly together.

Today we meet an inspiring entrepreneur who is determined to help women to body acceptance, self-love, and feeling beautiful and confident in their clothes.

Julie Allen is a sustainable boutique owner and creator of the clothing line, Hope Continues, that is ethically made, size inclusive, and elevated styles for the chic minimalist.

Today we talk about what sustainable fashion really means, why it’s important – for our health and the livelihoods of those who make our clothes – to source materials ethically. We also talk body image and much more, including Julie’s inspiring entrepreneurial journey.

Julie Allen is the type of entrepreneur who is out to change the world.  A sustainability awareness activist, creator of the clothing line Hope Continues, and CEO of the Mary Rose NW Boutique and founder of the Mary Rose Foundation, Julie first leapt into entrepreneurship because her own personal journey inspired her to create a clothing shop that focused on body acceptance and self-love.

Her mission expanded and now her three guiding pillars are sustainability, inclusion, and social justice. After winning “Best Online Boutique in Oregon” in 2020, Julie shifted her store by implementing sustainability. In one word, that means appropriate wages and ethical treatment given to all people that produce the garments, and eco-friendly clothes in all sizes.

We get into the nitty-gritty of what sustainability in fashion means in practice, why it’s important and how Julie has now reached 50% sustainability within her storefront, even down to what type of hangers the clothes are displayed on.

With a bachelor’s in psychology and a background in physical therapy, Julie truly understands how the mind affects the body and vice versa. She struggled with anorexia and bulimia for 15 years and as a result, made it her mission to empower people to love and embrace themselves wholeheartedly.

Her nonprofit, The Mary Rose Foundation, meanwhile helps people struggling with the financial burden of eating disorder treatment and works on the prevention side as well with their educational outreach programs. Julie’s message is simply one of strength, courage, self-compassion, and most of all, hope.

Let’s put on our wings with the inspiring Julie Allen.

Melinda Wittstock:

Where there’s shame. Yeah. It is like a corner of shame.

Julie Allen:

Absolutely.

Melinda Wittstock:

You don’t want to be seen there.

Julie Allen:

Absolutely. Yeah. And that really, that was a defining moment for me because I said to my husband too, who was with me at the time. I said, “Okay, so I’m going to open up a store. I think that’s when I’m going to do now.” Because I knew I didn’t want to go back to PT, but I didn’t know what I wanted to do. So I told him, I was like, “Okay, we are going to open up a store, and it’s going to be different. It’s going to be a place where people in all bodies are welcome, and they feel respected, and they can shop. They can shop.” Because people in all bodies deserve to feel beautiful.

So that’s just a little bit about how the store actually came to be. And it wasn’t even a year later that we opened the store. So I took that first year postpartum to just redefine what I wanted and get all the things on the back end set up. And then a year later, Mary Rose Boutique was born.

Melinda Wittstock:

Well, what a beautiful and inspiring story. What it says to any woman listening, is that anything, anything at all that you’ve been through, chances are there are other people too. And you went through that, happened to you, but in a way, it happened for you.

Julie Allen:

Absolutely. Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right. To be able to do that. And I think of all the constant bombardment of images. And when I was growing up, it was all fashion magazines and super models and that kind of thing. And then morphing into Instagram, all the ‘comparisonitis’ of social media and just this constant reminder of oh, I don’t look like that. So therefore, oh, that must mean something about me. And these feelings of shame or inadequacy or whatnot.

And so, there are so many things in society that have to change, to stop young girls from falling into anorexia and bulimia to begin with. But also, as just having given birth, that should be such a wonderful time in your life, and to go through and feel shame. So there’s all these points on the female journey where we have this continually.

And so, tell me a little bit about your shop and how you do that experience. What’s different about it, walking into your store from any other fashion store?

Julie Allen:

Well, we’re going into our fifth year in business. So, we’ve been around for a little while now. And over the course of these five years, our business has changed dramatically. Inclusion has always been at the center of our business. We’ve always strived to be size inclusive. We also have a nonprofit that I haven’t mentioned yet that’s called the Mary Rose Foundation. And that helps fund people’s treatment for eating disorders. And a portion of all sales at the boutique is donated to the nonprofit.

So, this idea of being inclusive, specifically size inclusive, but inclusive on all levels, has always been a central theme of our business. And over the course of the pandemic, a lot of other things have changed with the business. So when we first started, we were doing, the term is fast fashion. So cheaper to buy clothing, more of a higher turnover, things are just coming in new constantly, which is the status quo in the fashion industry. Most stores operate in that fast fashion realm.

And we were doing that for the first three years of the business. And what I learned during the pandemic, over the course of the initial part of the pandemic, is that the actions of one impact us all. There are so many issues with the fashion industry that I really didn’t know about. And it’s embarrassing to say that I didn’t know how bad the fashion industry was in terms of child labor, not treating the women who are making our clothing, not treating them well, not paying them a fair wage, and all the pollution and things of that nature that go into the fast fashion industry.

And so, it was the beginning of 2021 that I really took a hard look at our business and decided to switch our entire business model from this fast fashion, buy, buy, buy, to a slow fashion, intentional mindful, carefully curated selection of clothing. The problem with that is size inclusion barely exists in the realm of sustainable fashion.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right.

Julie Allen:

The vast majority of ethically made clothing go up to a size large. 70% of people identifying as women in the States are a size 14 or above. And with inclusion having always been this central theme in our business, we had to figure out how are we going to bridge this gap? Where do we go from here, knowing that size inclusion was important to us, but now also understanding the effects that the fashion industry has, this buy, buy, buy, more and more and more, you’re never enough as you are. So having to switch our business, the entire business model, to this slow ethical fashion, but not being able to find it. [crosstalk 00:09:55] sizing was really a massive challenge for us. And we spent the last year diving into that and figuring out, okay, well, how are we going to do this? How are we going to stay true to our values?

So we expanded our mission statement from being purely size inclusive, to being sustainable size inclusive, and an emphasis on social good. So all of our business decisions now run through those three pillars. But I’m not going to lie. It was really, really hard at the beginning because that is just an area of the fashion industry that is basically untapped. It barely exists, barely exists above a size large in ethically made clothing. It is completely ridiculous.

Melinda Wittstock:

This is so astonishing to me, after all these years. It’s almost like Whack-A-Mole, right?

Julie Allen:

Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

One problem solved. But only in one small area. Only really super skinny women care about sustainability?

Julie Allen:

Right. That’s the message, though. So it’s diet culture. And so our society, it’s no secret our society is completely obsessed with diets and trying to have women’s bodies fit into this one little box that’s deemed acceptable. When I’m boiling down the definition of diet culture, it’s the equating of moral superiority to living in a smaller body. So if you take it from that angle, it really does make a lot of sense that sustainable clothing does not exist above a size large because, “Oh my gosh, why would somebody in a larger body have enough morals to care about all the environmental things that I’m talking about?” It is absurd, and it’s a direct correlation with diet culture.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah, absolutely. Well, the diet culture is really interesting, because so much of it, gosh, people go on these diets, they lose weight, and then they yo-yo back. And it’s just this constant cycle, and it gets worse each time. And so, we can talk about at that for a little bit, because on one hand there’s body image and body shaming, and then there’s the health. You don’t want to be obese because that’s not good for your health. You don’t want to get diabetes or have the heart issue or any of those things.

So, what is the right messaging around that? How to make people feel comfortable in their own skin and have that self-acceptance, but at the same time be healthy. It’s a big thing. And it seems to be so much around our mindset as well.

Julie Allen:

Yeah. And it’s interesting too, there’s a whole movement called the Health at Every Size Movement. So what that basically means is that we are detaching health from weight. There’s obviously some correlations, once you get to the extremes on both end, there’s definitely correlations between weight and health. But the vast majority, there’s not as much correlation as we just have been taught that there is. And so, this just idea of health at every size and nourishing your body with what it needs, this intuitive eating, intuitive movement, it’s all really finally being given a voice, which is really, really nice to see. But in our society, we totally, totally equate health to a number on the scale. And that’s just simply not true. It’s just not. We’ve moved past that, which is really cool, but it’s still so ingrained in us, especially as females. It’s so ingrained in us. We’ve been taught from the moment we’ve been born that we need to fit into this box and it’s just not realistic and not what we’re meant to do.

Melinda Wittstock:

Well, and the fashion industry profits from this as well.

Julie Allen:

Totally. Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

So the fashion industry forever has, like so many things, has been controlled by men.

Julie Allen:

Basically, yes.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right?

Julie Allen:

Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

Which is interesting, given that women are the vast majority of continual buyers of all of this. And so, how are women like yourself making a difference? Because it’s not just you. There are more and more women tackling this problem. How do you see it changing overall at a macro level, beyond what you are doing?

Julie Allen:

Yeah. It is changing. There are a lot more body acceptance influencers out there, but it’s also… You can see it growing in both directions for the good, like towards body acceptance, but then also the other way too. It’s just with the rise of social media, TikTok, Instagram, all these social media platforms, this idea that your body needs to look like this, it’s just in our faces constantly.

The body acceptance movement is taking much more footing now, but it is coinciding with that same old crap that we’ve been taught from the moment we’ve been born. So I think it’s really, really important for us to normalize bodies and to normalize that all bodies are beautiful. Our worth is not in our shape. Our worth is not in our weight. So we have to just keep those messages coming because I don’t think that other message is going to go anywhere for a while until that body acceptance movement gets even stronger. And I do see it rising. I really, really do.

But on the other hand, you have the other stuff that’s always been there that continues to have a really strong hold on most of us. And it’s nothing to be ashamed of. We all live in this society that is just obsessed. And the diet culture is very sneaky too. Shape shifter is what we call it in the nutrition world. It takes on just different… The health and wellness role sometimes. It just disguises itself as so many things. And the awareness piece is critical. And I do see it changing, which is really nice.

But following social media accounts that don’t make you feel bad about yourself is a really good check. If you’re following something and then you see it and it makes you feel bad about yourself, that’s an unfollow. We have to be a little bit more protective of what we’re putting in our bodies and our minds.

Melinda Wittstock:

And that’s so hard for kids because these habits start early. I think it’s easier for someone who grew up without social media to be able to make that decision because you already have… You already remember a different way of being. Right?

Julie Allen:

Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

So you stand more of a chance, but I think for girls, tweens, teens, young women in their 20s, all of that stuff, all the way through, that’s all they’ve ever known.

Julie Allen:

For sure. Yeah. So I mentioned our Mary Rose Foundation, and what I said was it helps fund treatment for people with eating disorders. And the foundation has been established for almost four years, so it coincides pretty cohesively to when the boutique was founded, just maybe six months or so after that. And over the last year, what our focus was with the foundation was more on the education and prevention side because we were seeing the same thing. We were getting requests for treatment scholarships, two maybe three a week. And a lot of these humans are asking or needing $60,000 worth of treatment cost. It’s completely inaccessible.

And so, what we decided as a board was we need to hit that prevention side. We have got to work on the education and the prevention in order to hopefully have a bigger impact because we can fund treatment all day long. But until we’re teaching our young humans, young girls specifically how to love and accept themselves as they are, it’s going to be a circle. We’re just going to be going around and around and around.

And so over the last year with the foundation, we implemented some body positive, earth based groups, which have been really fun to see. So they’re for teens and tweens. Right now, they’re just local in our Portland, Oregon area. But we’re hoping to expand that this next year, because it’s just… Yeah, it’s so important that we start talking to the youth, the teens and the tweens, about social media and body image in a really safe way. For them to talk us through art, it’s really an easier way to express yourself a lot of the time. Because if we’re having these discussions about bullying and just anxiety and all those things that we’ve all been through these last couple years, art is a very… An easier tool to use. So that’s a little bit of work on the foundation side that we’ve been doing because it’s so important that we start talking to these kids.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yes, Julie, 100%. And it’s such important work. And I love how you’ve created a non-profit profit structure to work within or adjacent to your for-profit. And some people go down just the for profit path. And as we have with [inaudible 00:20:26], my podcasting platform where we’re committed to 10% of our earnings to deserving charities, or gamifying the app so we can reward social impacts and that sort of thing. Other folks choose the B Corp route. What made you decide on the foundation on one hand and for profit on the other, and the two working in parallel process?

Julie Allen:

Yeah. They work beautifully together. So I like to say that the foundation is the heart of our business. We have been in a pandemic for a little while now, and operating any business during a pandemic is challenging. Operating a physical [crosstalk 00:21:12]

Melinda Wittstock:

Business [crosstalk 00:21:13]

Julie Allen:

Oh my gosh. I can’t… It’s just been unreal. And all that to say, there have been many days with the actual business piece that I’ve wanted to throw up my hands. It’s hard. It’s how entrepreneur ownership business owning is. It is hard. But what keeps me going on those hard days is the foundation, is our nonprofit, knowing that in the year 2020, we were able to donate three treatment scholarships to humans that needed lifesaving eating disorder treatments. And that is what keeps me, me going. It’s having those two pieces work together in conjunction with one another really keeps me going because, like I said, it’s hard. And there has to be that bigger piece of why you’re doing what you’re doing, because it’s a tough world out there. It is. It’s really hard. And there’s going to be so many obstacles.

But the key is you have to keep getting up and finding the thing that you care about, that you are passionate about. For me, it’s eating disorder treatment and body image and anti-diet culture. That’s where my passion lies. And so, having my business tied to that impact has been critical for us being able to continue on during a pandemic, owning a physical retail store. So finding that thing that you care about is very, very important, and making that a central aspect of your business, it really is just so important, and it really does keep me going.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. The mission piece of it is vital, staying on your mission and whatnot, because they’re always going to be things beyond your control, are always going to be bad days. There are going to be days where, “Oh my God, how am I going to make payroll?” There’s going to be all kinds of things. A new competitor. It goes with the program, and so, I know this only too well as a five time serial entrepreneur, I can’t tell you how long I could be talking to you on this podcast, for many hours, days about all the things all along my journey. Each one, though, was a learning opportunity. But the way I always got through it is I’ve always been mission focused. So you’re 100% right on that, however you choose to structure it.

And so, let’s go into the pandemic a little bit. So there you are, you have a physical store. What did you do to get through it? Apart [crosstalk 00:23:50]

Julie Allen:

Right. Well, another fun fact, I was seven months pregnant in March 2020, so that was pleasant.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right?

Julie Allen:

I know. Looking back, I’m like, how on earth did we do this? But we did. So what we ended up doing was… So we had our physical storefront. We started online, so the brick and mortar came about nine months or so after we officially launched Mary Rose Boutique. So we [crosstalk 00:24:19]

Melinda Wittstock:

Okay. So it started as an online business. Well, that’s convenient. How lucky is that?

Julie Allen:

Yes. It was, and we maintained our online presence throughout, throughout the course of owning the business, which was critical. We were not starting from scratch with our online portion, but what we did was we closed the storefront because we’re in Oregon. That’s what we did. And we were online only for the first probably five months or so of the pandemic. And it’s interesting because we did really, really well monetary wise during those first six months or so of the pandemic, six to nine months or so, but we were doing really well with fast fashion. And so that is what… I try not to be too hard on myself about it. Because first of all, I didn’t know. I did not realize that the clothing was plastic and made not ethically. I didn’t know.

And second of all, I mentioned earlier that we were able to donate three treatment scholarships during 2020 to people that needed [crosstalk 00:25:25] eating disorders. Yeah. And we were able to keep, I think we had a staff of seven at that time. I think five were full-time. So it was a very hard year. It was a very hard, hard time in the business, but we ended up surviving, and we did really, really well. But then I started to learn about all the things of fast fashion, and I was like, well, this isn’t going to work either. So then you just transition again.

So, it’s all worked out, but it’s definitely been a journey these last couple of years, for sure. And now our storefront’s open again. We’ve been open for a while. We’ve been able to maintain that and do the online thing, and we’re just floating along. It’s been good.

Melinda Wittstock:

So that’s just so wonderful that you were able to do that, and you mentioned fast fashion as opposed to slow fashion. And slow fashion, of course, is the sustainability piece, clothing that’s made ethically. And it’s really complicated to figure out the supply chain on that. And how do you know? So take us through that.

Julie Allen:

Oh my God.

Melinda Wittstock:

How do you validate [crosstalk 00:26:47]

Julie Allen:

Okay. So if we’re talking about things I didn’t know at the beginning of when we started this journey of transitioning our entire store. Oh, so we also, during the height of the pandemic… Or not height of the pandemic, during July 2020, I believe it was, we got so busy online that we ended up renting a 5000 square foot warehouse. So picture this, we have our storefront full of clothing. And then, we have a 5000 square foot warehouse full of clothing that all came on plastic hangers, all came wrapped in plastic. It was a mad house. And it’s interesting too, because that was the definition of success in the boutique world, is having all this stuff and selling 100 pieces just constantly.

And I look at it now, I’m like, that is just… It’s over consumption, and it’s just not good, not good. So one that ended up happening was I was prepping for one of our big live sales because that’s how we really sustained ourself during the pandemic, is we went on Facebook Live, we used an app, and just sold. Sold, sold, sold. So many things.

So, I went into the warehouse, and I was prepping for the sale, probably about 100 or so new pieces. And I remember just stopping and looking at the warehouse. It was row after row, bin stacked upon bin of all these clothes that were very cheaply made. And a lot of them came with holes in them. They were all wrapped in plastic. They were all on plastic hangers. We had a corner in that giant warehouse that was dedicated to trash because there wasn’t enough space in the trash can. So we would have to, whenever there was space in the trash can, it would be fill it up with what we could, but it was just overflowing with stuff.

And I looked at that, and I said, “I can’t do this anymore.” I didn’t even know. I didn’t know that polyester is a main material that most clothing is made out of. It’s about 67% of our clothing has a form of polyester in it. When you break it down, polyester is plastic. Plastic does not biodegrade. So a lot of clothing, an average American throws away 70 pounds of clothing a year. And it just sits there. 200, 300 years, it is just sitting there. We are actually running out of room. We’re running out of room.

So, making that decision to switch everything. Everything. We had 100 plus vendors, and we took it down to maybe 20, maybe 30 we have right now, and trying to weed our way through. We had to learn so much. I didn’t know anything. I didn’t know anything about materials. I didn’t realize that polyester was plastic. I didn’t understand that it goes into a landfill and it stays in a landfill. It does not biodegrade. I didn’t know any of that.

And then, so we researched all of our vendors. We started there, and we very, very quickly found out that it is a big black hole, trying to research your vendors and trying to find their supply chain because the reps, the people that are selling it, they don’t know their supply chain. There is such a lack of transparency in the fashion industry, that it is virtually impossible to find where your clothes came from. Not impossible, but as the status quo in the fashion industry, it is very challenging to find where your clothes came from. Because people can say what they want to say. There are hardly any rules and regulations about what actually has to happen.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. There’s no labeling law, or there’s no law. It’s just like you can say a carrot’s organic. Yeah, it’s organic because it came from the ground [crosstalk 00:31:25] doesn’t mean it’s organic.

Julie Allen:

Yeah. Yep. I do know what you mean. Absolutely. And it’s frightening. It is really frightening. And the hard part is we don’t know that stuff. As a boutique owner, I was in business for over three years, and I had no idea that this was even an issue. And I thought I was carrying quality things. I thought because the tag said made in the USA that it was made well and the people were treated well. But the problem is it can be made here, the people in the factory still might not have been paid well, and the material most often came from a third world country, that those people were not treated well. Those people were not paid.

So it was just digging and digging and digging, and layer after layer. And we ended up getting so frustrated with really a lot of things. One of them being we just couldn’t find the pieces that we wanted to in the sizing that we wanted to. The other thing is we couldn’t… You can’t discern that. There’s no data, there’s no record of where all these pieces came from. And so we got so frustrated with a lot of things, that I threw up my hands and I said, “Well, guess what? We are going to make our own line of clothing. And I’m going to know exactly where everything came from.”

And so that’s what we did. That’s what we did. So we have our own line now of size inclusive, ethically made clothing for the sexy minimalist that is actually up for pre-order right now. The line will arrive to us in May. So we created a seven piece capsule collection that is inspired by Greek and Roman goddesses. And it’s just the most beautiful collection. I’m so, so excited for it. But yeah. So now I know. I know where my material came from. I can tell you who sourced it. I can tell you who made it and the pattern maker and all that stuff because nobody else is going to tell me.

So we have to change things. We have to be the change we want to see. And if I expect other brands to do this, then we better be doing it ourselves.

Melinda Wittstock:

How wonderful is that? But what you’re taking on isn’t easy, of course. Right?

Julie Allen:

Right.

Melinda Wittstock:

Creating your own line and everything that means. That’s a whole other business. It’s a whole other business.

Julie Allen:

I know. My husband thinks I crazy. He’s like, “Really? This is what we’re doing now?” Because my husband’s also my business partner, and he’s looked at me many times like I’ve completely lost my mind. [crosstalk 00:33:57]

Melinda Wittstock:

All entrepreneurs have effectively, we’ve all collectively lost our mind. I can’t tell you how many times anyone, everyone, everyone has looked at me like, “Oh my God, she’s lost her mind.”

Julie Allen:

Yeah. And my response has been, “You’ve told me this before.” I’m like, “We’ve already been down this road. You know it’s going to be fine.” He’s told me I was nuts so many times that I’m just like, “Yeah, we’ve had this conversation, and guess what? It turned out fine. So this is what we’re doing.”

Melinda Wittstock:

So how’s it going then, with the new clothing line?

Julie Allen:

Really, really well. Really well. So we launched a pre-order this month. So we launched a pre-order, and it is set to arrive to us in May. We did a pre-order because it’s very expensive to do your own line ethically and sustainably. So we’ve got seven, excuse me, we have a seven piece capsule collection, and it is made of hemp, organic cotton, and linen. Oh, I love it so much. It is just beautiful. It comes in all the different shades of blues, and we have some earth tones in there, and it’s just a beautiful, beautiful line. And I’m very excited to see it come to life. Because it’s been a year in the making, and it’s really beautiful to see your vision just come to life and [crosstalk 00:35:19] yeah. Physical pieces of clothing. And I’m like, “Oh my gosh, I made these, I made these.” [crosstalk 00:35:26] I didn’t sew them. Don’t worry. That is not my wheelhouse.

Melinda Wittstock:

But isn’t that incredible, though. What a sense of accomplishment to see that physically manifest and it makes it all worthwhile.

Julie Allen:

It does.

Melinda Wittstock:

Do you think the industry is ultimately going to change because consumer demand, as consumers get more educated about this… When you think of the health impacts of wearing clothes that are filled with toxic chemicals or just sleeping in beds that have mattresses with toxic chemicals [crosstalk 00:35:57]

Julie Allen:

It’s not good.

Melinda Wittstock:

Using room sprays. But let alone what we eat. So we have all this thing, but literally what we’re putting on our body, our skin is our biggest organ.

Julie Allen:

Yeah. And we sweat, and the sweat releases heat, and then the toxins… So yes, I mentioned polyesters, plastic. But then, yeah, you said the toxic dies, there is so much toxicity [crosstalk 00:36:24]

Melinda Wittstock:

And then you play it through, and you wonder why you have such high healthcare costs and high rates of cancer and et cetera, et cetera. So, consumers still need to be educated. So how big at this stage is the market of people who are conscious about this, who actively seek out really ethically made and non-toxic clothes?

Julie Allen:

Yeah. It’s still pretty small. I won’t lie. It’s still pretty small. We’ve been conditioned in our society to want that five dollar tee shirt. [crosstalk 00:36:55] And there’s these massive, massive brands, like Cheyenne, I’m not sure how to say it right, Zara, H&M, we all know those big brands that they… But they don’t pay their employees like they… I’m sorry. Their factory workers are not paid. And so, again, that’s that dichotomy. That dichotomy, there’s two different movements happening. So the slow fashion movement just has to keep going. We have to keep educating people.

And I say sometimes that there’s no such thing as a five-dollar tee shirt. Just because you and I didn’t pay for it, somebody else did. Whether that is in terms of the person who sourced that material, did they get paid? How were they treated? Or the person that sewed the garment, excuse me, or is it in the environmental effects? We just have to start looking at things differently.

And that is one thing that the pandemic really brought to light. Because I could sit here and say, I am one person. I am a small business owner. What I do really doesn’t impact the world at large. But I think if the pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that the actions of one impact us all. It was so easy for us to see how every person’s actions had this massive effect. And I think we are going to have to start thinking about that in terms of a lot of different things, the environment, the social causes, all of these things we have got to start just shifting our mindset, and slowing down is the first big thing we need to do. Slow it down.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right. Absolutely. So I would love to have you come back on, Julie, once your clothing line is out into the world and track your journey. But I think you’re doing amazing things on a number of fronts, all at once, which I love that. I love when women are ambitious and really step into it and go for it. So literally, hats off to you. It’s amazing. What a journey and what an incredible vision you have.

Julie Allen:

Thank you. I appreciate that. I really do.

Melinda Wittstock:

So I want to make sure, Julie, that everybody knows how to buy from you, because you’re doing amazing things, and how they can support your charity and much more besides. What’s the best way?

Julie Allen:

The best way to stay in contact with us is our Instagram page, and that is just at maryrose.boutique, and that also happens to be our website. So if you find us on Instagram at maryrose.boutique, that also gets you to our website, which links you to the foundation, and it links you to Hope Continues, which is our new line as well.

Melinda Wittstock:

Fantastic. Well, thank you so much for putting on your wings and flying with us today.

Julie Allen:

Thank you. Thank you.