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Black Entrepreneur Experience
BEE 522 Arabia Umrani: Empowering Women Through Travel ~ Rewind
00:38:13
We sat down with Arabia Umrani, a passionate travel expert and entrepreneur who built a business creating unique travel experiences for solo female travelers. Arabia shares her journey of exploring over 50 countries alone, the inspiration behind her...
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- [00:05]
A
Welcome to the Black Entrepreneur Experience podcast. Inside the business buzz and brilliance of black entrepreneurs.
- [00:11]
B
Here is your host, Dr. Frances Arlene. What happens in Vegas goes all over the world on Black Entrepreneur experience, episode number 522. Thank you for joining us as we elevate the Black Entrepreneur experience by interviewing CEOs, thought leaders, innovative thinkers, and black entrepreneurs across the globe. I'm your host, Dr. Frances Richards. How would you like to travel the world and go to over 50 countries, experience festivals, breathtaking landscapes, luxury hotels, and other unique global experience that others only read about in books and dream about while watching tv? Arabia Irani is a curator of global travel experience and the founder of Unwind, an intimate travel group for female travelers. Hello, Arabia.
- [01:13]
A
Hi, Dr. Richards. Thank you so much for having me.
- [01:16]
B
You know what, you have such an impressive bio to have traveled over 50 countries as well as some other things that you have done. Why don't you share with our audience what you'd like them to know about you and and your company?
- [01:31]
A
Yes. Wonderful. So thank you so much for having me again. I founded Unwind in 2018. Originally, Unwind was a travel group that I created that its main purpose was to empower women to travel the globe solo, but in a group form. So I'd have women traveling from all over the world, Hong Kong, New York, Atlanta, Louisiana, come together and these beautiful destinations where I would curate these eclectic experiences, both both mainstream touristic and also very local and intimate. And we would enjoy several days together with the itinerary that I had planned out for these women. And we had amazing experiences and created lifelong memories. So 2018, I. Well, throughout 2018 and 2019, we did about four group trips to Brazil, we did Italy, we did Tokyo. And now I have expanded Unwind to an online marketplace to where women all over the world can curate and host these eclectic experiences themselves and invite other women who are either traveling to your local city or live in your local city and join you, join you for the experience that you've curated. So, yeah, that's what Unwind is and really happy to share about it and hope that I can inspire more women to travel and more women to connect and discover new passions.
- [03:03]
B
And I think that's a brilliant idea. Talk about your love for traveling and how did this all come about?
- [03:12]
A
Yes, When I was 16, my mother took me to New York as a birthday present, and we were traveling from Georgia, Atlanta, and it really just opened my eyes to really just this deep curiosity about how others live, how others think, how others react to situations and the resources of information that exist outside of my community. So that seed was planted very early. Both my parents have traveled all over the world, instilled this curiosity for learning about other cultures in the world and traveling from very young. So as I grew into my adulthood and took my professional positions, I found myself repeatedly with companies that gave me an international platform to resources to learn from the international platform. So I've worked and manage operations and customer experience in hotels, convention hotels like that. So people were visiting often from all over the world and, you know, getting an opportunity to interface with these high value customers. I would learn different things about their culture, whether it's their language or it's the way, you know, the fashion or the way they dressed or their etiquette, you know, even business etiquette and different things that these all, all of these different things began to just expand my mind and expand my own expectations for constantly learning more about the world and about others. When I found myself professionally in these spaces of meeting people, they were coming to me. I wanted to visit my new friends all over the world. So I began traveling. I began traveling and then up until last year, I've been traveling for the last five years. And up until last year, I decided it's time for me to open this opportunity for women that are ready. They're ready to. They're not waiting on anyone, They've got this curiosity, they want to travel, they have the resources and they make themselves available to explore the world, but they're tired of waiting on their friends, whichever. So it's my pleasure at this time to inspire women and give them resources to see the world and meet other very interesting people.
- [05:19]
B
Arabia what is the average age of your clientele?
- [05:25]
A
Yes, so it ranges. I have ladies that are in their latter, later 20s and I have ladies that are in their 50s. So I'd like to say the majority of women are millennials. So I would say later 20s to like lower to mid-40s. But I also do have a selection of ladies that are over 50 and are absolutely amazing women that travel and they, they're coming into a new part of themselves. So they're either divorced or they're widowed or they're empty nesters or their kids are off in college and they're excited about seeing the world and they want to do it in a group setting. So I'm excited about both groups.
- [06:05]
B
And what was that aha moment that you knew that your business model was going to be successful?
- [06:11]
A
I knew my business model was going to be successful when I just randomly decided to Create a travel company for women. And, you know, I put my first trip together and, you know, I just prayed on it, I prayed on it, I put it together, and I said, okay, God, show me what you're working with. And, you know, it was a success. And I think that truly showed me that I am walking in my divine purpose to inspire women to travel.
- [06:39]
B
I love that. And what problem exists in the world today that you like to solve? Arabia?
- [06:47]
A
Many. But if we're exclusively talking about travel, I feel very, very strongly that it's time for. It's time for women to come together through entrepreneurship and through financial economic development, especially in travel. Many of the travel platforms we love are all created by men and for the financial gain of men. But it's funny that women are actually the strong purchasing power in the travel economy. They contribute 15 trillion a year to the travel economy. They're responsible for over 92% of all online travel purchases. And the experiences and activity market alone is over $183 billion a year. So if you look at the market and you understand that women travel 70% more than men, it's very easy to understand that women are the target consumer and that travel is our market. But there are not enough resources that are empowering women to take advantage of this market to support each other through entrepreneurship and through economic development.
- [07:58]
B
And what else can we do to galvanate women to come together in this market?
- [08:07]
A
Yes, I think it starts with online and offline education and online and offline community. I think that women need a strong community to flourish. I just think that women are. They're social beings. We thrive off of community. And I think that education is also a huge part in growing women's participation in the travel space. Many women are afraid of a lot of things that were either passed down generationally or on the media. With our limited resources and media of the real world, you know the truth about different places in the world and about people. So I'd like to see more resources and education online and offline about travel that women can understand and that women can share and that kind of translate into a community that they can rely on when they're looking for support to be able to travel themselves or to make informed travel decisions.
- [09:06]
B
Is there a magazine or a channel that's geared towards women, women traveling that you would recommend?
- [09:15]
A
There are a multitude of different channels. I cannot say that I can recommend specifically just one because there's so many. I don't think that there's a mega channel for that does everything. I think There are multiple channels. There's a multitude of channels that do a bit of everything. So if I were a woman listening to this podcast and I'm looking to join a community, my advice is to join several. If you see a community that lets you know about traveling to Europe, join that community. If there's a community that lets you know about traveling to the Middle east or traveling to Asia, or you know, how to pack, or you know, how to deal with different customs and etiquette while traveling, join all these different communities because the more resources, the better.
- [10:01]
B
All right, what's some advice that you wish you had followed?
- [10:06]
A
Some advice that I wish that I had followed before I started my business.
- [10:10]
B
Or in life in general, however you'd like to answer it?
- [10:13]
A
Yes. Okay, let's see. Some advice that I wish I followed. You know, this will be a hard question for me because I typically do listen to advice a lot, especially from my mentors, my parents. I do not like making mistakes. So I definitely more cautious before I make decisions and, and definitely have a strong element of group thinking for when I make strategies to attack different things. But, you know, being an entrepreneur is challenging. I've been presented with many challenges, and so I think I'll keep it around that realm.
- [10:47]
B
So, Arabia, what is one impact that you'd like this interview to make to our audience?
- [10:55]
A
I would love the opportunity to continuing my journey to inspire if I can just reach out to one woman, one woman or one person that's listening to this and can relay the message to other women or the message of traveling and learning to love travel and challenging yourself to expand outside of your community and bring back the resources. That's what I'm hopeful. I'm hopeful for. At the same time, I'm also that I can bring more visibility to the movement that myself and the other women on the platform are doing and pioneering a new movement for women in travel. So, yeah, I hope that this podcast touches and inspires your listeners to travel more and to check out our platform@join unwind.com and when you talked about building.
- [11:46]
B
Your business, one of the questions that come up, especially when you talk about female entrepreneurial ship, it's about raising capital. So talk about how did you raise capital for your business and what advice would you recommend for those that are looking for more capital to infuse into their business?
- [12:10]
A
So I the capital that I raised was my own. I'm bootstrapping, and I have been bootstrapping since I started unwind. And so there's two ways that you can Fund a business, you can bootstrap it the way that I have been doing, meaning that I have been funding it with my own money from my full time and for my investments and different income and revenue streams that I have outside of unwind. Or you can pitch investors and sell shares of your company in exchange for large sum investments or large or small, it doesn't matter, you know, a sum of money for them to invest in your business for your growth in investors looking for a 10x return. So I chose to bootstrap because. For a number of reasons. One, because that's coming from a small business owner background and that's been the majority of my influence growing up. I see that most of the small businesses I know bootstrap, they took on a second, third job or whichever, and they, they managed to keep the shares of their company and grow it organically and did see success. So this is why I chose to bootstrap. It's also easier, and I use the term easier lightly because although it's easier being that you have 100% control of your company and the finances, it still presents a challenge because you now have to sacrifice and utilize some of your time to bring in an income. And then that of course takes away from building your business. But the reason why I say that's easier is because it's easier for me because I am a woman. I am a woman of color and those two minority groups receive less than 1% of venture capital funding. And so I know the challenge that I'm up against. And instead of playing out the waiting game, no harm for me to bootstrap until I get to a certain point in my business to where I need large sums of capital in order to stay open, which is the best time to raise funds.
- [14:18]
B
Arabia, talk about you living on two separate coasts. We talked about that. So you're in Atlanta and San Francisco, two big tech hubs. Talk about why those two cities are important to you in reference to what you do for your business.
- [14:37]
A
Yes. So I'm very fortunate to live by Coastal and especially being in tech and a natural born entrepreneur. I'm very appreciative of the culture, the entrepreneur culture in Atlanta. It's born in Bredney. I was not born in Atlanta, but I do feel like it has had a huge impact on my entrepreneurial spirit and hustle and grit. And then of course, San Francisco being so tech focused and so many resources for people who are inspired by tech or interested in tech and also people who are looking for resources, resources that tech investors have here or just even the education as well. So I would say that living in Atlanta and San Francisco have both been beneficial to me because of the entrepreneurial spirit in both places, the resources for entrepreneurs in both places also. Growing up in Atlanta, I was able to see for the first time, actually, so many so, so, so, so, so many successful, educated and polished, beautiful women of color. And that was pivotal to my development of what type of power that I even had and understanding that power. So I think that was the foundation of letting me know that I wanted to see more women enjoy travel because travel is the next level of education when you get outside the institutional education. So I think those are some pretty strong. Some pretty strong influences. And I'm very happy to have both the resources from Atlanta and have resources from San Francisco as well.
- [16:22]
B
And speaking of influence, talk about the two influencers in your life and what lessons do they teach you.
- [16:32]
A
The two biggest influences in my life are my parents. I absolutely adore them. They are the best parents in the world. They have literally hand stitched and hand molded every piece of me. I've stuck very close to them my entire life and really appreciating their advice and their guidance. My parents are two natural entrepreneurs. My father is a retired artist. My mother is. She's had her hand in many things, homemaking for many years. She's also ran nonprofits. She's worked in the government sector. She's been in education. She's just done a lot. She's basically superwoman. And growing up, my parents taught me the value of a dollar, the value of hard work, the value of the entrepreneur spirit of constantly creating and taking time to create, taking time to innovate, and not letting that spirit die. And that very much being rooted in my identity. And also my parents just taught me that I think the value, the true value of happiness is making a difference, walking in your divine purpose, and uplifting the community. Really?
- [17:47]
B
And speaking of happiness, how do you keep your happy?
- [17:51]
A
How do I keep my happy? You know, I keep myself happy by making. By trying not to forget to make time for myself. I think that we so often forget how and when to make time for our own happiness. So what that looks like if we look closer is making time for my friends, my closest friends and my family. Making time to travel, which, you know, I work and travel, but, you know, I also really love to travel. So I do make time for that. I make time to shut everything off. You know, I'm pulled in so many directions like most women are, and I just make time to Stop being everything for everyone else and just take a moment to be everything for myself. So those are a few of the ways that I like to unwind and really channel on things that make me happy.
- [18:49]
B
Arabia, what is self care and self love looks like for Arabia?
- [18:56]
A
Self care and self love for me, I think largely looks like me allowing myself to be satisfied with a job well done. I am incredibly competitive with myself, incredibly critical, very critical, I think at times overly critical about my work. But I think that just comes from a deep hunger and a deep passion for wanting to touch people, wanting to make a difference in women's lives, and wanting to share what I've been given through my experiences in the world and through different concepts that I've just come into through my life experiences. So I think that's what self care looks like to me, is reminding myself to have patience, to be satisfied with where I'm at right now and to give myself a break. That's what self care looks like.
- [19:57]
B
And talk about maintaining a healthy lifestyle. What advice would you give?
- [20:04]
A
Oh, right, that's right. So develop as much into your work as you do, your personal happiness and personal care. So what that means to me is I think when people's creativity starts to die, people's innovation starts to die, that's when the unhappiness settles in. And I think that's very important as well for like developing your identity and really kind of to enter an exploratory space through hobbies, through community, through conversations and through experiences. So that's my answer is to develop as much into your personal identity, your personal, personal happiness, the things you like and learning the things you don't like as much as you Devote to your 9 to 5 and to the man and to your boss and to, you know, for taking it a level deeper here and to your children, to your spouse or your partner, to your friends, to your family. As much as you are pouring into that, pour into yourself as well.
- [21:04]
B
And what's working well for you now in business?
- [21:08]
A
What's working now for me is I am meeting a lot of people that align with my mission in empowering women and curating and bringing forth these really exciting experiences that are really innovative in the way that women want to live their lives now. So I think that's working well for me is I'm getting the word of mouth effect. And honestly, I haven't spent anything on marketing, anything on customer acquisition. It's largely been word of mouth. So I think that's working for me now. And I do spend a lot of time surrounding myself in the community with industry leaders and sharing my story via speaking to the people on social or I absolutely love doing these podcast interviews because they're just casual conversations where we can talk about the mission that I'm on and the story that I I'm walking in and the position that I play and the position I seek to play. So I think what's going well for me and what I want to celebrate is the fact that I do feel I'm meeting and getting in contact with some key people that are planting some beautiful seeds for 2020.
- [22:16]
B
And you talked about your business being a travel technology type company. What's a technology tool or technology platform platform that is a must have for you in managing your business day to day.
- [22:31]
A
A technology platform that's important to me to manage my business every day is, you know, I will make it broader than just I'll answer both. So the tool is my iPhone and I'm not endorsing Apple. I'm just saying that my phone, it's everything. It's my calendar to where I can make and break appointments. It's. It's my email to where I can touch my customers and have one on ones with them. It's my phone to where I can make phone calls and onboard host and cold call and do the things I need to do for marketing. My documents are on my phone or at least you know, everything's in the cloud of course, but like my digital tools and files and things that are helping me run my business, especially as a solo founder and you know, the only person on that's handling all the operations. It's definitely my favorite tool. If I had to be very specific about what platform, what digital platform is my been most resourceful to me in my journey, I would say that it is my camera, the camera on my phone. And that's a little bit of a tricky answer. But through my camera is how most people have been able to become consumed with the story that I am sharing through the different photos I've shared when I travel, the different videos I've shared when I travel and the content that I'm sharing are amazing stories of women all over the world, videos and photos of different communities, different cultures, different landscapes, different ideas all through this tiny camera. So I think I'm pretty confident about that. That has been the most powerful, most resourceful digital tool is my camera on my cell phone. That has been the most beneficial to my business.
- [24:20]
B
Arabia we can learn from successful entrepreneurs or brands just like you tell us a brand or a business that is dominating or you admire and why.
- [24:36]
A
I'm very strongly, I feel very strongly about the brand of women's empowerment that Beyonce Knowles herself has built. I understand she is an entertainer, I understand she is a vocalist, I understand she is a performer and she's had many other business investments in philanthropy and etc on the side. But I have been heavily impacted by the work, by the storytelling, by the message of Beyonce and Oprah and Michelle Obama. And I want to name all these other women that have really just shown me the blueprint or just of what it looks like, what it feels like through their work to be a powerful woman of color, especially in the space that, that a lot of women are living in the pits of self doubt. And it's a sad thing and it's something that we're all trying to conquer on our own. But women are constantly trying to conquer their own voice in their head of, you know, I can't do this or the odds are stacked against me. I don't have, you know, my work is not going to be as good. So I think though the brand women empowerment and you know, being resourceful and just success, women's success that Beyonce has shown and I mentioned Oprah as well Michelle Obama have been really powerful for me in the fact that representation matters for women, period. And especially women of color.
- [26:14]
B
And what would you say your biggest accomplishment so far in, in your business?
- [26:21]
A
Really good question. My biggest accomplishment has honestly been every day that I open my eyes and I thank God for waking me up. And I continue to fight. I continue to fight through my fears. I continue to take on challenges that I'm unfamiliar with, take on this dream that I'm chasing. I think that that's what I'm really just most accomplished. Excuse me, that I feel most accomplished with. And what I feel most proud of is the fact that I haven't given up. I'm still very proud of the small success I've had and you know, I've still very empowered to keep on my dream and yeah, so what I'm most proud of is my spirit, my spirit to keep going and to keep sharing my story and my story of uniting women and empowering women economically and creatively as well.
- [27:15]
B
If someone wrote a book about you today, what would we find out about you that we don't know about you? Arabia.
- [27:28]
A
I think a common misconception about me is that I am an extrovert. And I'm an extrovert. I'm a natural people person and I love being around people 24 7. And I think that that's a skill that I've learned over the years. But naturally, I am very introverted. I enjoy quiet, and I enjoy time in spaces where I can be alone to meditate. Yeah. I think upon, you know, reading my book or, you know, a more intimate piece about myself, that would be surprising to many.
- [28:03]
B
Is there a social cause that's connected with Unwind?
- [28:09]
A
There is. There is. The reason why Unwind is unlike any other platform in this space is because Unwind's true purpose is to bring women together. And that is the empowering empowerment piece. But it's also encouraging women to be entrepreneurs as well. And I think that very much ties to philanthropic efforts. Women are the curators of culture. We create culture around the world through these unique experiences that we start the trend. Unfortunately, in the travel space, all of these experiences have been appropriated by men. And although women are the face of these travel experiences, they're not the financial beneficiaries of these experiences. So what I want to do is I want to encourage women of all socioeconomic statuses to curate experiences and let this be a revenue stream for them and a way to experience entrepreneurship through curating these experiences. So for an example, what I love most about Unwind is that unlike other facets in life, there really isn't a strong barrier that keeps weight women from creating experiences on the platform. So an example is a woman who is living in San Francisco making over six figures a year can do it once a month. You know, whether she's hosting, you know, cycling the Golden Gate Bridge experience. Also, women that living in Mumbai living off of $10 a month. She can also create a cooking glass or she can also create let me teach you how to wear an Indian sari. She can also create experiences and create revenue streams for herself to educate her children or to provide resources for her family. So I do very well see philanthropy in what Unwind is doing.
- [30:14]
B
What is the one thing that we can do right now to support your business?
- [30:20]
A
The one thing you can do right now to support Unwind is to sign up. Thank you. Sign up and join as a traveler. Or if you're interested, please join as a host. And I'd love to work with you one on one to get you verified and really help you curate really amazing experiences in your local town. And you can sign up by visiting. Join unwind.com and you can click the sign up button. That would be lovely. Also, share Unwind on your socials. Share it to everyone you know and really create a community effect. About what we're doing with Unwind and the community that we want to grow and expand. Those are, those are two things that would be really beneficial to Unwind. And I also want to encourage entrepreneurs to look into aligning what you're doing with technology. Technology is the future. What I want to encourage is that more entrepreneurs are understanding that forecast and adjusting. Because what I don't want to happen is when the world shifts, a certain community is left behind. So it's very important that we are constantly figuring out how to stay innovative and adjust with where the economy is going to. And that is, hands down, the tech space. So find out how you can align your business with tech and somehow and.
- [31:47]
B
What book would you recommend and why?
- [31:50]
A
I really, really like Stephen Covey's book of the 10 traits of highly Effective People. I read that in my college years and that always stuck with me. I like that book and I also would recommend I'm Sorry, the title is Escaping Me right now. It's called Sorry. It's a huge, it's a famous book. I'll probably have to table that because I can't really remember it right now. You know, it'll probably, it'll probably come back to me by the end of the, by the end of the podcast. But as all those things naturally do when you forget something.
- [32:25]
B
Arabia what are you most grateful for now in your life?
- [32:30]
A
I'm grateful for my strong community of family and friends that are supporting, supporting me and cheering me on. And regardless of what anyone tells you, we all need affirmation, whether it's from self or family, friends, close loved ones. We all need a rah rah team, a cheerleader, someone to keep us going whether it's our faith, whether it's our community. I'm very, very appreciative of my relationship with God and my unbreakable relationship with my family and friends.
- [33:03]
B
And what have you not done in life that you dream about often?
- [33:09]
A
I haven't built a successful company for women that are coming together to make experiences yet. So this is what my main goal is. I haven't done it yet, so I am on that trajectory to make it happen.
- [33:25]
B
If you conducted this interview with what is the one question that you would ask yourself? And I want you to ask the question and answer that question.
- [33:36]
A
I would ask myself what is the most important part of building a business? And my answer is community. I think that a secret leg up is for those starting a business are those who already have developed a community, are in a strong community of that industry. I think that if I had focused more on deep diving into a community before I started my product instead of focusing on my product first, I focused on the product first instead of focused on building the community. I think I don't regret what I did because of course it's brought me full circle to where I am now. But I think that that is a secret. Leg up for any aspiring entrepreneur or any entrepreneur right now is dive head, dive into the deep end with community and really getting a. Getting a base of people that support you. Surround yourself with people who are in the industry or in the industry or consumers of the industry. The leaders are consumers and they know the industry well and can be a resource to you for questions you have and also can also be potential customers too. So establish yourself as a thought leader in a community first before you build your product and that'll make you know your, your scalability, I think much more easier.
- [34:58]
B
How do you build community?
- [35:01]
A
You build community, I think by listening. Listening and learning is how you build community. Listening and empower, listening, learning and empowering people around you. I think that is the true roots of building community.
- [35:16]
B
Thank you for that Arabia. We've come to the part of our interview, it's called fun facts lightning round and I'm going to ask you a series of questions and I'd like you to give me very quick answers and if there's something you desire not to answer, feel free to say pass. Are you ready for the Fun Facts Lightning round?
- [35:39]
A
I am.
- [35:40]
B
The last movie you saw was the Joker. You relax. Doing what?
- [35:47]
A
Listening to music.
- [35:49]
B
Your favorite singer or rapper?
- [35:52]
A
My favorite singer is Beyonce.
- [35:55]
B
Your favorite dance song?
- [35:58]
A
My favorite dance song is pass.
- [36:01]
B
What food you eat every week? No matter what?
- [36:06]
A
Bananas.
- [36:07]
B
Your favorite month?
- [36:09]
A
My favorite month is February for my birthday.
- [36:13]
B
Hit the couch or hit the treadmill.
- [36:17]
A
Ooh, I'm guilty. Hit the couch.
- [36:20]
B
Thank you so much Arabia. Before we conclude, why don't you tell our audience what is the best way for us to connect with you and support your business and brand.
- [36:34]
A
Thank you. So I would love to connect with everyone listening. Thank you for your time. Listening. Please connect with me over social. You can also connect with me via unwind the platform to connect with me on my social. Please connect with me at join unwind J O I N u N W I n d that's my handle for the platform Unwind. If you want to connect with me personally because you admire my entrepreneur journey and you want to network for entrepreneurial purposes, please follow me or connect with me via my all the platforms at Arabia Amrani A r a b as in boy I a u m as in mary R a n I those are all my handles and then please sign up for for unwind it's www.join unwind. So similar to the social handle J o I n u n w I n d.com Sign up. Tell your friends about it. Tell your family about it. Book your girls trip on with unwind. Book your bachelorette trip with unwind. Go solo. Leave everybody that was too shady to book behind and give go alone. And yes, please share and sign up.
- [37:50]
B
Thank you so much Arabia. That is a wrap.
- [37:53]
C
Thank you for listening and subscribing to black entrepreneur experience. We would love for you to leave a review and rating on itunes and share with your friends. For show notes and more episodes go to www.beepodcast.com. join us next Wednesday. And remember green is the new black so keep your bank accounts and your business in the black.