Erin and Sara Foster on Turning “Failure” Into an Empire

Summary

Episode Overview

Episode Title: Erin and Sara Foster on Turning “Failure” Into an Empire
Podcast: This Is Working with Daniel Roth
Date: November 6, 2025
Guests: Erin Foster & Sara Foster, co-founders of Favorite Daughter
Theme:
In this candid, refreshingly honest conversation, Daniel Roth sits down with sisters Erin and Sara Foster to unpack how professional pivots—some borne out of what felt like failure—helped them build a multifaceted brand empire. The sisters pull back the curtain on their non-linear career paths, lessons learned from missteps, navigating partnerships, and building a business that’s both authentic and scalable.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Nonlinear Pathways and Embracing Failure

• Early Struggles & “Failures”
  The Fosters reflect on how their careers didn’t start as planned. Their entertainment aspirations didn’t initially take off, pushing them to explore new opportunities.
  • "One part of our career wasn’t taking off, so then we tried to focus and pivot on a different career... it took several years for them to gain traction." —Erin Foster [00:47]
• Joining Bumble as creative directors (before it was fashionable) felt, at first, like moving away from their dreams.
  • "At the time it was a little bit in no man's land... it felt a little bit like an admission of failure to us." —Erin Foster [02:20]
  • "It sent us down a path that really shaped our lives and our careers, which was saying yes to something that seemed out of our wheelhouse and intimidating and scary." —Erin Foster [02:46]
• Their "failure" ultimately opened doors they didn’t know existed, instilling a love for business and connection.

2. Imposter Syndrome and the “Chip on the Shoulder”

• Enduring Imposter Syndrome
  • "I think maybe for me, I might have the imposter syndrome forever..." —Sarah Foster [04:09]
  • They see their insecurities as motivation to stay present, engaged, and humble.
  • "I don't ever want to get too comfortable in the success..." —Sarah Foster [04:33]

3. Choosing and Navigating Partnerships

• Intuition and Instincts in Partnerships
  • "It's like a date. You use your instincts." —Erin Foster [04:52]
  • The “love bombing” analogy—being wary of over-the-top promises when evaluating partners.
  • "It’s kind of like getting love bombed, honestly. It's like someone's telling you way too many good things." —Erin Foster [05:00]
• Case Study—The Mirror
  • Introduced by Phil Schwartz, a partnership that “felt right” and leveraged their skill in consumer education from Bumble.
  • "Phil was so amazing in the process...such a champion of us." —Erin Foster [06:00]
• Scaling Their Impact & Creating Their Fund
  • After making lots of small “skin in the game”-less investments, their desire to meaningfully participate led to forming their own fund, with Phil as a partner.
  • "We had tons of deal flow and no more money to write checks... we're either going to stop investing or we're going to have real skin in the game." —Sarah Foster [06:27]

4. Building ‘Favorite Daughter’ and Learning On the Job

• Divergent Mindsets
  • Sarah’s fear-based, scarcity perspective contrasted with Erin’s abundance mindset.
    • "I am always fear based. And Erin comes from a place of abundance. She just has an abundance mindset. And I catastrophize everything." —Sarah Foster [07:24]
• Finding Their Niche
  • Initially, Sarah doubted their capacity to enter fashion, but realized their relatable, unpretentious approach was exactly what their customer wanted.
    • "I just don't think there's a customer for that. And then it turns out that's exactly our customer..." —Sarah Foster [07:38]
• Iterative Learning
  • “Learning on the job” through mistakes, especially about production—unafraid to admit what they didn't know and corrected course by demanding more transparency.
    • "We made a lot of mistakes that first two years, honestly, because we didn’t understand how the business worked." —Erin Foster [08:56]
    • "Treat us like partners. Don't appease us. Tell us the truth. Teach us." —Erin Foster [10:17]

5. Authentic Leadership and Brand Voice

• Embracing Transparency
  • They don’t pretend to do everything nor take sole credit, openly sharing the importance of partners and joint ventures.
    • "There are some people that like to perpetuate a false narrative of like, I do everything... That is not us." —Sarah Foster [09:54]
• Feedback Culture
  • "A CEO...who is not willing to hear feedback that's honest is really going to be out of touch with their brand..." —Erin Foster [10:45]
  • Inviting collaborators to push back.
• Advice on Personal Branding
  • Authenticity over obligation: not everyone has to become an influencer or personal brand.
    • "If it's not authentic to you, it's not gonna go well. Anytime you're forcing yourself to do something because you think you should be doing it. Like, I shouldn't be on TikTok." —Erin Foster [11:25]
    • "We are living in this crazy hustle culture right now, where everyone thinks they have to be everything to everybody... It's not good. It's not healthy." —Sarah Foster [12:00]

6. Reflections on Growth, Balance, and Sustainability

• Avoiding Hustle Overwhelm
  • Recognizing the pressure to keep growing, Sarah focuses on “watering what you’ve already built.”
    • "There can always be more. For the first time in my life at 44 years old, I'm kind of like, okay, it's enough... let's really water what we have built and be happy with that." —Sarah Foster [12:24]
• Work–Life Balance
  • Erin underscores balance and setting boundaries, even if it means responding to work later to prioritize family.
    • "If I'm in bed with my husband and we're watching Love is Blind...I will respond and say, guys, I'm watching Love is Blind in bed with my husband, and I'll write you tomorrow morning." —Erin Foster [12:46]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Career Pivots
  • "A lot of times when you're envisioning your future or you're dreaming, you're limiting yourself, you don't even know how good it could be." —Erin Foster [02:54]
• On Partnership Red Flags
  • "It's like someone's telling you way too many good things. You know they're not realistic. And it just puts your antennas up." —Erin Foster [05:00]
• On Honest Leadership
  • "A CEO of a company who is not willing to hear feedback that's honest is really going to be out of touch with their brand and with the people working for them." —Erin Foster [10:45]
• On Authenticity Over Hustle
  • "My soul is not on TikTok. It just. She's just not there." —Erin Foster [11:51]
• On Defining Enough
  • "For the first time in my life at 44 years old, I'm kind of like, okay, it's enough...let's really water what we have built and be happy with that." —Sarah Foster [12:24]
• Work-Life Boundaries
  • "I'm watching Love is Blind in bed with my husband, and I'll write you tomorrow morning." —Erin Foster [12:53]

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Key Timestamps

• Nonlinear Journey / Early Doubts: [00:47 – 02:44]
• Imposter Syndrome & Mindset: [04:09 – 04:46]
• Partnerships & Fund Creation: [04:52 – 06:50]
• Building Favorite Daughter: [07:16 – 08:56]
• Learning from Mistakes: [08:56 – 10:17]
• Transparency & Feedback Culture: [09:54 – 10:59]
• Authenticity in Branding/Voice: [11:25 – 12:09]
• Hustle Culture & Work-Life Balance: [12:23 – End]

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Conclusion

Through vulnerability, accountability, and a refusal to follow conventional scripts, Erin and Sara Foster demonstrate how so-called failures can open up surprising and powerful avenues for success. Their empire is rooted in honesty, instinctive partnership, learning from mistakes—and a firm belief that your best path may be the one you never imagined.

Transcript

[Sarah Foster]

We literally had a problem. We had tons of deal flow and no more money to write checks. So it was truly like, we're either gonna stop investing or we're gonna have real skin in the game.

[Erin Foster]

We made a lot of mistakes that first two years. Honestly, we didn't understand how the business worked.

[Interviewer]

Welcome to this Is Working, where leaders share their strategies for success and the lessons that shape them. Favorite daughter co founders Erin and Sarah Foster are sisters who may have cracked the circular business model. They have an ecosystem that keeps customers and fans firmly in their orbit. A clothing line, a VC fund, a pod, and even a hit Netflix series. As you can imagine, they are very busy, so it's great to have them join us here on LinkedIn to talk about what it takes to lead an empire, what they've learned about building brands and working in partnership. Aaron and Sarah, welcome to this Is Working.

[Erin Foster]

You listed, you know, really all of our main businesses that we have going, but it wasn't as if we launched them all at the same time. One part of our career wasn't taking off. So then we tried to focus and pivot on a different career and then we had different stokes in the fire and it took several years for them to gain traction. And then we sit here today in 2025 and a handful of them are really working, but it took time to get there.

[Interviewer]

Do you like the experience of juggling so many things? Is that the way that you prefer to operate or is that just kind of where you've ended up?

[Erin Foster]

It's where we've ended up.

[Sarah Foster]

It's where we've ended up.

[Erin Foster]

We're not type A people, which seems strange to, like, list what we're working on. We are definitely type B. We are. We avoid emails, we get really tired. We wake up at 5am and go to the gym. That is not our personalities. I think that we have what once was a chip on our shoulder that became sort of a driving force. We had an insecurity about where our position was in the world. We didn't go to college. You know, we didn't. I certainly did very poorly in school, so I didn't really know if I was going to be good at anything. And so when the entertainment part of our careers weren't taking off the way we wanted to, we got this offer, an opportunity to go to Bumble and work at as the creative directors, whatever that means. It's kind of a vague title, but

[Sarah Foster]

it was really vague in 2017. Now it's like this is. It's sort of normalized to see front facing talent take on these positions at tech companies. Right?

[Erin Foster]

Yeah. At the time it was a little bit in no man's land and it felt a little bit like an admission of failure to us. Like, oh, we're gonna go work in tech.

[Interviewer]

That is so crazy to think.

[Sarah Foster]

Not an admission of failure in life. Cause obviously that's a huge honor. And we met Whitney Wolfhard and we were like just completely enamored by what she had built it. Okay, I guess this means the entertainment part of our career didn't work out.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Sarah Foster]

I'm not gonna be the actress that

[Erin Foster]

I thought I was gonna be, you know, and diving into a different category. And it sent us down a path that really shaped our lives and our careers, which was saying yes to something that seemed sort of out of our wheelhouse and intimidating and scary. And we were worried about what people would think. And it ended up being this huge asset for us and it gave us this who arm of success that we never even saw as a possibility. So it's a reminder to us and to everyone that a lot of times when you're envisioning your future or you're dreaming, you're limiting yourself, you don't even know how good it could be. You don't even know how vast it could be. And we realized how much we loved business. We realized how much we loved working with a founder, how much we loved speaking to women and connecting a product to a consumer. That was really fun for us.

[Sarah Foster]

Also, I would say that we were utilizing the same at Bumble. It was all about connecting to women. This was before our podcast, this was before Favorite Daughter. That is what we do in every venture that we have going on. It's about connecting with women.

[Erin Foster]

Point is, I just think we don't know what our capabilities are.

[Interviewer]

But wait, can you go back to that chip on your shoulder? Can you look back now and say, oh, this was the point where I stopped operating from feeling like I don't belong in this room.

[Sarah Foster]

I think maybe for me, I might have the imposter syndrome forever. Because I, and I say this because I don't have a specific tangible skill. You know, I'm a people person, I'm a connector. But here's the thing. I hope in some way that we never lose that because it keeps us having to show up constantly. I don't ever want to get too comfortable in the success of all of this or buy into it because to Aaron's point, Hollywood is in a. It's a, it's a crazy Place you. One minute you have a hit, and you got the number one show that you're producing and creating, and that goes away fast.

[Interviewer]

And how are you picking partners? I assume you're partnering all the time with people. How are you picking who to work with and who not to?

[Erin Foster]

It's like a date. You use your instincts.

[Interviewer]

So what is that like to walk through a partnership that you maybe thought was okay? And then you were like, well, this is not for us.

[Erin Foster]

It's kind of like getting love bombed, honestly. It's like someone's telling you way too many good things. You know, they're not realistic. And it just puts your antennas up. You know, you're like, I don't know if I trust this, but when it comes to our fund, there was a guy named Phil Schwartz. He had been the CMO of Tinder, and he left Tinder, and he got into the VC world. He met with Bryn Putnam, who started the Mirror, and he. It wasn't right for his fund, and he brought Sarah and I into it, and he said, I think this would be a good fit.

[Sarah Foster]

Yeah.

[Erin Foster]

So he brings us in, and it's a great partnership for us.

[Sarah Foster]

He helped launch it.

[Erin Foster]

We helped launch it.

[Interviewer]

How'd you know it was a great partnership?

[Erin Foster]

It just felt right. It felt like a product we would use. It felt like a product our friends would use. We hadn't seen anything like it in the marketplace.

[Sarah Foster]

And our sweet spot, too, is educating the consumer. Right. Like we had just at Bumble, we were educating the consumer on why it's not weird to meet a friend or find a job online. Right. Bumble was a dating app. And then when it came to the Mirror, we were like, we think that we could educate women on why they have to work out to a mirror on the wall.

[Erin Foster]

It was a good partnership. They got a, you know, had a really healthy exit that we were a part of. And Phil was so amazing in the process, and he was so smart and so supportive and such a champion of us that when it was time to start our own fun, which just means that we were getting a lot of opportunities to. To investments, but we didn't want to make big personal investments. My husband actually, who had a little background in. In investing, he said, I really think that Phil should be your partner and you should start your own fund. Stop using our money.

[Sarah Foster]

He literally had a problem. We had tons of deal flow and no more money to write checks.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Sarah Foster]

Because the $25,000 little checks, there's like, you have no skin in the game.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Sarah Foster]

So founders are. Have expectations for us. We're like, yeah, okay, but we own like.01% of your business. We're not going to do all the work. So it was truly like, we're either going to stop investing or we're gonna have real skin in the game where we own, like, you know, between 5 and 8% of these.

[Erin Foster]

Of these businesses. So I think the message there is really the intention behind it. And so, speaking about partners, the opportunity for Favorite Daughter came to us. Centric Brands came to us. They never incubated their own clothing brand like that. And it just felt like a really great opportunity. And it was these three really powerful, cool women sitting at the table with us, and they won us over. I mean, it's as simple as that. We liked them and we trusted them.

[Interviewer]

And how do you two decide what to go in on? Is it instant or you, like, just, you know, you look over at each other and you're like, no, I didn't

[Sarah Foster]

want to do it. I thought it was a bad idea.

[Interviewer]

Really?

[Erin Foster]

Yeah. I was scared.

[Sarah Foster]

I am always fear based. And Erin comes from a place of abundance. She just has an abundance mindset. And I catastrophize everything. I do not have an abundance mindset at all. So I really felt like, we're not fashion girls. Why would anybody want clothing from us? Why would any? I just don't think there's a customer for that. And then it turns out that's exactly our customer. Our customer is the girl that isn't obsessed with fashion, isn't spending $3,000 on a coat. She wants to look nice. She wants to feel chic, but she's not feeling about it. She has too much effort into it.

[Interviewer]

All right, so you don't want to do it. You do want to do it. What's the process where you decide to say yes?

[Erin Foster]

You know, with sisters, we fight. I just thought it was a very interesting opportunity. I really was in a lull in my writing career, and I. And I didn't know if I wanted to go back to writing. It had been really hard, and I hadn't had the success that I had wanted. And I was feeling discouraged, and so I was looking to be productive in some way. And I liked the idea of putting my energy into something that was like a tangible thing. You know, for me, getting a sweater right is much of a cleaner part of my brain process than figuring out how to write a script. You know, being a writer is very. It tortures you.

[Interviewer]

Yes.

[Sarah Foster]

I remember when they presented the deck to us Sort of what they were thinking because we had owned. I mean, the IP of Favorite Daughter was ours. They were like, this IP is huge. That Favorite Daughter. It's like, we like you guys, but we don't want the Foster brand. We want Favorite Daughter. Like, that's what we want. No name, no deal. So that's when, you know, the wheels started spinning and I started going, okay, I see this, I see Favorite Daughter home shoes fragrance. It was hard for me to get there, but then when I got there, I was like, oh. I was like.

[Erin Foster]

But it took a really long time for us to be making the kind of quality clothes that we're wearing right now. We made a lot of mistakes that first two years, honestly, because we didn't understand how the business worked. So we would say, you know, I really want to make a cardigan. They'd be like, great. You know, what kind of fabric would be like, I don't know. We trust you guys. And then we'd get to the third fitting and I'd go, by the way, guys, I really hate how it bunches in the shoulder and I really hate this. And they'd go, erin, this is production. You didn't say that three fittings ago. It's done. We've made 150 of them.

[Interviewer]

I mean, how lucky are you that you can learn on some, on, on the job like that? But I think the most mind boggling part of this to me is that you guys do this together. You two decide what you're going to go into business with, how, what you like in the lines. Right? Do you agree on everything?

[Sarah Foster]

But. And like a huge part of our whole brand, our whole thing is transparency.

[Erin Foster]

Yeah.

[Sarah Foster]

We. There are some people that like to perpetuate a false narrative of like, I do everything. I'm the this, I'm the that. That is not us. We're the first people that say, if we did not have Centric Brands as our partner, as a. It's a joint venture, 50 50. If we don't did not have them as a partner, we would not be sitting here with you right now.

[Erin Foster]

And we have a full time designer. And a big part of why those mistakes were happening, this is what got fixed for us, is that they were letting us make those decisions and we had to finally say to them, we need do not treat us like talent. Treat us like partners. Don't appease us. Tell us the truth. Teach us.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Erin Foster]

And we really tell them, like, you have to push back on us. Even if we have a strong opinion, you have to Say no.

[Interviewer]

So do you start your conversations when you're partnering with someone? Are you saying, like. Like, push back on us? This is how we work.

[Erin Foster]

I think that a CEO of a company who is not willing to hear feedback that's honest is really going to be out of touch with their brand and with the people working for them. And if you make yourself too scary to talk to, no one's going to

[Sarah Foster]

tell you, look, we don't want a chaotic work environment, but we want one where everyone feels like they can be heard. Good things happen when everyone feels like they're heard.

[Interviewer]

You guys talked about being talent but not wanting to be treated like talent. But there's also this kind of movement in business where everyone is expected to be their own brand representative. Does everyone need to build their own voice? And if so, what kind of lesson would you have for them on how to put their own personality into their small business or something they're launching?

[Erin Foster]

I don't think everyone needs to, because if it's not authentic to you, it's not gonna go well. Anytime you're forcing yourself to do something because you think you should be doing it. Like, I shouldn't be on TikTok.

[Sarah Foster]

Oh, yeah, I definitely should not.

[Erin Foster]

I've thought to myself, okay, am I gonna, like, not have a career if I don't make funny videos on TikTok? And I did it, and I was like, this just doesn't feel right for me. It's just not right in my soul. And so I don't belong there.

[Sarah Foster]

That's a very good point.

[Erin Foster]

My soul is not on TikTok. It just. She's just not there. If something is intrinsically not representative of you, I don't think it's gonna work.

[Sarah Foster]

It really is a good point. We are living in this, like, crazy hustle culture right now, where everyone thinks, like, they have to be everything to everybody and to everything. It's not good. It's not healthy.

[Erin Foster]

A big part why it's succeeding and working is because it's not following another person's path. That wouldn't be right for us.

[Interviewer]

As you get more professional and you see what works and what doesn't, do you start developing a path or do you want to kind of keep this chaos? Is chaos part of the.

[Erin Foster]

I'm down to keep the chaos.

[Sarah Foster]

Like I was saying to her recently, I was like, I have to stop myself and go, okay, no, you need to water what you've already built. There can always be more. There can always be more. I've felt a lot like, I need more. I need more. And for the first time in my life at 44 years old, I'm kind of like, okay, it's enough. It's enough. Like, let's really water what we have built and be happy with that.

[Erin Foster]

Also, for me, I would say the most important thing in my work right now is work, life, balance. That's the thing that keeps me going. I want to be able to do the things that I have to get done for the day, and then I want to be with my daughter at bath time, because that's important to me. And it also, like, recharges me, you know, I've learned to not be embarrassed. Now, if I'm in bed with my husband and we're watching Love is Blind and we are having a wonderful, wonderful Wednesday night, and I get a work text, I will respond and say, guys, I'm watching Love is Blind in bed with my husband, and I'll write you tomorrow morning.