Entrepreneurship Drives Founders of Ladies Who Launch
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

Bill Gates may have harnessed the power of the PC, but Beth Schoenfeldt and Victoria Colligan may be tapping into something considerably more potent: the creative energies of entrepreneurial women.
Consider this: According to the Center for Women’s Business Research, there are 10.6 million firms in America that are at least 50% owned by a woman. Nearly half of all privately held businesses are owned by women, and the growth in such enterprises since 1997 has been double that of all firms. This is a market that vendors galore are suddenly keen to tap.
In response to this growing phenomenon, Ms. Schoenfeldt and Ms. Colligan have founded an organization called Ladies Who Launch. Ms. Schoenfeldt describes the venture as a “distribution, marketing, and public relations channel for women.” Part resource, part inspiration, LWL reaches out to thousands of women who are making, according to the founders, a lifestyle decision. Enabled by productivity enhancers such as the Internet and cell phones, millions of women, many of them mothers, are starting their own businesses and leaving the corporate world behind.
Women are encouraging this trend, apparently, by proving to be extremely competent as entrepreneurs. According to various studies, they are natural networkers, comfortable with asking peers for advice and insight, and born multitaskers, which, reasonably, enhances their prospects of success.
Where does LWL fit in? This outfit supplies numerous tools to inspire and enable women’s dreams, while remembering that clever women are feminine and, actually, different from men. Move over, Gloria Steinem.
LWL hosts events and programs, including an “incubator” workshop series for those interested in starting their own business. The sessions, which Ms. Schoenfeldt describes as helping to “expand and clarify women’s vision,” set participants various tasks designed to get them thinking collaboratively and creatively. For example, they might be asked to issue a press release or plan a product launch.
The incubator course costs $250 and consists of eight hours spread over four weeks; those who wish to join up afterward receive, for $500 a year, invitations to events and weekly e-mails providing real-life stories of how women have achieved their dreams.
For example, in September the group held a gathering at the Lotus Club in New York, featuring a number of women who have built successful businesses, including Jeanine Lobell, founder of Stila Cosmetics, and Charyl Van Winkle, founder of Pythoness Hedge Fund.
LWL also hosts a Web site that offers tips to the budding entrepreneur, a calendar of upcoming LWL events, and, of course, ads for products that might be appealing for ladies who want to launch. The Web site features a profile each week of a “featured lady.” Most recently, the site carried a story on Paula Begoun, who has hit it big as an outspoken critic of cosmetic company claims and products, and has also done well with her own cosmetics line.
In March, LWL undertook a new phase when it held a kick-off party for a collaborative speaker series with Avon. At the first session, held at Avon’s Salon in New York, Liz Lange, a designer of chic maternity wear, spoke to about 100 women. Avon has become a sponsor of LWL, which allows the cosmetics company access to their growing network of active consumers.
In many ways, the ladies who launched LWL are typical of the women they are targeting. Ms. Colligan, who lives in Cleveland, graduated from Brown University and earned a joint law and business degree from Case Western University. She started out as a corporate lawyer in New York before signing on with an online wedding gift company that was bought by Martha Stewart. After a subsequent stint with Amsale, a wedding gown designer, for whom she redesigned a Web site and worked on marketing initiatives, she began to build her LWL Web site.
Ms. Schoenfeldt had a little more of the touchy-feely approach to the business. Her background includes an undergraduate degree from Texas A &M and an MBA from Columbia University. After school she did marketing work with Clinique, Ibeauty.com and American Express. Ms. Schoenfeldt describes herself as being “good at moving people forward.” She started out offering coaching and lifestyle guidance inspired, perhaps, by her association with Regena Thomashauer, founder of Mama Gena’s School of Womanly Arts.
She began her LWL career by hosting workshops designed to help women make important changes in their lives. She was encouraged by her clients to formalize her sessions into what is today the incubator program, pairing up with Ms. Colligan in 2002 as a result of an e-mail introduction.
As is so often the case with a new business, the plan is evolving. The new focus that may have the most revenue potential is lining up more corporate sponsors. Besides Avon, LWL has recruited Commerce Bank and American Greetings. In effect, one of its most lucrative opportunities is to put corporations in touch with a large number of ambitious and motivated women.
LWL’s Web site, www.ladieswholaunch.com, gets more than 100,000 visitors per month, and has more than 12,000 subscribers to a weekly e-mail. The incubator program has been licensed to women in 20 cities who pay $6,000 to put on the workshops, and about 10 more are in the pipeline. The licensees, according to Ms. Schoenfeldt, “have to be connectors. They have to want other people to succeed.” A recent event in Seattle drew 300 women and considerable local press.
Meanwhile, the Ladies have signed a book deal and are busily expanding their own networks. The secret of their success may be that at the end of the day, Ms. Schoenfeldt claims, “I just want to have fun. I love what I do.” How many investment bankers can say the same?