Meet The HIBT Fellows: Katie Mitchell & Celena Gill

As a part of the 2021 How I Built This Summit (At Home) we have selected 10 Fellows, and we'd like to introduce you to them over the next couple weeks. In this episode: Katie Mitchell and her mother Katherine opened a book shop in Atlanta called Good Books, that centers Black authors and brings books into the community. And in Washington, D. C., Celena Gill and her three sons, Collin, Ryan, and Austin, started the home fragrance and candle company, Frères Branchiaux. How I Built This Summit - information and tickets at: http://summit.npr.orgSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Guy Raz?

  We get support from US Bank. A question I love asking founders. What's the one decision you almost didn't make? The one that changed everything? Because it's never the obvious stuff. It's never, I decided to start a company. It's the small, boring, Tuesday afternoon decision you barely remember making until you realize it's the reason everything after it either worked or didn't. Say you're 18 months in. Business is growing. You've got expenses coming from six directions. Gas for the van, office supplies, your phone bill, team lunches that are actually client meetings, and you're putting it all on whatever card you grabbed in year one. You're not thinking about it. Why would you? You've got bigger problems.

• 0:45Guy Raz?

  But here's the thing. Path A, you keep going like that. End of the year, you're sorting through statements, trying to figure out what went where. You've left hundreds, maybe thousands, on the table in rewards you never earned. Money that could have gone back into the business. Path B, you pause and get the US Bank Triple Cash Rewards Visa Business Card. Now, you're earning 3% cash back on gas and EV charging, office supply stores, cellphone service, and restaurants. You pick up an extra $750 cash back as a bonus. And you've got a low APR on purchases and balance transfers for 12 months while you're scaling. Same business, same expenses, two completely different outcomes

• 1:30Guy Raz?

  based on one small decision. Visit usbank.com/business to learn more. The creditor and issuer of this card is US Bank National Association, pursuant to a license from Visa USA, Inc. Some restrictions apply. Our presenting sponsor today is Anthropic, the team behind Claude. Every founder on this show started with a hard question. Not the marketing plan, the 2:00 AM kind. Is this idea any good? Am I the one to build it? Should I quit my job? Anthropic got built the same way. A public benefit corporation founded on one Hard question. How do we make sure AI goes well for people?

• 2:14Guy Raz?

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• 2:58Guy Raz?

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• 3:40Guy Raz?

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• 4:24Guy Raz?

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• 5:06Guy Raz?

  or get started building for free today at framer.com/built for 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan. That's framer.com/built. Rules and restrictions may apply.

• 5:23Guy Raz?

  Hey, everyone. So as a lot of you know, every year during normal years, we do a How I Built This Summit, an in-real-life gathering that we've been doing in San Francisco. This year, we're going entirely virtual. But every year we've done the summit, we've invited a group of entrepreneurs to become How I Built This Fellows. These are dreamers and builders that may be in all different stages of their businesses and are looking to make connections, or get mentorship, or take their ideas to the next level. This year, we picked 10 fellows, and we're holding a pitch competition where the winner will get a $50,000 check from us, a grant. So over the next two weeks, we'll be getting to know them a little better.

• 6:08Guy Raz?

  One of the things I find really interesting is when people start a business with someone in their family. It might be a spouse or a sibling, but no matter the relation, they have a story that goes beyond a typical co-founder relationship.

• 6:22Guy Raz?

  Both of the fellows we're going to hear from today started their company with family. First, Katie Mitchell, who started the business Good Books in Atlanta with her mom Catherine. Together, they're building a community that centers on Black literature through monthly book clubs, author spotlights, and pop-up events. And while they just started the business in the spring of 2019, Katie's love of books started long before that, at a time she could rarely be found without one.

• 6:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, always a book in my hand, a book in the backpack, book in the car, just always wanting to read. And the way my mom raised my brother and I, it was something that was just fun. It was an activity. I remember standing in the living room when we lived in Manhattan, Kansas, and reciting Langston Hughes poems. I had the little short ones and my brother had the longer ones. But it's been something that's just been so a part of my life. And it's really just shaped the way I see the world. And my mom was really big on teaching us not what to think, but how to think and how to come to our own conclusions. And of course, books played a huge role in that.

• 7:32Guy Raz?

  Who did you like to read as a little girl?

• 7:36Speaker 01

  As a little girl, I loved the American Diary series, where it was a girl from ancient Egypt. And I really loved Addie. She was the girl who was a former enslaved person. I still have them. And I'm like, I can't wait to pass these down to my daughter. But yeah, reading someone's diary. And I feel like it was a little bit of me being nosey, but also a little bit of wanting to just learn the history in a fun, in different way.

• 8:05Guy Raz?

  So I want to ask you about the experience that you have when you read. Do you get lost in books? Is it like this immersive thing where it doesn't matter what's going on around you, but you are completely lost in that book?

• 8:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, definitely. Really good fiction does that for me. And before, I shared a little bit about my struggle with mental health issues. That's really what got me through it. Reading books that had nothing to do with mental health issues, where people were just going on adventures and living their life. And like, for those hours that I was reading those books, all my problems didn't exist because I was just in it.

• 8:46Guy Raz?

  How did you, how did you come to the idea for, for the business that you created Good Books?

• 8:52Speaker 01

  So it started in my parents' house, selling books through Instagram DM. And when I look back, Good Books started in May 2019, but it really has roots in 1930s rural Mississippi. When my grandfather was born, he, along with my grandmother, were sharecroppers. And he left school to help out his family and didn't learn how to read or write. But he instilled in his children, his grandchildren, the importance of that. And he made sure that they knew how to, even though he, he lived to be 82 and he never learned. He raised his family and showed us how important it was. And we officially launched a month after me and my mom were just having a conversation over breakfast.

• 9:37Speaker 01

  And it was kind of a lull and she said, why don't we start a bookstore? I was like, yeah, why don't we? And it kind of just happened super fast after that. We knew that we wanted it to be all black books. We knew that we wanted to be mobile and be able to bring literature and prose to the people. And looking back, I see like, that's such a huge part of why I was raised the way I was. I feel like it was very intentional with our family, trying to, you know, move past that point in history where it was hard for black people to get access to books and learn how to read. And it was seen as more important to work and provide for your family, which is, which is important and which helped them survive racist rural Mississippi.

• 10:23Guy Raz?

  Katie, can you talk a little bit about how Good Books works?

• 10:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, of course. Before COVID-19, we were doing pop-ups around the city. Like I said, to have that mobile aspect, bring books to people who typically wouldn't have black books in their neighborhood. After COVID happened, we transitioned to 100% online, including an online book club, where we discuss books and then we have a, a large social media community where we talk about books online. And we are creating Atlanta's first mobile black Black bookmobile. So when outside is open and it's safe to do so, we'll be driving around the city and bringing books to people that way. So you can kind of think of it as a food truck for books or a bookstore in a tiny house that will come to neighborhoods and book deserts

• 11:11Speaker 01

  and parks and just have that really communal experience around reading.

• 11:16Guy Raz?

  What is your broader vision for Good Books? It's in Atlanta now, you're virtual, but tell me what your vision is five, 10 years from now. What does, what does Good Books look like?

• 11:28Speaker 01

  Uh, the, the vision is, it scares me a little bit and I think that's good. I see it as becoming a fleet of bookmobiles in cities that have a storied black literature tradition and history. So Atlanta, of course, Selma, Harlem, Oakland, Shreveport, like all these places. I would love to see that have this fleet of bookmobiles where people can really make it their own and it can, we can co-create it with the communities that it'll be in.

• 11:59Guy Raz?

  Do you see this as a, I know you're running a for-profit business, but do you see this sort of as a hybrid kind of for-profit, nonprofit type of model?

• 12:07Speaker 01

  I definitely do see it as something that is doing a social good. We partner with groups in Atlanta and Chicago that give books to incarcerated people and also give books for free to students. So I haven't incorporated it as a nonprofit, but we do things that like profit isn't our first motive. We do want people to learn and engage with the literature and the thoughts and have it as a, like a third space for, for just gathering and learning and supporting each other.

• 12:39Guy Raz?

  Katie, as part of the How I Built This Fellowship, you, you were able to attend some workshops, including a workshop with Robin McBride of, of the McBride Sisters Collection. She talked about telling brand stories. What did you take away from that conversation?

• 12:54Speaker 01

  First, Robin is awesome. I was kind of starstruck. I was trying to keep it, keep it low when we were on the call, but she, she really brought it home for me that people are buying from you because they believe in you and they believe in your vision. Anyone can get a book. From any other place. You can go to Amazon, you can go to thrift stores, Barnes and Noble. There's places people can get books, but people shop with me and my mom because of our story and because of our passion and what we bring to the space.

• 13:28Speaker 02

  Like every founder is a real person and with a real personality and a real passion, you know, either for the product or services you've created or are providing. Every brand has a reason for why you created it in the first place. I think sometimes people tend to overlook that as being a piece of what's really important. Not necessarily why they created it, but just the fact that, again, people are buying in, are also buying into you, right? And they want to, they need a reason to believe that the passion that you guys feel should resonate with the person who you're telling the story to as well, but it's gotta be, it's gotta be true.

• 14:11Speaker 01

  She let us know that your backstory isn't something to be ashamed about. I shared with her that I was kind of hesitant to talk about my family's history with illiteracy because it's something that they had been ashamed of. It's not something that people just shout from their rooftops, but she let me know, like, that's part of your story and that is what led you to where you are now. And it's not your shame to hold because it's not something that's shameful.

• 14:37Guy Raz?

  Yeah. If you won the $50,000, the grant, how would you use it?

• 14:44Speaker 01

  We would use that $50,000 to create the flagship bookmobile here in Atlanta. Designing it, building it, we want to use sustainable materials and local builders and designers. Also stocking the bookmobile and just creating a space that is inclusive, but also very specific. I think a lot of the times, black consumers are seen as second-class consumers. And, you know, if you find something for yourself, then you do. If you don't, oh, well, we have millions of other people to, to buy our products. But we want to have something that's specific to black culture and black history. And debuting it in Atlanta, whether it's during the Black History Month Parade or even the Juneteenth Celebration, that's what we would do with that $50,000.

• 15:30Guy Raz?

  That's Katie Mitchell, co-founder of Good Books Atlanta. When we come back, we're going to hear from another How I Built This Fellow, a mother who started a company with her three kids, the oldest of whom is just 12. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This Fellow's Edition from NPR.

• 16:02Guy Raz?

  Hey, welcome back to How I Built This Fellow's Edition from NPR. I'm Guy Raz. So Selena Gill co-founded her company Frere Bronchio with her three children, Collin, Ryan, and Austin. They started a home fragrance company, and they now sell soy and coconut vegan candles, diffusers, bath salts, all under that name, Frere Bronchio, which was not their original idea, but they ran into a naming issue pretty early on.

• 16:32Speaker 03

  The brothers wanted to name it Gill Brothers Candle Company. And when we Googled Gill Brothers, there are so many different companies named Gill Brothers. So I was like, OK, let's do something different. We had just started homeschooling that year, but all three of them had gone to the same French-American school for a number of years. And they had a French tutor who used to call them her little Bronchio. She said Bronchio. We said Bronchio, because you know, different accents in that way. And I said, well, you know, your tutor used to call you that. Let's add brothers to it. So that's where Frere Bronchio came from.

• 17:01Guy Raz?

  Because Bronchio or Bronchio is Gill, like official. So the teacher used to call them?

• 17:07Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 17:07Guy Raz?

  That's so cool. So the Gill Brothers, in French, Frere Bronchio. And now that's the name of the company?

• 17:14Speaker 03

  Yes. Yes.

• 17:14Guy Raz?

  All right. How did it start? How did this business begin? What were you doing in your life at the time when you started this business?

• 17:22Speaker 03

  It was our first year of homeschooling. So I was at home with all three of the boys. And they asked for more money for Nerf guns, PS4 games, toys, you name it. My husband and I were like, no, you get enough in line with the money. If you want more, you have to get a job or start a business. And I said it, you know, just to encourage them, but I didn't think they would actually want to do it. So they were like, Mom, let's start a business. I'm like, are you serious? I said, okay, so if you want to do this, let's do it and be successful at it. So we did a research project because it was all homeschool. I was like, this is going to be a lesson plan. And they they researched which kit businesses were the most successful. And those were bath bombs, soaps and candles. So we learned how to make all three types. They they know how to make hot processed soap, cold processed soap,

• 18:07Speaker 03

  all types of bath bombs, paraffin candles, soy candles, vegan candles, and we all use them as as chemistry experiments.

• 18:14Guy Raz?

  By the way, they just went online and just like looked at how to videos?

• 18:17Speaker 03

  Yep, we Googled it. I went to a candle making workshop as well and brought those, you know, what I learned home to them. And we learned how to make everything and people loved the candles the most. And they asked me also, Mom, which one do you like the best? I said candles because everyone loves candles.

• 18:33Guy Raz?

  Yeah. So how, all right, so you so they start experimenting and they come up with a line of candles, your boys. And this is back in, I think, 2017, right?

• 18:41Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 18:42Guy Raz?

  And at the time, your boys, what were their ages?

• 18:45Speaker 03

  They were 12, nine and seven, 12, nine and seven.

• 18:50Guy Raz?

  Oh, wow. Awesome. Okay. So they have this line of candles and where do they go? Where, I mean, they want to sell it. So how do they start to to put it out into the world and and sell them? Who who who are they selling them to initially?

• 19:04Speaker 03

  Baseball and football games. We literally have the candles in the back of my minivan. They went out, they let people smell and sniff them and they brought people back to the minivan and they bought candles.

• 19:16Guy Raz?

  Wow. Then how did they, what was the next step? I I think they actually decided to go to like craft fairs, right? And and and start to sell at craft fairs. What was the first craft fair they went to?

• 19:29Speaker 03

  It was an NPR All Crafts Considered Holiday Fair.

• 19:32Guy Raz?

  Okay, and I should explain this. NPR in Washington DC has a craft fair around Christmas time. And it's all local makers and it's called the All Crafts Considered Fair. Play on All Things Considered. And you can go there and sell your stuff and NPR employees and the public can come into the building and buy stuff. And so how do they find out about it?

• 19:55Speaker 03

  Someone sent me an email. Like someone knew what the boys were doing. And they sent me an email and was like, Selena, you should, you know, apply for the boys event. And I said, okay, I had heard of it, but I had never been a part of it. So I applied for them to event. And I also, I used to sell t-shirts at the time. So I had a booth, they had a booth. And I asked the coordinator, I said, make sure that their table is not close to mine. I trained them. I said, look, this is what we say to people. This is usually what I do when I sell t-shirts. Because the t-shirts was a side, like kind of a side hustle because I was full-time homeschooling.

• 20:25Guy Raz?

  Wow.

• 20:26Speaker 03

  And I said, this is how you sell to customers. You know, I taught them how to do an elevator pitch, everything. And I said, make sure they're away from me and they're with their dad. I'm not stepping in to take over. Because you know what moms do? We say, you know, I said, no, I want them to do it by themselves. I want them to feel independent and know they can do it. And they sold out.

• 20:44Guy Raz?

  They sold out at the NPR Crafts Fair?

• 20:46Speaker 03

  And they took orders. They took orders for future.

• 20:48Guy Raz?

  They took orders?

• 20:49Speaker 03

  When they ran out, they took orders.

• 20:51Guy Raz?

  Wow. And by the way, were they selling one-size candles or were they selling different sizes at the time?

• 20:56Speaker 03

  We, at the time, they were selling four ounce and two ounce.

• 20:59Guy Raz?

  Got it, okay. So completely sold out. So that's a good sign that they're on to something. What was the next step in expanding the business out?

• 21:08Speaker 03

  We joined the Made in DC program, which is a program for our local makers in DC and Maryland, Virginia area. And through the program, we were able to, one, meet other makers, find out about vending fairs. They had programs for us to attend, you know, to learn how to better our business. And through actually another program, we also joined Market 7, which is an initiative in Ward 7 in DC, which is a historically black district. And the founder of that program brought black makers together. And she would present them to retail stores to say, look, I have these black makers. Do you want to put them on your shelves? So through her, we ended up in a Made in DC shop. So that was the first retail location because it was like a black history fair, something like that. And she got a lot of us together, presented us, and they picked the ones they wanted to

• 21:54Speaker 03

  be there on that night. So from November to February, they got their first retail spot.

• 21:58Guy Raz?

  Wow, this is now February of 2018.

• 22:00Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 22:01Guy Raz?

  All right, now, bring us to today. You're now in in some retail, more retail locations, and I think you're you have a partnership with Macy's to sell your candles and your diffusers and things online. I have to assume that the boys are not hand making the candles anymore because they the capacity, right?

• 22:18Speaker 03

  No, they're not. No, they're not. I promised them, I promised them, what is it, in 2019? I said, guys, if you all want to extend your business, I said, just trust me. I said, get it to a point where you don't have to make it anymore. So less, by 2020, we made it happen. In July, we got a warehouse and we started hiring people for the warehouse. So now, at this point, they don't make, they make if if I say, guys, we need some extra production help. Can you come in? They'll come in and make, but for the most part, they just kind of manage to oversee. They go in, they they train, every now and then they train people if they need to. But they're not the primary manufacturers anymore.

• 22:54Guy Raz?

  And and tell me a little bit about your sales. I mean, I think you guys are close to or maybe more your revenues in the seven figures?

• 23:03Speaker 03

  Yes, yes, we we were very happy. They made seven figures in a pandemic.

• 23:08Guy Raz?

  Wow.

• 23:09Speaker 03

  We were amazed because if you ask Ryan, Ryan is the middle son. He was nine when we started. From day one, Ryan has had the most consistent attitude with, we're a million dollar company. Ryan is the the analyst. He says, OK, how many people at the event? So we should talk to 10% of them. So this is how many we're going to talk to. And because of that, we should have this much in sales. But that's the way Ryan thinks. He's very analytical, like he's a Lego head. Like, you should see all the Lego creations we have. He's an engineer, he's an architect, he wants to be an architect when he gets older. So Ryan was like, we can make a million. We need to make this much to make a million and this much a day. And this is what we need to do. And that's just who he is as a person. I was just kind of fearful of saying yes to because I was like, are we ready? And Ryan was like, yeah, we're ready. We're ready, mom, let's do it.

• 23:54Guy Raz?

  I read in your fellowship application that a part of what you do is not just make candles to make money, but there's a social side to your business. Can you tell me a little bit about it?

• 24:05Speaker 03

  Well, when we started, the boys wanted to definitely give money to someone in the community. And literally, every time we saw a homeless person, they were giving money. Either they were giving their money or asking me to give if any cash that I had. And DC is a very large homeless population. So we decided that very early on, we're gonna give, they wanted to give like, they wanted to give 50% at first. And I said, we can't do that because then you won't make any money. I said, you know, profit is after we pay our bills. So you won't make any money. Let's, let's give a amount that makes a significant difference, but also enough where you all can have a profit. So we decided on 10%. And we work with three foundations in DC that we donate to. And then we also sometimes, and you know, sometimes you just feel like giving, like every time we visit a different

• 24:49Speaker 03

  city, we'll give to a charity there. We just don't really publicize it. So we'll find a charity in that city and we'll donate to that charity. We donate to other charities around the city. I think we just don't publicize because we're like, you know, sometimes you just give to give. You don't give so someone can say, thank you. Just give to give.

• 25:04Guy Raz?

  Yeah. Tell me what your and the boys' vision for the business is. What, how do you, how do you, how do you think about it in five or 10 years from now?

• 25:13Speaker 03

  They want Fred Broncho stores. They want candle stores around the world, not even the nation, around the world. So that's what they want. They want them to be on the shelves of Target, of Norsha. Like, they, they have a very big vision. Right now, um, we're gonna be moving out of our warehouse. When we described, it was an experience of harassment, a little, some racial intimidation where we are. And so I was telling everyone about it on social media. And they were like, okay, how about you all buy a warehouse? Now, we talked about buying a warehouse, but we just talked about it. I said, you know what, we can buy a warehouse. We can do that. And then when I talked to the boys about it, and I saw another initiative about building a homeless center, I said, why don't, what do you guys think of a homeless

• 25:58Speaker 03

  center next to the warehouse that we build? And they were like, yeah, mom, let's go for it. Because in our mission, We've always had our mission that we wanted to help train homeless people and have them work for us, like have a transitional program. And we were actually, right before COVID hit, we were talking to the different organizations that we work with about bringing some of their employ-- you know, helping with the training programs. And then COVID hit, and that just went down the drain, you know. So I was like, OK, we build a warehouse, and then we can build a homeless center next to it. And then we can actually help people, not just help them find a home, but train them as well.

• 26:30Guy Raz?

  So the plan is to eventually get buy a warehouse?

• 26:33Speaker 03

  Yes, buy a warehouse and then build a homeless training center next to it.

• 26:38Guy Raz?

  So cool. If you and your boys win the competition, how will you use the $50,000 grant?

• 26:47Speaker 03

  Definitely towards the warehouse. Definitely to the warehouse and helping build that center. We're actually talking to different realtors this week about, you know, finding the land, getting more employees. We tend to employ families. And I tell you, everything we do is very organic. We employ mothers and daughters. We employ brothers. We employ brothers and sisters. And it's not on purpose. Either they come to us in pairs, or one starts working and says, you know what, can my brother come? So we have like, either someone's related, or a lot of the kids, like, we have a team crew in the evening, and all of them grew up with Colin playing football. So we have all these big football players making candles and root sprays in their fezzes.

• 27:31Guy Raz?

  That's Selena Gill, co-founder of Frere Brachio, along with her sons Collin, Ryan, and Austin. More stories of How I Built This: Fellow's Edition will be in your feed next Tuesday. To learn more about The Fellows or to get tickets to our How I Built This virtual summit, you can visit summit.npr.org. And to find out more about NPR's live events, go to nprpresents.org. This episode was produced by J.C. Howard, with music composed by Ramtin Arablouei. Thanks also to Janet Ujum Lee, Gianna Capadona, Bruce Grant, Farah Safari, Liz Metzger, Al Mannion, Joanna Palavsky, John Isabella, Jessica Goldstein, Nivea Grant, and Jeff

• 28:12Guy Raz?

  Rogers. I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to How I Built This: Fellow's Edition from NPR.