nJoy the Pitch - Pt. 2
Last week, we had the opportunity to pitch nJoy the Rush at the 12th Annual W.O.M.E.N. Conference at Morgan State University.
We were one of the ten selected to pitch our business. The winner of the pitch competition would receive $1,500, mentoring for a year and space in The Cube CoWork for three months. The conference was hosted by the Entrepreneurial Development and Assistance Center at Morgan State University. There were so many different breakout sessions and panels to help young women entrepreneurs, promote themselves and their business. It also focused on empowering women during national women’s month.
nJoy the Rush prepared for the pitch competition for weeks! We started off prepping by making a presentation to handout to the judges. “Rush” put some extensive work in making the presentation for the judges, and it turned out to be really good! Together, we made a script as a blue-print for how we would pitch nJoy the Rush! We wanted to be really conversational with the judges, so they could really grasp the personalities that made nJoy the Rush. We made sure to add a lot of personality, information, and spice in our pitch. We practiced every single day, mostly at nights, all the way up until it was time to pitch in front of the judges. “Joy” was a lot more nervous than “Rush” but luckily, the calm attitude “Rush” had helped the nerves “Joy” had, leave.
The pitch competition had two judges. One of the judges was Takia Ross, owner of Accessmatized.
Her business focuses on make-up artistry with a team of three ladies who will make your face, their canvas. Takia has won more than $60,000 in pitch competitions for her business. She has even formed her own conference that helps entrepreneurs learn how to pitch their business in competitions. Takia was so full of energy and life, that it made it really easy to pitch our business to her. The second judge was Quinn Conyers,
owner of The Purse Paparazzi. Her business offers women an assortment of unique, stylish, and edgy clutches for every occasion! The Purse Paparazzi is also the home to custom clutches for women in sororities, HBCUs, Breast Cancer Awareness and The Obama’s. Quinn has won over $50,000 in pitch competitions for her business. Together the two
judges had a lot of great advice for the ten-people selected to pitch their business.
At 10:00am, we received our pitch times. nJoy the Rush was number four in the competition and was scheduled to present at 11:25am. With an hour and 25 minutes left to spare what do you think we did?! We found a corner tucked away to practice and hit a few dance moves!
Luckily enough, there was a D.J. for the conference who was playing all the jams that helped ease our nerves even more. At 11:25am, it was finally time for nJoy the Rush to present! We walked in and did our best to impress the judges in four minutes. Takia and Quinn seem to love nJoy the Rush as they asked us some really thought provoking questions!
While we waited for our competitors to pitch, nJoy the Rush was able to venture around the rest of the conference and visit different vendor booths. We also attended the Black Girls Vote Political Panel that had some heavy hitters in the political world like Marilyn Mosby and Liz Copeland.
The panel was very informative and empowering for young women. It was a nice placeholder while we were waiting for the competition to wrap up. We even had the opportunity to connect with the other competitors to network and learn their businesses.
After hearing the empowering political panel, nJoy the Rush was anxious to hear who won the pitch competition! It even got to the point where we were waiting at the door!
At 3:00pm, we were told that the winners for the pitch competition was ready to be announced.
When we walked back into the room, we saw two huge checks, one for the student winner, and one for the women business owner. Both of our hearts dropped, and we were even more excited. After hearing a short but sweet pep talk from the judges, the winners were announced. Unfortunately, nJoy the Rush’s name wasn’t called, and we were saying congratulations to another lucky business owner. Even though nJoy the Rush didn’t win the pitch competition, we were very grateful for the opportunity to be one of the ten that were chosen. For our first pitch competition it was a great learning experience and opportunity to meet other business minded women in the Maryland area!
What’s next for nJoy the Rush you ask? Well to keep enjoying everyone’s rush and take on new business! We will also be looking for more pitch competitions to enter, so be on the lookout for us! Thanks for taking a step into our world today! See you next week!
