How The Female Quotient is Changing Media, with Jason Schulweis

What if building a media company was really about building a movement?

On this episode of Breaking Through the Mayhem, host Alena DeSalvo sits down with Jason Schulweis, Chief Commercial Officer at The Female Quotient, to talk about scaling a mission-driven brand without losing its soul. From running HBO digital campaigns at 22, to helping Morning Brew grow revenue 20x, to leading FQ’s evolution from the Girls’ Lounge to a global media and events powerhouse, Jason shares how purpose, content, and community can fuel real impact.

They cover:

• The evolution of FQ and its global growth
• Why organic social growth still works
• The role of men and allies in gender equality
• How brands can bridge B2B and B2C through shared values
• Lessons from partnerships with Ferragamo, Invisalign, and more

Plus, Jason gets personal on fatherhood, preparing the world for his daughter, and why Cannes and SXSW top his list of FQ memories.

Whether you’re a media leader, brand marketer, or just curious how mission-driven companies scale, this episode will leave you inspired.

TRANSCRIPT

Alena DeSalvo
Hello, and welcome to Sightly's Breaking Through the Mayhem podcast. I'm joined today by Jason Schulweis, who is the chief commercial officer at the Female Quotient. What's going on, Jason?

Jason Schulweis
I'm just really happy and, and grateful to be here with you today. Thank you, Alena

Alena DeSalvo
Of course. Happy to have you. So before we jump in, I have to ask if you are experiencing any jet lag. I feel like you're always jet setting for your role.

Jason Schulweis
Jet setting sounds very glamorous. But, yes, it is. It's definitely a lot of travel. But it's always going to, you know, amazing places where we have amazing people in our community. So, yes, I am generally always a little bit jet lagged, but always feeling very fulfilled and just, you know, happy with what I get to do.

And as a parent of two young children, I'm always tired.

Alena DeSalvo
Pepeutal jerlag.

Jason Schulweis
So the two, like, being different types of diet is, You know, semantics.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah. Yeah. Love that. So before we jump into all things Female Quotient, I usually open these with, you know, giving the bio of the person we’re interviewing, but I think it's actually more interesting to hear it from the horse's mouth.

So would love for you to speak to your career journey and your background that's led you to the Female Quotient

Jason Schulweis
Absolutely. So, you know, I graduated in 2008, which was a terrible time to graduate. And I got very lucky in that there was a really cool up and coming digital agency in New York called Deep Focus.

They were doing a lot of innovative things. And social mind you, that's when I like social was, you know, the Facebook ads and hyper targeting on Myspace. But they were hiring for, you know, an internship. And I jumped at it. I had no idea what I was doing. But I really fell in love very quickly with just with media and advertising, and it just, I felt that I got very lucky and, you know, not going to.

There's no two ways to really, you know, talk through that. And I picked it up very quickly. You know, there even at 22, 23, I got to run very large campaigns and programs for HBO and AMC and Microsoft. Bing. Some Este Lauder work. And so it was just fascinating to me.

Alena DeSalvo
What was the big HBO show at the time? What were you promoting?

Jason Schulweis
Well, there were a few really big ones there. The few that like, we actually got kind of written up from like an awards perspective. There was a big one for True Blood. For Eastbound and Down.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah. Love that.

Jason Schulweis
Flight of the Conchords.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
We did a lot for, like, HBO boxing, too. But, those other ones were really cool, and big and allowed us to do some really innovative work.

Alena DeSalvo
Awesome. Makes me nostalgic hearing all those show names.

Jason Schulweis
Yeah. I feel like I need to go back and rewatch, yeah, watch a lot of those, but it's so funny. A lot of, like, the innovation at the time was like synced rich media units that would, like, interact on a page, right?

You know, fortunately, not touching that at the moment, but. Yeah, but it was great. And it's, it's kind of interesting because a lot of the work that we did was partnering with a lot of really great publishers and media partners, and, and I, I really started to gravitate to that space.

Two of the biggest partners that we worked with were Yahoo! and Thrillist. My next two stops in my career were actually Yahoo! and Thrillist. And I got to know the Yahoo! team just from, you know, all the meetings that we had and all the media and content that we were running on the site. And I, you know, it's a very kind of natural switch to go from, I think, the agency side doing media planning, to the publisher side, doing account management.

And so that was kind of like the first jump and my first foray into, like, the sales and revenue side or the dark side. And, I loved it. You know, I got to work on more big accounts. And from there, because I had the background with deep focus, I started hosting a lot of these, like, social media roundtables and education sessions for a lot of the Yahoo! employees.

Just like, what are big brands doing? What are the opportunities? Because at the time, Yahoo! thought social was like Yahoo!! Answers, Yahoo! groups and, you know, Yahoo! mail.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
But they weren't really understanding that. Like, we have this treasure trove of content that when, you know, kind of like utilized on these social platforms could create a lot of engagement, a lot of conversation.

And it's, again, very fortuitous that around the same time Yahoo! bought a company called Citizen Sports, which was doing a lot in the mobile and social space, they created the first Yahoo! social solutions team, and I was the first internal hire onto that team. And that was fascinating. And I loved it. And it allowed me to start to put together some really big ideas and packages.

And I loved putting together big ideas and packages and so moved over to more of, like, the integrated marketing side there. That's ultimately what I did at Thrillist as well, which was a lot of fun because, you know, again, at that time I was going out a lot. And, you know what Thrillist was talking about, like the best places to eat and drink.

That was a that was actually very useful for, you know -

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
For, for me as a human.

Alena DeSalvo
Back in my agency days, Thrillist always had the best events. For that reason, it was not surprising.

Jason Schulweis
Yeah. And I mean, you know, we had Hotel Thrillist and Taco Knock Out and Best Day of Your Life. And it was like it was really cool because those were just really amazing.

Ben, the CEO and founder or co-founder of Thrillist would always say that those were like physical branded content, like opportunities.

Alena DeSalvo
Right.

Jason Schulweis
Those and, like, we would partner with, like, Giant Spoon and GE to create like a moon boot in celebration of the 45th anniversary of the moon landing. Or like a scientifically engineered hot sauce.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
And so there were different ways to, like, bring brands to life. And I thought that was always really fascinating. Around that time, I fell in love with going to live music, which got kind of like Live Nation as a real workplace opportunity and on my radar, applying to an integrated marketing role there.

I was able to get it. And that was also so cool because it was a way to, you know, have my personal passions also be what I love to do professionally. I was there for two and a half years. And, you know, at that point I had been doing integrated marketing a long time, and just a very big marketing and industry nerd.

Just, I love understanding, like how things work, how leadership is making decisions, a lot of those sorts of things. And there was this company that was in the background where, you know, it was talked about at Yahoo!! We worked with them at Thrillist. We worked with them at Live Nation. Media link. And I realized, like, you know, I, I wasn't in at a place in my life where I wanted to go get a secondary degree or master's and, you know, what better way to get a really good understanding of the industry than to, you know, to try to work with a company that works with every single, you know, company in the space, and get a, you know, peek under the hood at how these companies work.

And I was able to work hand in hand with seeing those CEOs and CROS and really help them run and grow their businesses. You know, part of the responsibility there is always, you know, again, kind of like keeping your ear to the ground and understanding what's new and happening.

Newsletters were a very big thing or burgeoning thing like at that time.

Alena DeSalvo
It's crazy to think about now. Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
It's just crazy to think about now. And so Morning Brew got put on my radar, I started subscribing, I thought it was great. Turns out one of my very good friends, who we didn't overlap with at Michigan, but he also went to Michigan.

His name is Phil Shermer. He and I were catching up. He knew the founders from Michigan. And so there's a big kind of like, you know, in Michigan alum you know, kind of like a tradition or not really a tradition, but rather just, a thread, there. And he introduced me to Alex Lieberman, who was a CEO and co-founder of Morning Brew.

We went out for a drink. And there was an immediate connection, and he kind of explained that, you know, they were hiring a head of brand partnerships. You know, salesperson, head of sales.

Alena DeSalvo
Mhm.

Jason Schulweis
And I had never done field sales at that time, but by then I had held just about every single role inside of a revenue organization. And I had a really good network. And I could sell. And, you know, I kind of pitched myself after the fact saying, look, you know, you might be looking for, you know, a salesperson, which would be a great hire for right then. But, you know, this company is a rocket ship. We're gonna start growing exponentially.

The revenue organization is going to look fundamentally entirely different in a few months.

Alena DeSalvo
Right.

Jason Schulweis
And so you know, what you would get with me is someone who has seen what the kind of outcome and multiple outcomes life actually should look like and can help get there. And someone who can speak a lot of these different roles and languages from a professional empathy standpoint, because I've done those things.

Alena DeSalvo
Well that makes sense too right? Because I'm sure they were going from a place of wanting to build their subscriber list to maybe figuring out what partnerships as a role looked like. So you were kind of forward thinking in that sense.

Jason Schulweis
Exactly. And it was, you know, it was a very interesting thing to where it was like, you know, we also need to not just sell newsletters.

We need to take a look at what we are selling and what you know. It was content. It wasn't newsletters. It wasn't just ad placements. It was like, you know, sponsored content and branded content and just even that immediate, you know, branding shift for what we were selling, like, opened up a world of, you know, advertising dollars for us.

Alena DeSalvo
Right.

Jason Schulweis
And so that was, just a really incredible three and a half years where, you know, we grew revenue like 20 x. In those three and a half years, it grew headcount to about 20 acts as well. You know, through the sell of the company to Business Insider and Axel Springer and, just such an amazing experience.

And what you see today is a lot of what we had started to build, where it's so truly a multimedia company that does events, social content, and a ton of video works with creators. Yes, they're still, you know, a great newsletter business. But it looks like a, you know, a real modern media company, right? So after that, I worked at Mindbody Green for a year, as CRO which was such an amazing learning experience to, you know, be at a company that was, yes, doing like media and content, but also had CPG products and had a commerce offering and had an education offering.

And so it was just for me, it's such a cool way to better understand the different ways that brands can engage with a consumer and the different things that, you know, ultimately, a consumer can buy from a brand. Fast forward a year. So about like 15, 16 months ago, as I, as that was winding down, I started talking to the Female Quotient Team.

And, you know, I have known them, actually, for a long time. Because when I was at Media Link, we were always at the same events.

Alena DeSalvo
Right.

Jason Schulweis
And, you know, I would always make sure to stop by what was the Girls Lounge, then was the Equality Lounge and is now the FQ Lounge. And it always just felt more like home to me in terms of the people that went there.

The types of conversations that were happening, the the level of the depth, really, of relationships that you were able to create and cultivate and the types of agreeable things that people were talking about on stage. Like it didn't sound like, you know, multiple people on a panel competing for airtime and trying to pitch their products. And I just thought that was so amazing that like that, that is the vibe and the energy and environment that this company has built.

And the, you know, the team Talia and Shelley are just two of the most impressive people like I know, period. And so, you know, I've gotten to know them over the years, and Shelley is involved with UJA and, you know, I got to talk to Talia a bunch. And, you know, over the years, I would just offer my time and advice as they started to initially think about how to turn FQ into a media company.

Because I had done that and they saw a lot of similarities with, like, Morning Brew and whatever you could be. And so sorry for that little roundabout way to get back to where we are.

Alena DeSalvo
It helps contextualize it.

Jason Schulweis
Yeah. When, so when my stint at Mind Body Green was winding down, I was talking to you about, you know, media and those sorts of things.

And maybe I could come on as a consultant. And then that quickly led to, like, you know what? What would this look like to just come on and do this full time? And so like from a professional standpoint, it was such a no brainer because of the degree to which I admired the leadership in the company.

You know, I understood what the company was doing and where they wanted to go again because I, you know, I've kind of like done that and seen that. And then on a personal side, you know, my daughter is four. My son is two. But when, you know, when my daughter was born, you know, I was still at Morning Brew, but I think a seed was planted in that moment in my brain.

Because her, her, her birth, her existence was like, the single most, like, transformative moment of my life. Like, you could feel like your whole sense of being changed, your heart changed like everything changed.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
Yeah. At that moment. And it's like, oh, I like I live for you. You know. And so I feel like that seed just kept growing and growing and growing and so like when the opportunity to actually like work at FQ and, you know, one of the things that I always kind of come back to is like, you know, when you're your first child or when any child, you know, any of your children are born,

you feel like as a parent it's your job and responsibility to, you know, prepare them for the world and what FQ is doing. And now, like, what I'm able to help do at FQ is actually prepare the world for her. And that is like such an I make it very emotional talking about it, but it's like that is like such a true calling.

You know, for, for me and, you know, I think it's like, it's just a very, like, meaningful and impactful opportunity. You know, it's really like, do something and help change the world for the better. And it's, you know, Shelley always says when purpose meets passion, you're unstoppable. And I feel like that's like, you know, where I'm where I'm at now.

Alena DeSalvo
Right. And it's really sort of your career evolution meeting you in your personal life. Right. And kind of fitting too. And I believe your wife works in media also. So I feel like there's a lot of kind of personal touch for all for you.

Jason Schulweis
Yes, yes, we have, we have very romantic conversations about CPMs.

Alena DeSalvo
Love that. Okay. So I have seen on LinkedIn that the Female Quotient is celebrating the ten year anniversary.

Jason Schulweis
Yes.

Alena DeSalvo
And you've been there for a year and a half. So kind of curious if you can look back on, you know, before you joined the team, what that evolution has looked like today and then what that evolution has looked like since you joined the team? Because I know you were saying they kind of the Female Quotient comes from this activation background. That's what you guys are known for, right? Is your FQ Lounges But you really joined the team to help round it out into a holistic media company. So kind of curious what that's been like. And then -

Jason Schulweis
Yeah

Alena DeSalvo
What will the next ten years look like?

Jason Schulweis
Ten years.

Alena DeSalvo
Gotta be right.

Jason Schulweis
I wish I had a crystal ball that could tell me ten years into the future. So, the company to your point was really started as a physical space. You know, for, you know, started really for women to have a safe, warm, welcoming, positive of, space and experience at, you know, a lot of these events and conferences that were so overwhelmingly male.

Alena DeSalvo
Mhm.

Jason Schulweis
And, you know, very fortunately that has really, you know, grown to be, you know, to include men and advocates and allies and conscious leaders and, it's a very special environment still. And so it's awesome that, that, that is a through line that has stayed, when the pandemic hit the, you know, FQ very quickly, I think was one of the really the first event for first to companies to pivot to virtual events.

And I believe over Covid, FQ ran around 800 virtual events.

Alena DeSalvo
Wow.

Jason Schulweis
And because, you know, everyone wanted the connection and the community to stay. And so we were able to really, you know, remain consistent. You know, in our mission and what, you know, how people really connect with us, what ended up happening also was that there was, you know, a huge spike in the growth of our digital community.

You know, largely Instagram and LinkedIn. And those are still our two largest communities. Coming out of the pandemic, once, you know, the event piece came back, the events and, you know, the digital content that we like, got in the habit of creating and were continuing to create was very much like a one plus one equals three equation.

Because not only were we doing these events, we were, you know, creating tons and tons of content. I'm sure you, you know, you see, and you follow like we, we’re very prolific, you know, content creators. And we also go live stream all of our panels. We have we're creating content on site. And so there's like this middle bucket of like a Venn diagram, which is like experiential content, which allows us to like take all the the magic and conversation that's happening in the lounges and push that out to our many millions of, you know, followers and our community around the world.

Over the course of the year of 2024. We went from about 2 million followers across all of our socials to over 6 million.

Alena DeSalvo
Wow.

Jason Schulweis
And so that was a huge exponential, you know, kind of like point in time of growth where that is largely continuing. And it was a signal also to us that, you know, the content that we're creating is really good.

We're going to continue to do that. The live streams get a ton of views and a ton of engagement. I think, you know, depending on what the platform is, the engagement on our content is like 5 to 7 times the industry average. And so that has allowed us like, experiences, organic growth where we have not had to turn on any paid growth mechanisms.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah

Jason Schulweis
So that's a, I think a very rare, you know, sort of thing to be able to say. We are going to continue, you know, to create a lot of content. And I think the biggest evolution, you know, to kind of like get back specifically to your question is that we have been doing content and media actually for some time.

But we hadn't been really talking about those things as content and media products. And so, you know, there was a very immediate, quick, low hanging fruit sort of opportunity when I first joined is to say, like, let's look at a lot of these packages that we've been partnering with, you know, brands on with the lounges that included the live stream that included these, like LinkedIn quote cards, that included executive interviews that, like all of these things, like they should still be part of the package, but we need to be talking about those things as valuable in and of their own.

Right. And as media and content products.

Alena DeSalvo
Right.

Jason Schulweis
And so that gave us, I think, a really good, you know, stepping stone, you know, kind of like a step to say we do content and media.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
You know, we are creating more original content. We've got, you know, a series and format that everyone really knows us for. That's called Take it To The Streets where, you know, we're we're out and about with an FQ microphone asking like, really important questions tied to women's health or leadership and careers and business and, you know, when people see the FQ microphone that everyone kind of flocks also to us, we generally don't have to go ask people.

It's very recognizable. And again, you know, with over 4 million followers on Instagram, there is a big consumer push. And, you know, outside of everything that we do in the, you know, industry conference circuit. And so what you'll see from us very soon is more content and events. We have a content studio now at every single event.

We're creating a ton of the actual FQ originals with Shelley, with a lot of our, like, celebrity and talent friends and, so you'll see more and more media and content from us. And the initial response has been just really incredible.

Alena DeSalvo
That's awesome. I'm seeing the name FQ leaders come up a lot. Can you speak on that?

Jason Schulweis
Yes. We just had a really big push around that. And so that, if you don't already follow FQ leaders on Instagram, please do.

Alena DeSalvo
I do. Don't worry.

Jason Schulweis
But it was, you know, it's something that we really wanted to do because the idea of leaders in leadership is so important to us. And that's been part of our DNA since day one.

You know, our space is a space, both a physical space and a digital space for leaders to really come and turn, you know, their insights, their everything into action and impact. And, you know, there's just a huge opportunity to continue to focus on, you know, a lot of the leaders who have been with us for ten years, but also what does the next generation of leadership look like?

Alena DeSalvo
Right.

Jason Schulweis
You know, for, for, you know, for us and for the over 30 industries that we're in. And so, you know, there is enough there both from an audience quantity perspective and a content perspective. To kind of carve out that as something that we want to continue to like, really focus on, and invest in.

Alena DeSalvo
Right. Yeah. So when you speak about leadership at the Female Quotient you can't not talk about Shelley. So I'm just curious, like, you know, a lot of us see her in the public persona, but I'd love to hear about sort of what her role is like from, you know, from the inside and what it's like to work with her.

Jason Schulweis
It's amazing to work with her. And it's amazing, you know, to work for her. She is so very and genuinely inspirational. She has more energy than anyone else on earth. You know, she is an operator. She has built companies and sold companies. She quite literally pioneered online research. And, you know, so her, her vision and her ability to will things into existence is, quite literally unlike anything I've ever seen in my life.

Like the fact that, you know, we have such a deep relationship with F1 Academy and that they branded one of their cars, you know, in rose gold.

Alena DeSalvo
So cool.

Jason Schulweis
FQ branding was raced. You know, in the Netherlands last year it was featured on the F1 Academy Series on Netflix and by the way, will also be, parked out front of the Martinez in Cannes.

Alena DeSalvo
Oh, I cannot wait.

Jason Schulweis
You know, she has these ideas and is just able to make it happen. And it's like, it's just very remarkable.

Alena DeSalvo
That's awesome. So I, I do want to address something that I feel like we've talked about before, and I'm sure it comes up a lot for you and your role, and that is that people are often surprised that men can be, you know, involved in the emotion or the FQ

And I wanted to sort of dig into what that's like for you in terms of your role in the company. Your role as an ally and kind of stepping into that space because you were speaking about your media experience, but this is a very unique role in that way,

Jason Schulweis
For sure. You know, back in the day, when I first started going to, you know, the lounges there, there were men there, but there weren't a ton of men. And, you know, and I would tell people where I was going they’d be, like, I didn't even know that men, you know, could -

Alena DeSalvo
Mhm.

Jason Schulweis
come into, you know, into space. And I was like, yes, you know, they can.

Alena DeSalvo
Right. Right. This wasn't made to be exclusive.

Jason Schulweis
Yeah. And it's like, you know, it was always really. Well, yes, it was originally designed for, you know, for women to have a place to, you know, to go and to meet other women in those industries.

You know, it's it's also really important that a lot of the conversations that, you know, were happening there need to be, you know, kind of like transcend and ensure that they don't happen in a silo or an echo chamber, and that men and conscious leaders, any leaders are participating and active, you know, advocates and participants and allies, so that change can happen.

Alena DeSalvo
Mhm.

Jason Schulweis
But, you know, it's very similar to when, you know, I had started going to the lounge. When I took the job, I had, you know, I had some people be like, wait, what? But you're, you know, you're a man. I'd be like, yes.

Alena DeSalvo
Right.

Jason Schulweis
And that's okay. You know, it's like. And I would kind of share it. It's like, you know, here's what I've seen, you know, over time and more men are coming in, more men are on some panels as well. And, you know, we have fun with it too, where, you know, a lot of the times we have, like, our signature mantle, where, you know, men can also talk about, like, the women who have helped, you know, mentor them and manage them and the leadership lessons they learn from the women in their lives.

And, you know, at Cannes last year, we also, you know, asked some men questions that men don't normally get asked and only women get asked. You know, and so there are, there are ways in which, you know, we can incorporate men both from you know, very kind of like real topic and, and conversation perspective, but also, you know, in a, in a way that's also fun.

I think also a lot of the men that come in now really do understand the value that they can bring in the responsibility that they have to to make all of our industries better and to really contribute to, you know, what the future needs to be.

Alena DeSalvo
Right, and that's where I want to give Sightly a shout out and Adam Katz, a shout out. We were running the data for International Women's Day, and we knew we had a lot of women in leadership at Sightly, but it's 59% of our leadership team, which I know is well above the industry average.

And it really is because Adam is so vocal and it's something that's so important to him. So it's cool to see it in practice. I think because Sightly is a startup it's easier to kind of manage things like that. And I think that's where companies like The Female Quotient come in, is making sure that prioritizing that can scale

Jason Schulweis
100% and big, you know, big kudos to you all and to Adam and, it's, you know, it's great to it's great to see and, you know, hopefully more, more companies follow suit.

Alena DeSalvo
100%. Another thing that comes to mind, sort of the connection point with how Sightly practices that value is that we very much kind of look at how the contextual space can benefit from brand values. I think an often overlooked benefit of the nuance of contextual is making sure, you know, underrepresented, creators can monetize on what they're doing online.

We've put a lot of work into making sure that brands who care about uplifting women's voices can also have that translate to their contextual approaches. And I feel like there's a lot of nuance. And what you've been doing with Female Quotient in the media space, specifically, not just speaking to women in sort of their business role, but like speaking to them holistically.

So what does that look like in terms of like, the evolution of it, you know, as a media company, but also like the partnership that you're gravitating toward?

Jason Schulweis
Yeah. So I think there are two really interesting things in there. And I'll get to the partnership set in a second. But, you know, even when you talk about the, you know, looking at people holistically, and you know, the there is a, you know, a B2B and B2C component from a partnership perspective that, you know, again, I'll get to you, but, you know, or I guess that's a this actually segways really nicely into it.

You know, a really good example of that is that we have been talking a lot over, you know, the last few years, I mean, really for the last ten years, but like, it has significantly picked up in the last, you know, year or two around health. And even more specifically, you know Shelley who is the ultimate lead by example person.

You know, she talks about health and her personal journey. Like, especially with menopause where, you know, she's now one of the leading voices on LinkedIn for a lot of topics, a lot of health topics that impact women. And our stance is that women's health is health. You know, our stance is that we need to keep talking about these things so that any stigma around talking about those things goes away.

And we're very happy to, of course, like again, lead by example from a corporate perspective because, you know, we follow Shelley's lead. And so that has been a really incredible kind of piece and Shelly’s stance there too. Like it's part of who she is and part of who you are doesn't you know, it's not we're not in Severance.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
You know it's like you're not a different person. It's like you are the same person and your health things, your family obligations, all of that stuff is with you. Whether you're at home or whether you're at work. And so we need to be talking about that. Like even in work, traditional work environments, like a LinkedIn or like a Cannes Lions like we need to be talking about those things in those places.

And so, you know, we realized very quickly over the last, like, you know, one two years that there are in addition to the, you know, the B2B, you know, kind of like pitch that we were best known for. And we still obviously do that really well, given the amount of CEOs and CMO, those that speak and attend our spaces.

But they're also people, too, you know, and our audience generally skews, you know, between 25 and 55, largely female, high consideration, you know, affluent, successful, aspirational, the subset that is extremely, kind of like, attractive to advertisers and finance. You know, there's a huge horizontal transfer of wealth that Shelley has written in Forbes about what she called the feminization of wealth areas.

You know, a lot of opportunity in the kind of pharma and health healthcare space in the, you know, luxury retail and apparel space. You know, especially like if you think about, you know, beauty apparel and, and luxury, this idea of powerful business women and confidence being not just, you know, both how you feel and how you look and you know, we have content and styling stations and, you know, Ferragamo is a big partner of ours, and they've been able to dress Shelley for a lot of, you know, our really big events.

And so we've seen now a big shift in the business where there are these opportunities with, you know, a lot of more B2C, brands and marketing budgets. That has been hugely successful for us.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah, that totally makes sense. I even think about when I've been to your lounge and I see people on the panel like what they wear or how they're the vibe they're giving off as part of their brand. It's like it's holistic. You can't just define it by their role or their title

Jason Schulweis
100%. And, you know, it's it's I think absolutely. And like that's why we have a confidence styling session. That's like why we partner with a brand like Invisalign to which their whole thing is around. Like your smile is really just this, you know, outward expression of confidence as well.

And so there are these really natural ties to how, you know, like the B2C in you.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
Relates to B2B, you know, it's like this again, it's like it's two sides of the same person.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah. And I also think that's so nice because historically those things have been minimized when it comes to women. And like in those spaces is, you know, you're supposed to and there's nothing wrong with wearing the power suit or whatever, but there's sort of these stereotypes of what you needed to do to be a woman in those spaces.

Jason Schulweis
I mean, I absolutely it's, you know, we see that as, like, those are all again, it's about confidence. It's about how you feel, how you want to show up, you know, and they're, you know, we we just, we make sure that it's an environment, which it's, it's not calling, you know, attention to like, oh, what are you wearing?

Or, you know, where those things are. It's like, it's about your substance and you know what you've done and what you can say and you know, all those sorts of things.

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah, 100%. So I think we have time for one more question.

Jason Schulweis
Okay.

Alena DeSalvo
I know we've gotten on some serious topics, so I wanted to end on a fun one. Will bring things full circle with your jet lag or perpetual jet lag.

Jason Schulweis
Okay.

Alena DeSalvo
So you've gotten to go to all kinds of cool activations all over the world in your role. So, I was just curious, selfishly, what your favorite was. And it doesn't necessarily need to be an entire activation if it could be like a tidbit or a memory. I just wanted to end on sort of like, a fun experience. And in your time at the Female Quotient.

Jason Schulweis
For sure. The FQ Lounge in Cannes is, for lack of a better word, just epic and perfect. I mean, it's like it's at the top of the margin as it's so beautifully designed. Like, the content is great, but also like your, you know, you're, you're overlooking, you know, the French Riviera and it's, it's just like a very, just incredible experience.

And so I never really understood why people were like, oh, yeah, I have to go to Cannes, or it's like just, you know, let's take a step back and realize that, like, we're very fortunate that, you know, we get to do that. It's, you know, literally one of the most beautiful places on earth.

Alena DeSalvo
Right.

Jason Schulweis
So like, you know, but whereas that is always beautiful and an amazing experience tied to, like, my own personal kind of journey at FQ you were probably South by (Southwest) 2024, which was like my second day at FQ.

Alena DeSalvo
Oh, wow.

Jason Schulweis
And so it was very cool.

Alena DeSalvo
Threw you into it.

Jason Schulweis
Well, yeah. But it's you know, I had always been -

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
I've like, run a media company as before, but I had never been like, you know, on the inside at, you know, at an FQ Lounge and just seeing how everyone worked together and hearing people's feedback and just so much different light about what the Lounge means to them and what they're learning and the connections that they're making.

And like, that was just, such an immediate, like affirmation of that big career decision that I had made or was like, oh, yeah, no shit. Like, this is -

Alena DeSalvo
Yeah.

Jason Schulweis
This is absolutely where I am supposed to be. And I cannot wait for everything that is to come.

Alena DeSalvo
I love that answer. Jason this was an awesome, awesome episode. I really appreciate everything you're doing in this space and making the time to chat with us today.

Jason Schulweis
Thanks so much, Alena, You too.