Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Appearances
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Yeah.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Yeah. I feel like everybody's in such a hurry to be successful, right? To like get there, to make these like big things. When you're bootstrapped, you actually can't. You have to be very slow. You have to be very responsible. Every single opportunity that comes across your plate, you need to make sure that it's profitable.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And so bootstrapping was an incredible opportunity for me and my husband, Jeremy, who you know. Jeremy, yeah. To really be slow and thoughtful with our growth. And I'm not going to call all of our decisions were very strategic because sometimes we had to say yes to certain opportunities because they were the most financially practical. And so, yeah, so the first opportunity was Nordstrom Kids.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Were we a kids brand? No. No. But it was Nordstrom Kids and we made it out of the apartment. I had a LTL, which means less than truckload truck, come up to the apartment and I'm loading these cartons out, processing orders. How many? How many was that first order? I think it was like 20, 25 cartons, but it was a $13,000 order. Huge at the time. Manufactured out of my living room.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
But still just doing hair ties. More hair accessories at this point. Elastics, you know, we're really getting into hair accessories. And I remember reaching out to a buyer on LinkedIn from Ulta and just saying, you know, I've got these really interesting new hair accessories. I don't know if you'd give us a chance. And I sent her the catalog and
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And she responded and she was like, you know, there's some interesting pieces here. Are you going to be at Cosmoprof next month or something? Which is like an expo in the beauty industry. I literally had to go Google what is Cosmoprof. Because I had no idea. It was way too expensive. It was like $20,000 for a booth or something like that. And I was like, I can't do that.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And I was like, how much is a plane ticket? And I was like, you know, we're not showing in Cosmoprof, but I would love to take you out to lunch. There's a great Mexican restaurant right outside. I'd be happy to like set up a whole thing. And she said yes. She said yes. And so then...
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
tula was really young at this point and she was sick that's your daughter yeah yeah tula um and i was like jeremy you have to go and so my husband went did the whole meeting she was so impressed so excited she gave us one shelf on an end cap in a small amount of stores and it did so well that she asked us to pitch for a two-foot space and then it was like i remember um
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
one buyer in particular and she was like you know these hair ties are so great for my hair and I knew that they were better for your hair that was part of the sales pitch what else can you be doing in hair and I thought about it I was like okay what if I created a basically a new category is hair care as a lifestyle it's the pillowcase you sleep on it's the tools you use in your hair it's pretty much everything that wasn't shampoo and conditioner and
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
It is a household staple because my daughter has long hair. My husband has very curly hair. And we all love the spa headband. But yeah, and so it's everything that interacts with your hair from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And we just kept thinking about all these other things and how can we be creating a better experience for the customer for products that they were kind of already using. But let's make better versions of it. It wasn't rocket science. It wasn't rocket science. It was just like you. It was thoughtful. Yeah.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Yeah, I think it's really interesting as founders because there really is, I think that there are three stages. There's founder stage where you are in this like very scrappy, like you need to do every role so that you know who to hire. Right. And it's so important. Like, how do you want this done? Can that person really execute, you know, the way that you're envisioning it?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And then you're able to like create the job description and not through chat GPT. It's like, this is how I want the job done.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And then hopefully they know how to do the job even better. You know, that's the goal. And then there's the entrepreneur stage where then you're in build. You're in build mode. And that's kind of like the post Nordstrom experience, Nordstrom kids experience where then I'm like, OK, all my bills are paid. What's next? Now it's not just an idea anymore. Like what's the next product?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
What's the next retailer? How do we get to this next place? And that was a really interesting phase for me because that is when I had my daughter. What year was that? So that would have been like 2014. Wow. I can't believe you have a 10-year-old. It's so crazy. That is wild. And she's the best. She's also a mini entrepreneur, too. Oh, okay. Awesome.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
But yeah, and that was actually really tricky for me, you know, being four years into the business. And that was this entrepreneurial stage where you have to get more strategic and you're doing a lot of hiring and trying to figure out, like... business infrastructure. I've got the private label arm of my business that is slowly dwindling away because people are wanting the brand more.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
The brand is being celebrated. And then I had my daughter. I thought everything was going to be just so easy. I would continue to just go on as my normal self and breastfeed at the office and do all of these things. And I had a real reality check. And I had some really intense postpartum anxiety. And my husband really had to step in. And this is when, you know, we were really growing quickly.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And it was such a crippling growth period for me. It was so hard. I felt like I wasn't good at anything. And I have one child. So I can only speak for my experience with my one daughter. But I... I think it wasn't until seven, until she was seven years old, where I was like, I'm okay.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
I think it was her ability to really, because, you know, when they're infants, the way they communicate is crying. And I think I had a lot of stuff that came up, and I was like, the crying really hurt my heart. It just was so hard for me to hear her cry.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And I wanted to be there for her, but I had this business that's growing rapidly, and I feel like I'm letting the business down if I'm not there every day.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
No, no. Kitch is still bootstrapped today. You're kidding me. No, I'm not.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
We were profitable year one. I mean, that's what happens when you don't hire a graphic designer.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Yeah, she just she was so she was such a great communicator. And I really felt like it was more than just like an energetic bond. It was this real at seven. She was like just so wildly smart and capable of communicating what she wanted and needed. And the whole dynamic, it made me feel like I was doing a good job. So what's interesting, though, I'm dyslexic. I didn't know that.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
It was one of those things where it ended up being a superpower of mine because failing at such a young age at something so foundational that it gave me this ability to not be so scared of failure. But then also knowing that I have this and what I like to call sensible optimism. I can get through this. I can get through it.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And when I had her, even though I was in such a dark place, I continued to have that sensible optimism. I know I can get through this. This is dark. This is heavy. I will come out stronger. And, you know, I did a lot of like Byron Katie's work and again, like digging deep in my toolbox of meditation and all these different things. But just like everybody talks about, this was a minor stone.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
It was so important for me. It taught me how to hold boundaries with people. And, you know, when I started Kitch, I was 25 years old. I was very immature. I was very—I did not know how to manage people. I did not know how to manage, you know, being a parent. And when she turned seven, I had done so much work around that. I, like, woke up one day and I was like, ugh. I've arrived.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
I know what I'm doing. I know I'm not perfect, but I know where I'm going.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Well, she really wanted to buy something around the holidays last year. And I said, you know what, Tula, you have to come up with a business idea of something that you can make and sell. I'll give you a loan for all the supplies that you need. I'll work with you. We'll make a little plan of what the product will be. How are you going to sell it? How much are you going to sell it for?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And I'll work with you on this. And she came up with this great idea to make candy kebabs for for Halloween and so she bought all these different kinds of candies and like peeps and like all this stuff and she stuck them on a kebab stick and wrapped them up and she took a basket and went out on Larchmont Boulevard and she was like really meek and quiet she's like candy kebabs. She was so little.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And so then I was like, hey, if you really want to sell these, you got to talk loud. You need to stand in the middle of the street and you need to tell people why they need these candy kebabs. And it was the best. It was one of the best things that we've ever done as parents. And now she'll be like, I want something. I'm going to go make something. So now she doesn't have to take loans anymore.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
She has a savings account. She goes and every time she She wants something, she goes and she'll think of a new idea and go sell it out on Larchmont. But we always tell her she has to give some of it to charity. I wish it was self-initiated that she has to give something to charity, but we have her pick a charity that she wants to donate a portion of all of her sales as a mitzvah.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And so when the L.A. fires happened, she was like, Mom, I have a great idea. We have a lemon tree. And she's like, I'm going to pick all these lemons, and I'm going to sell the lemons on Larchmont and just donate 100% of it to the firefighters. She made $800 today. Oh, my gosh. For the L.A. firefighters. Wow. Everybody was so giving. She was just so proud of herself. I'm proud of her.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
I was writing journal entries from the future as if they were already happening. There's ones where I'm like, you know, we're the fastest growing brand at Target. We weren't in Target yet. And we just found out this last fall that we were a top 25 fastest growing brand in all of beauty.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
The people pleasing in my interpersonal life was complicated. I mean, I think that even with my daughter, I didn't set boundaries with her because I wanted her to like me. And with employees, you know, pre having kids, I had a hard time, you know, giving good feedback because I wanted them to like me, you know, and that is more of where the people pleaser aspect was not healthy.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And so then when I broke that down and I channeled it into something that was more healthy. appropriate in like, you know, of service to a customer and, you know, giving great customer service for the brand to our retail partners in all these different ways. But learning how to have healthy boundaries, I think, you know, that was that was a big shift for me.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Yeah. So I once read, which is really fascinating and something to keep in the back of your mind, that if the founder becomes the CEO and the business continues to grow, what they were best at... starts to become like their most difficult area of the business. I'm writing it down. But if you have the CEO title, you have to keep running the business.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And so you're now part time in the area that you were the best at at one point. And so I need to make sure that I have the strongest product developers and I had to release control over it, too. You're better at this than me. I will let you do that. You get my vision.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Is there any insight you want to share? I mean, there's so many mistakes that I made. The leadership aspect, I wish I would have educated myself a little bit more on that earlier because I think I read a lot of management books, but they were so old school and And I think I was a little immature about this, like, OK, I read a management book. I know how to do it.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
You know, and it was like I would do like a pretty immediate about face and I'd be like, let's do this. You know, we're implementing all of these new strategies right away. And I think there's real power in having endorsements from your team. And, you know, I have these ideas. I would love to get your feedback from leadership teams specifically. I would love to get your feedback on these.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
How do you think we can improve these ideas? And I think that that is something that we do now. And it's extremely beneficial learning how to run highly effective meetings. Some mistakes that I've made. It doesn't have to be mistakes. I mean, mistakes are great confessions, but also just advice either. I mean, you know, I can give some advice. So definitely that's sensible optimism.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Knowing that, like, it's not about avoiding all the hard problems. It's about knowing that you'll get through them. And continuing to focus on like, what are you wanting the outcome to be? Brene Brown talks about this all the time. What does done look like? What does it look like when it's done? That's what you have to focus on.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
And then some other things like I do a lot of micro intentions sometimes. I have been doing this since 2018. I started a journal and it was, I love journaling. I was writing journal entries from the future as if they were already happening. Have you saved all the journals? Oh, it's incredible. It's like, Megan, I can't even tell you how... How insane some of these things are.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Like there's just there's ones where I'm like, you know, we're the fastest growing brand at Target. And I wrote it like in 2019. We weren't in Target yet. And we just found out this last fall that we were a top 25 fastest growing brand in all of beauty.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Thank you. Thank you so much. I'm so proud of you, too. I mean, it's so wild. I remember I remember thinking, like, I wonder if Megan and I will run into each other again one day. That was just so wild. And we did. And that's so cool.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Of course. Oh, my gosh. This is such an honor.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
She texted me last night. She was like, good luck tomorrow.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
By the way, I love, love that you call me Cassie. Oh, I know. Sorry. Cassandra. No, no, no. I love it because like... There's such a small handful of people that call me Cassie, and it's like my immediate family and Meghan Markle. It's like Meg or Em. It's the same thing. It's how we met all those years ago. I know. It's so sweet.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
I mean, we met in a very sliding glass door moments of our lives, I think.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Yes. I love this because I feel like This is a perfect example of, you know, all of the things that I said yes to. I was like, yeah, I'm sure I'm a stylist. I will be a stylist. Now I'm a stylist. Yes. Yes. I will add it to my resume of all the things that I that I aspire to be in life. And I had no idea what I was doing, but I really enjoyed our time together.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Oh, see, you know what? I am so intuitive. I wanted to put you in these power suits. That's right. And little did I know, you know, it was an echo from the future. I had suits in mind, but it was just not a physical suit. It was the show suits.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
So that would have been 16 years ago. So 2009, 2009.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
All the way back. It's funny because I never thought any of these little things in my life were, I don't know, foreshadowing for what would happen in my future. But my stepdad was an orthodontist and my mom and my stepdad were in business together. And they offered us the opportunity to make an allowance to make retainers. And I think this is my first memory of being very entrepreneurial.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
They created a... a little workshop in our garage in Wisconsin where they set up all of the materials and tools to make retainers. Oh, my gosh. And I loved getting the little plaster mold of someone's mouth with someone's name on it. And it had all of their wants. I want it in pink with glitter. And I love this idea that I was like an elf in Santa's workshop. That is amazing.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
This was on their Christmas list and I get to create this item. And then every single night, this person is going to put in this retainer and I get to be part of that journey. And that was just like, I thought that was so exciting and cool that I got to be part of it.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Absolutely. I mean, I think the best way to put it is from day one, it was always, the kitchen's always been people-centric. We've always been people-centric. You know, when most people start a business, they write a business plan. But I really, it was just like... I want to make great products that people love and reorder. Because I really genuinely believe that reorders are what make a business.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
That really tells you, I value what you've created to the point where I need it again. That is not a business plan, but it is an ethos. Business plans get rewritten every single year. Your ethos does not. And so I think for me, it was... Building a business off of that ethos, it's genuinely of service. It's that same, you know, tween that's making retainers in the garage.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
In the garage in Wisconsin. Hoping that I'll be, you know... creating this great experience for the customer that will somehow impact their life for the better.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Oh, my gosh. It was so big today, by the way. I was testing out a new product, and I was like, I have to just start over. I had to go and wet it all down and start over. But thank you very much for saying that. It started with hair ties because I could hand make it. It was something that I could be in complete control over. I was making the packaging. I was hand making the product.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
I was the manufacturer. I was the salesperson. It was 100% me. I could make 10 pieces, 10 samples, go out, sell them, come back, make 20 more. And that's why it started with hair ties.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Yeah. So when I was starting Kitsch, I was thinking about what am I doing? I'm sitting on the floor of my apartment. I'm making these hair elastics. They're, you know, kind of silly and fun and cute. And I was like, it's kind of kitschy. And I was like, what if I would just call it Kitsch? And that's how we came up with the name. But if you look at the logo, which, you know, I...
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
I think I've been through seven different logos and the first six were designed by me. But I finally have a true graphic designer. But if you look at the logo now, how Kitsch has evolved is we've taken these very kitschy items, scrunchies and hair towels and all these like silly things, and we've refined them and made them beautiful. So that's why the logo is in this like phonetic aesthetic. Yes.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
So much easier to trademark. And now it can actually be printed on a packaging because my other ones were like all swirly and crazy and it was just really hard and all of whatever.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
It's time. I mean, and this was my eighth business that I started. Let's talk about some of the ones before. It's not including Meghan Markle's stylist, so... Yeah, that was a big one on the resume. No, I had so many more businesses before Kitsch. My mom and I had a boutique together. And then I had a jewelry line. I had scarves with inspirational quotes on it. I had my own website.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
So my mom and I, we had a boutique. And I really wanted to have my – this was one of my first businesses. I really wanted to have my own business that wasn't affiliated with my mom's. And I was like, you know what, mom, I would love to take all of these products that you have in the store and I want to make my own website and I want to sell everything. I want to do e-commerce.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
But it cost so much money to build a website at that point. There was no like plug and play. And I said, I know you save money for each of us to get married. Yeah. I would love to take that money and create a website with it and start my own business. It was called CassiesCouture.com. Oh. Do you still have it? Do you still have the domain? No, definitely no.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
Maybe someone else can do something great with it. I will bequeath it to whoever wants it. No. Or just start to use it now and have it auto-direct a kit. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Great idea. But, yeah, so that's a couple of the businesses. You know, I had a spray tan business when I was out here for a while, too. I forgot about that one. I had a machine. It was actually a great investment.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
The return on investment was very quick. But I mean, I had failed so many times and I got a job working at a private label jewelry company and I saw the whole private label world. And I was like, oh, this is really interesting. It really takes a lot of the risk out of inventory.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
I feel like everybody's in such a hurry to be successful. When you're bootstrapped, you actually can't. You have to be very slow. You have to be very responsible. Every single opportunity that comes across your plate, you need to make sure that it's profitable.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
You know, it's essentially you get you design a piece, you show it to a buyer, they place an order for it, then they produce, you deliver it, then you get paid in 30 days.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
So this is when we'd connected.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Bootstrapped and Booming with Kitsch’s Cassandra Morales Thurswell
You were doing a lot of stuff. But yeah, so that's how I got into the private label world. And that's how I funded Kitsch.