GARY: Next on "Start Up," we head to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to meet up with Lia, the owner of Valencia Key, a jewelry company on a mission to help people believe in themselves and find their light.

All of this and more is next on "Start Up."

ANNOUNCER: Spectrum Business recognizes the importance of small businesses to local communities, so we're investing $21 million to help small businesses access funding to help them grow.

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♪ The first time you made a sale online was also the first time you heard of a town named... MAN: Dinosaur.

We just got an order from Dinosaur, Colorado.

MAN: No way!

ANNOUNCER: Build a website to help reach more customers.

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♪ My name is Gary Bredow.

I'm a documentary filmmaker and an entrepreneur.

As the country continues to recover, small business owners everywhere are doing all they can to keep their dream alive.

So we set out for our tenth consecutive season to talk with a wide range of diverse business owners to better understand how they've learned to adapt, innovate, and even completely reinvent themselves.

♪ This is "Start Up."

♪ Jewelry design is one of civilization's earliest forms of decoration, dating back at least 7,000 years to the oldest known human societies in Mesopotamia and Egypt.

The art has taken many forms throughout the centuries, from the simple beadwork of ancient times to the sophisticated metalworking and gem cutting known in the modern day.

Today I'm heading to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to meet up with Lia, the owner of Valencia Key, a jewelry company with a fascinating backstory.

From what I know, Lia has faced countless challenges to get to where she is today.

I can't wait to learn more about her path to creating this incredible business.

I've noticed that you're kind of a fan of yellow.

LIA: Kind of, just a little bit.

GARY: Tell me about yellow.

What does it mean to you?

LIA: Yellow is this representation of joy and light and possibility.

You can't help but smile when you see yellow.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: Like, as soon as...

I don't have to say anything.

Immediately, people just gravitate to joy when they see yellow, so that's... GARY: It's sunshine.

LIA: It's sunshine.

GARY: What is Valencia Key?

LIA: Yes.

Valencia Key is all about light, joy, bravery, possibility.

Actually, it's my middle and last name.

And I found that Valencia means brave.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: And of course, we know that "key" is unlocking, so it's about unlocking your bravery, your light, your perseverance, your joy.

So everything that I create is really based on symbolisms that I want to have these visual reminders to trigger you back when you need it the most.

GARY: Tell me about yourself growing up.

LIA: I love sharing my beginning journey because you see this yellow and you see the light.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: And I actually was raised and born in poverty in the inner city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, So the neighborhood was full of violence, full of drugs on every corner.

And then my mother actually broke her leg in several places, so this little one-bedroom under-basement apartment that I was born in, my mother couldn't afford anymore.

So, this day I remember so vividly.

She's walking myself, my brother and I, that's my siblings, home from school, and it was a padlock on the door, and that immediately took us to homeless.

And so for the whole early part of my life, I lived in a homeless shelter.

What I love to share about that part is the first day in the homeless shelter, you hear all of this crying and sorrow, but my mother looked down at us, and she said, "Your predicament does not determine your destiny."

She didn't want us to follow this path of fear.

And I think fear had paralyzed my mother.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: But she knew that if she could speak light into our lives, she could unlock some possibility in us.

And that's what Valencia Key is all about.

Like, it's, it's light somewhere.

No matter how dark it is, you can unlock it.

GARY: What do you think your mother felt when she walked up and saw that lock?

LIA: Uh, when I say that, I get teary-eyed and think about it, because that was the first time that I saw what pain looked like, like heart-wrenching pain.

She had no place to take her children, so there was nothing that she can do.

And she was bound by, like, society, generational curses and just this societal thing that had been weighed on her, so she couldn't break out of it.

GARY: Knowing other people that were in the same position, is it a lot of circumstances?

Circumstance?

Is it mindset?

What can you say about it from experience?

LIA: It's people that are looked over and aren't given opportunity.

Everything is a compounded thing because it's really lack of knowledge, lack of exposure, and lack of people showing you what you just don't know, so generations... GARY: Yes.

LIA: ...keep coming up in the same issue because what your mother doesn't know, then you weren't taught finances, and then you fall in that circle.

Another really profound memory was I'm coming back from school.

I had become my environment, so I was failing in school and just really soaking up what I was around.

And I'm coming back to the homeless shelter, and my mother stopped me at the door, and she asked me two questions.

She said, "Do you want to be a follower or a leader?"

And she's like, "Right now, you're following.

You're following your environment.

And, Lia, you're actually gonna become everything you see, or you get to choose to lead.

You get to choose to lead your life.

You get to find your light inside, find your destiny and follow that."

I went right back to school the next day... GARY: Turned it around?

LIA: And I asked my-- So asking is the next thing.

GARY: Yes.

LIA: I asked my teacher, "I know I'm not doing well.

How?

How do I get out?

How do I get help?

Can I stay after school?

What can I do to see something different?

Because this is what I'm seeing and this is what I'm doing."

GARY: It mattered to you now.

LIA: It mattered because I, I knew that there was something different.

GARY: How long were you in the homeless shelter?

LIA: Up until about fifth grade... GARY: Okay.

LIA: ...we lived in the homeless shelter, so at least five years.

Then moved us to a housing project, which is very similar to the same thing.

And I stayed there until college.

GARY: You obviously turned things around with school because you said you went to college.

Straight out of the projects into college.

LIA: Yeah.

Only person in my family, only person in my neighborhood, and that, to go.

Finally I'm there.

I'm feeling uncomfortable.

I have no money, and then my mother starts to get deathly ill. GARY: Oh, man.

LIA: And so the entire journey of my schooling, my mother is deathly ill, and I have to decide, how do I manage that?

So literally, I'm splitting my brain, trying to get back to Philadelphia, help my mother, worry about my mother and school, get my schoolwork done, and choose that.

She told me that I can choose my destiny.

So I'm gonna cry on my papers every day, I'm gonna pray every day, and then I'm gonna get back and do more work.

And I just decided that I can do all things.

GARY: Tell me about when your mother passed.

LIA: Such a painful moment because, um, I felt she had never lived.

She never had an opportunity to live.

The odds were stacked against her.

She had so much greatness inside of her, but it was so heavy that she couldn't move out of it.

And so to leave this earth and never to have truly enjoyed life is one of the most saddest things that I think about.

GARY: Look at the beauty she left behind, though.

My gosh!

LIA: So I choose to live my life in light every day, and not just for me, for people like my mother, to let them know that you can live.

GARY: I bet she, she's incredibly proud of you, looking down on you right now.

LIA: I believe that.

♪ When did the aha moment come for Valencia Key?

LIA: Well, I've been sketching through all of this journey, college, everything, just for my soul, sketching this jewelry.

GARY: Mm-hmm.

LIA: And I worked in education a little bit, and I went back and got my master's in education, but I still had that inner whisper.

And, you know, I live by that word, like, "Listen, lead your light.

Listen to your inner whisper."

And it was really calling me to creativity.

I just, that's what really lit me up inside.

And I went back and got my cosmetology license.

And through the cosmetology, I finally decided, I was like, "I want to work at QVC."

I target my dreams.

Like, I'm specific.

Like, I know exactly.

So I'm like, "I want to work somewhere where I don't need clients to come in, but it's just an automatic client base."

And QVC was it.

24 hours.

Consistent styling.

GARY: Always someone on the air.

LIA: Always someone on the air.

So I targeted QVC.

And it's so interesting because it took me about five years to get in.

Application denied.

You're not qualified.

GARY: Love this.

LIA: So many times.

And it's interesting, I met a gentleman named Fred.

I had to bartend to survive.

GARY: Mm-hmm.

LIA: And I poured him one drink and maybe another word.

I said, "I want to work at QVC."

[laughs] So random.

GARY: "Funny.

I run QVC."

LIA: He was like, "Funny, my friend works, Stephanie Humphrey, works for QVC.

Let me see."

GARY: There it is.

LIA: He connected Stephanie Humphrey to me.

Stephanie didn't know me at all.

Never met me.

And it's about this light, right?

So Fred had felt my light... GARY: Yes.

LIA: ...and my passion and my desire and my energy.

And he must have radiated that onto Stephanie so much that she texted me and was like, "Here's the salon person's name.

Here's their email, contact number, and you can use me as a reference."

GARY: Oh, my gosh.

LIA: And she had never met me literally a day in her life.

GARY: That's amazing.

LIA: And that just circled me.

I got the interview.

But remember, the noes are power.

So anyone who's listening, noes hurt.

Cry in them, but work through them.

Because every time I got a no from QVC, I would go back in that salon, sweep floors, and watch more stylists and learn more hair and learn more hair textures and blowouts.

So by the time I got the interview, I was ready.

GARY: When she was a bartender, the customer she was serving knew you.

STEPHANIE: Yes.

GARY: What did you think when you got the text?

STEPHANIE: Well, Fred is the guy, the mutual friend.

If this was someone that he felt compelled to refer to me, then I could trust that it was someone that wouldn't ruin my good name... GARY: Right, right, right.

STEPHANIE: ...when I referred them, you know, to QVC.

You know, I've been in this business long enough to know how hard it is to break in, so whenever I can help, and somebody broke me in, so whenever I can help, it's my honor to do that.

GARY: Kind of paying it forward just a little bit.

STEPHANIE: Absolutely.

GARY: For anyone watching this that has a dream also to be on QVC, what does it take to break in?

STEPHANIE: It's one of those things where you really have to believe in your product, believe in what you're doing because you're going to have to be persistent.

It may not happen that first time.

GARY: Gonna get some noes.

STEPHANIE: Yeah, yeah.

You have to be willing to take those noes and keep coming back.

GARY: Does a no really mean no?

STEPHANIE: It just means not now.

That's what I say in my head all the time.

GARY: Not yet.

Not now.

STEPHANIE: No just means not now, so your time will come.

LIA: I got the job in QVC, which then opened my life.

Second light in my life.

I was around people making dreams happen.

QVC hosts literally taking people's dreams and making them happen.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: And then I was around business owners that had so much of a dream, they did whatever it took to make it happen.

GARY: Wow.

LIA: And then I knew I had this dream to bring physical light in the world.

And I talked to them about it, and they were like, "Create your business.

Do it.

Jump."

GARY: Tell me about your first piece.

How did you get it made?

What did you-- How did you go from sketches to a physical product?

LIA: I literally googled "How to take"-- And I kept playing with the words, "How to take hand-sketched designs to a physical jewelry."

GARY: Google?

LIA: Google.

And I kept googling different words, and finally I found "You have to take your sketches and make it a 3D design."

And then I was like, "How do you do that?"

And then it said, "Then the manufacturer can take that 3D design and actually mass-produce that 3D design."

I'm like, "Okay..." GARY: "Where do I find them?"

LIA: Exactly!

So I jumped on a plane and went to different countries, meeting different manufacturers, until I found a manufacturer that took a chance on me.

They were wonderful, and they created my first collection.

This is my very first piece.

It's the Synergy necklace.

It's about growth and that life continues.

No matter the ups and downs, you can keep in balance and synergy and light.

♪ ♪ ♪ GARY: What do you think of the actual jewelry?

JACQUELINE: I love the jewelry, first of all.

GARY: I can tell.

JACQUELINE: You can tell.

I love the durability of it.

But then it still looks great.

It still looks designer.

It still looks high-end.

I look put together.

And I get so many compliments when I wear it.

Like, women are like, "Where did you get those earrings?

Where did you get that bracelet?

I love it."

GARY: "I'd gladly recommend."

JACQUELINE: And I'm like, "Oh, here.

Let me tell you."

GARY: What would you say to somebody who's never been exposed to the product, never heard of it, never seen it on QVC?

What would you say to them?

JACQUELINE: I would say if you are looking for jewelry that will last a lifetime but that also helps you to feel joy and positivity and light and love... GARY: Yep.

JACQUELINE: ...that's what Valencia Key jewelry brings to you.

Sometimes you need those little reminders because life is hard.

So when I wear my "believe it" or my "love" bracelet, I'm just reminded that when you live in love, when you live in joy, anything is possible, and it just changes my whole attitude.

GARY: Was your intention to bring it to QVC?

LIA: Entire dream.

GARY: Okay.

Specific.

LIA: Specific.

Entire dream.

Why?

QVC is a place where you get to share your why.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: And I never just wanted to be a piece of jewelry on a shelf, because it's not the jewelry.

It's the heart and the intention.

GARY: It's a piece of you.

LIA: So I just started telling people... GARY: "I'm gonna have a product on QVC."

LIA: I want my product on--exactly.

GARY: Or a line of jewelry.

LIA: I want my line on QVC.

GARY: Okay.

LIA: And again, three years later, I get a text message.

"Lia, QVC is having a Big Find competition.

You've been telling everybody you want your jewelry to be on it.

You've got to apply."

GARY: Did you win?

LIA: I see an email come in, and it says you are accepted to be a Big Find winner to be a jewelry brand on QVC.

GARY: Wow!

LIA: Wow!

♪ How did that feel?

LIA: It was the proof of what Valencia Key stands for.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: That it's possible and you can unlock your light and that I'm not just saying this.

I'm living it.

And so anyone that wears it can live it, too.

GARY: Did you sell out?

LIA: I didn't sell out, but they called down.

I think I was down to, like, 50 pieces left.

GARY: Okay, so it was a wild success.

LIA: It was a wonderful success.

♪ GARY: Where are we going right now?

LIA: We are going to see Sue the photographer, Jill, my content creator.

GARY: What do these folks do for and mean for your business?

LIA: They mean so much.

They are, they are the backbone of how I can exist.

Sue is a wonderful photographer.

She just captures my light.

Jill, she knows that the brand is about possibility and dreams.

GARY: Mm-hmm.

LIA: So she's always finding inspiration pictures on how we can create that content to bring the joy out of the pieces of jewelry.

GARY: What advice would you have for somebody coming out with a, with a new brand as it pertains to photography and social media?

LIA: What's the story you want to tell in the picture?

You want to trigger an emotion first, so what emotion are you pulling out of them and inspiring them?

Think of that.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ GARY: Talk about your philosophy behind, you know, setting up Instagram and creating that brand online for her.

JILL: Oh, my gosh.

Well, I mean, it starts with the shoots.

Of course, she's, we're together with the shoots, but we always make the atmosphere so fun for the models.

Lighting, music, everything.

Make sure everybody's in that, in that mood.

GARY: The people are just, in the photographs, the models, are just smiling and laughing, and they're action shots.

I love that.

JILL: I know because that's the energy that Lia and I put off when we're doing, when we're getting together to create these shoots.

And like, if you can't help but feel the energy, you know, and you're focusing on the jewelry, but that, that jewelry is giving them light, you know?

GARY: How important is really good photography for a brand, especially a new brand?

SUE: It sets them apart because there's, there is a lot of jewelry brands out there, right?

So it's like, "Okay, what's, what's different about this one?"

GARY: Do you think having good photos would be the difference between generating a sale and not generating a sale on a product, in your opinion?

SUE: I think that there is potential, that people can see the quality of the jewelry through a good image, a high-quality image.

And they're also gonna feel an emotion from a good quality image and from a good model and good lighting and, you know, just good energy when they're on set.

And you can feel that through a photo.

So I think yes.

♪ GARY: Where is Valencia Key today as a business?

LIA: Valencia Key is, now that we're in Miraval Resort, which is a luxury resort in Texas and Arizona... GARY: Nice.

LIA: ...which is beautiful.

O Magazine saw the light of Valencia Key and featured my Limitless Hoop Earrings in Oprah Favorite Thing magazine.

GARY: That's huge.

LIA: That's huge!

GARY: Did that explode the product?

LIA: That exploded.

Those earrings... Those earrings just, ah, they're... GARY: They're moving.

LIA: They're moving.

It's a light movement that's just slowly...

It's still slow.

I'm still a very small brand.

I don't want to make it bigger than what it is.

I am in the-- GARY: But you're growing.

LIA: I'm growing.

I'm in the trenches, but I'm growing.

And people are starting to catch the light.

And I'm just gonna keep going because giving back is so important to me.

I'm doing this to show people that are already great that they can be great, but people from where I come from that it's possible.

So I go back to homeless shelters, and I do workshops to teach how do you unlock light in your life?

GARY: Oh, that's incredible.

You're pulling people up out of that hole.

LIA: I just was at a homeless shelter Wednesday.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: And we talked about the power of dreaming and then how we take a dream and we actualize it to reality.

GARY: What was the reaction?

LIA: To see people walk in... GARY: Yeah.

LIA: ...in this state and to walk out with their shoulders back and their chest up.

I felt that they felt that this is not my predicament.

And like when they walked out and just seeing men there was so powerful to me and how men felt empowered.

It's, it's a universal thing.

GARY: Are you gonna keep, keep that going or what?

Because your education background and just the life that you're able to share, you can be so powerful.

LIA: It's the lifeline of Valencia Key.

I'm gonna keep creating Valencia Key to have these beautiful stories, to show that we can keep shattering glass ceilings and that it's possible because someone needed to show me that it's possible.

So it's my job to keep going back to show that it's possible.

♪ GARY: Do you think that a person's true character is best judged at their weakest or their strongest moment?

LIA: At their weakest.

GARY: Think so?

Okay.

LIA: I truly believe that.

When everything's going awry... GARY: Yeah.

LIA: ...when the sky is falling and the earth is sinking under you, who are you and how are you?

I created a collection called Rooted.

When you're in your deepest, roughest time, what have you chosen to be rooted in?

That's what you hold on to.

That's what brings you out of these circumstances.

Do you choose to be a person that gives up, or do you choose right now to be rooted in perseverance?

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: Do you choose to be rooted in joy even when there's no joy around?

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: Do you choose to radiate light even when the energy is weighing darkness?

Like, root in those things, because when it's time to grab it, now you have roots that will hold you and pull you up out of any circumstance.

GARY: Where will you be in five years?

LIA: Five years... GARY: I can't wait because I know it's specific.

LIA: Yes!

You know it!

You know I like a target.

GARY: You're gonna be homed in.

LIA: Exactly.

GARY: Okay.

LIA: Five years, I want to be a global brand.

GARY: Okay.

LIA: But also I want to create, or at least at the beginning phase of starting to create, a school on the, on the give-back side, so all of the funding, portions of the funding that we get from being global will create a trade school, because my life was changed when I learned how to do hair and got my cosmetology license.

GARY: Yeah.

LIA: I could work.

GARY: Teach a skill to underserved communities.

LIA: Yes!

And I want to create a school or be in the works of creating a school to get licensed, skilled to underserved communities so that no matter what the economy's doing, you will always be able to work.

GARY: Opportunity is the equalizer.

LIA: Opportunity is the equalizer.

GARY: There are certain people that you meet in your life that have a profound impact on you, and you know that something inside you has been forever changed.

From the moment that I met Lia, I could feel this overwhelming sense of positive energy.

When she talks about her light, that is what she's referring to, and she shares it with everyone she comes in contact with.

Lia has overcome some of the most challenging hardships imaginable, yet one simple question that her mother asked her completely changed the course of her life: Are you a leader or a follower?

That question has resonated with Lia throughout her life, and she has proven to herself time and time again that she is definitely a leader.

It's so easy to become a victim of the things that have happened to us, the circumstances for which we have no control.

And it's easy to point fingers and criticize the people caught up in a system that's nearly impossible to escape.

Mental and emotional trauma, especially at a young age, can be crippling.

But Lia is proof that you can break free, that your mind has no limitations, and that you have to keep fighting even on the days that you feel hopeless and can't take one more step forward.

That is when the miracle happens.

I hope that each and every person watching this is able to understand, absorb, and share just a fraction of Lia's light.

And maybe that's exactly what we all need right now more than ever.

For more information, visit our website and search episodes for Valencia Key.

Next time on "Start Up," we head to Baltimore, Maryland, to meet up with Meaghan Carpenter, one of the owners of HEX Ferments, a company that uses traditional fermentation to preserve and transform local organic ingredients into nourishing foods.

Be sure to join us next time on "Start Up."

Would you like to learn more about the show or maybe nominate a business?

Visit our website at startup-usa.com and connect with us on social media.

♪ ♪ We got a long road ahead of us ♪ ♪ A long road ahead of us ♪ ♪ A long road ahead of us before we pay our dues ♪ ♪ We got a long road ahead of us ♪ ♪ A long road ahead of us ♪ ♪ A long road ahead of us before we pay our dues ♪ ANNOUNCER: The first time you made a sale online was also the first time you heard of a town named... MAN: Dinosaur.

We just got an order from Dinosaur, Colorado.

MAN: No way!

ANNOUNCER: Build a website to help reach more customers.

WOMAN: Wait, wait, wait, wait!

One more.

ANNOUNCER: GoDaddy.

Tools and support for small business firsts.

Spectrum Business recognizes the importance of small businesses to local communities, so we're investing $21 million to help small businesses access funding to help them grow.

Spectrum Business.

More than an internet, phone, and TV provider.

♪