This post is in partnership with Warner Bros. Pictures, but the story is my own!
I just saw a trailer for a new movie, Going In Style, that’s opening in theatres next Friday, April 7th. It stars three of my all-time favorite actors, Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine and Alan Arkin, who take a massive risk when they lose their pensions. It reminded me of the big risk I took a few years ago! A. Big. Risk.
It looked like my decade-long run as a successful publishing entrepreneur was about to end in 2007. After losing my largest account, I downsized my staff, moved to a far smaller office and, for the first time in my 40-year career, started to think, “what in the world am I going to do now?” I needed to work, not just for the income, but because I love the challenges, stimulation, and the emotional rewards of working. My anxiety level rose as I faced the harsh reality that the world of print publishing, which had defined my entire career, was on shaky ground, as the internet continued to gain a stronger hold in the media world. I was 60 at the time, and I wouldn’t even entertain the prospect of again working for someone else.
I instinctively began to think a great deal about women my age, the millions of fantastic boomer women who have accomplished so much in their lives, bucked so many rules, and set so many new bars in so many new arenas. And I realized that I wanted to do something about them, and for them, maybe a book.
Then, one afternoon in my living room, which by this time was doubling as my office–sans employees–I had an AHA moment: I’d start a website for women over 50. Like more and more boomer women, I was increasingly turning to the internet, Googling like crazy and checking out interesting websites, so it seemed like the right way to go. Surely, I could use my skills as a writer, editor and salesperson to make it work, even if I didn’t know a thing about building a website. So I pushed ahead, and within weeks I got a $90,000 commitment from an ad agency that handled the Olay beauty account, to help support my endeavor. Wowie, I thought. I’m onto something! What’s more, a generous and successful friend who believed in me and the idea, said she’d help fund it. I was off and running. FabOverFifty was born at the beginning of 2010.
