The 2nd Annual celebration for the Women's Entrepreneurship Day (WED) will take place on Wednesday, November 19th, 2015 at the United Nations; live streamed in 144 countries and 111 top universities and colleges worldwide! This monumental event is the world’s largest celebration of successful women entrepreneurs, women and millennial innovators, and job creators launching startups; bringing ideas to life, driving economic growth, and expanding human welfare. Women’s Entrepreneurship Day will empower the 4 billion women on the planet, bring hope, and help elevate the 250 million girls living in poverty!
Women’s Entrepreneurship Day is a worldwide movement that carries throughout the year in support of female entrepreneurs on every continent. The defining goal is to empower women and their businesses, as well as gather a think tank of women leaders, which will ultimately create an amplified merged message to expand businesses with social good initiatives in communities locally and globally.
"There's a cream puff donut day, turtle day, bubble bath day, lost penny day - why on earth isn't there a Women's Entrepreneurship Day!" quipped Wendy Diamond.
Wendy Diamond is the Founder of Women's Entrepreneurship Day (WED), an entrepreneur, humanitarian, pet-lifestyle expert and animal advocate. She launched Animal Fair Media, a pet lifestyle media company focusing on merging pets, celebrities, and media events all in the name of animal and wildlife rescue. Diamond’s prime motivator started in 1999, when she discovered 12 million animals were euthanized annually, that number has currently dropped to 5 million per year. She knows the true meaning of being a startup entrepreneur! Throughout Diamond’s ongoing and dedicated work with growing Animal Fair Media, she experiences firsthand that being a woman in business often means entering a dog-eat-dog world. Her vast experiences expanded her wide focus, business savvy, and limitless energy towards a different breed of global "underdog"- women.
“I have dedicated my entire life to helping the “underdog” get a chance and thrive,” says Diamond. “Historically, women worldwide have been underpaid, undervalued, underrepresented, underfunded – and underestimated.
We are dedicated, determined, and driven to change this status – the women entrepreneurs involved in WED are inspirational role models to women everywhere!”
WED is proud to announce their partnership with the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship. USASBE’s Executive Director, Patrick Snyder announced, "USASBE is extremely excited to work on WED and share its positive message within our membership and academia. A day, week, or year recognizing women and entrepreneurship is an idea that is long past due. I plan on being in NYC on November 19th! I hope our members will support WED by having events on their campuses.”
Diamond was inspired to launch WED on a Honduras holiday last year, where spent time with an organization that gives microcredit to locally impoverished women, (http://adelantefoundation.org). She witnessed firsthand how these beneficial startup loans empowered Honduran women, benefited their families, and provided the opportunity for their children to attend school. Diamond took note and understood the importance of empowering women through a financial vehicle of support. When women are provided economic empowerment, they outspend men on their family’s health, nutrition, and education by threefold; 90% women to 30% men. Together as a global community we can make the planet a better place!
“Empowering women worldwide and investing in their futures helps to drive and promote economic vitality and security locally and globally,” says Diamond. “Twenty-first century leadership skills, such as cooperation, communication, and sharing are more commonly associated with women. We want to celebrate the unwavering positives that women entrepreneurs bring to the global economy as well as inspire and support future generations of women entrepreneurs.”
Diamond has rallied an impressive and powerful list of worldwide attendees, influential organizations, leaders, and entrepreneurs supporting women that will gather and join at the UN on this day of WED as “ONE DAY TO CELEBRATE, SUPPORT AND EMPOWER WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS WORLDWIDE.” Major Fortune 500 companies and various female company founders, CEO’s, Creatives, and business leaders participating including; Adena Friedman (President of Global Capital Access, technology and insights for NASDAQ.
Former Managing Director and CFO of The Carlyle Group), Mamie Gummer (Actress and Ambassador Nomi Network), Andrea Kerzner (Founder and CEO of the Lalela Project, and co-creator of themoreweshare.com), Amir Dossal (Founder and Chairman of Global Partnerships Forum, former director of UN Office of Partnerships), Craig Newmark (Founder of craigslist and craigconnects), Cynthia Cohen (Strategic Mindshare Founder and President), Danielle Gelber (NBC Executive Producer, Executive Vice-President at Wolf & Films), Diane Brady (Former Senior Editor Bloomberg Businessweek),
Erika Karp (Founder and CEO Cornerstone Capital Inc.), Heidi Messer (Co-founder of Collective [i] and Linkshare), Leslie Blodgett (Creator of bareMinerals and former CEO of Bare Escentuals), Milena Berry (Co-founder and CTO PowerToFly and former Chief Technology at Avaaz.org), Kunal Sood (Executive Producer and Curator at TEDX UN Plaza), Sophia Swire (Founder of Aayenda and Future Brilliance), Susan Stautberg (Co-founder and CEO of Women Corporate Direct), Tamara Etmannski (Founder of Stackz), Vicki Escarra (Global CEO of Opportunity International), Martha MacMillan (Board Director of Cargill Inc. and Waycrosse Inc.), James Benedict (Advisory Board at Acupera and Principal with Kidd & Company), Katharina Sophia Volz (Founder and CEO of OccamzRazor), and Wendy Diamond (CEO & Founder of WED and Animal Fair Media).
New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo proclaims November 19th as Women’s Entrepreneurship Day! The global Student Ambassador initiative is in full swing with top colleges engaged including Stanford, Clarkson, Duke, University of Pennsylvania, Harvard, Babson, University of Oxford, and Yale and hundreds of other universities/colleges. WED’s Global Ambassadors are operating in every continent, and from Rwanda to Saudi Arabia they are primed to activate their communities with the WED movement through worldwide activities on the day of the event!
The WED social media platform will engage women and men globally to pledge their support for a women owned business/cause with; Talent, Time, or Treasure. When we empower a community, we are also advancing the next generation of leaders! On December 2nd, the first Wednesday after Thanksgiving we will launch the #WomenWOW social media campaign to encourage everyone worldwide to support women-owned businesses and causes that will inspire just as Giving Tuesday and Small Business Saturday.
We hope you’ll accept this invitation to join us and help spread the WED word through your media outlet. Please let us know if you have any questions. Thank you and we look forward to hearing from you!