Now that the fortieth celebrations are behind us, I have had a chance to reflect on just how far we’ve come and how the world of business has changed in 40 years.

It would have been unfathomable to imagine that Wall Street powerhouses like EF Hutton, Paine Webber, First Boston, Dean Witter just to name a few would have disappeared and little old Warden Brooks is left standing.  It was such a pivotal time in corporate America.  Up until then, companies really only had the company tie and scarf.  Most of them were designed and manufactured by the very upscale and preppy, G.S.Harvale, the company for whom I had been working.  I noticed a trend.  More and more clients were asking what else we had.  The parent company, Palm Beach Company in Cincinnati Ohio didn’t want to stray from their base of men’s clothing.  But I had ideas…lots and lots of ideas and I was frustrated that no one wanted to hear them.  Except for my parents and friends.

My Dad, who had worked at Jos E. Seagram’s since graduating from Notre Dame, was hardly an entrepreneur.  But he and my mother both, fierce believers in their children, encouraged me to go out on my own.  It was an outrageous thought.  My late husband and I had just bought our first house and we had absolutely nothing left.  Still, they said, “What’s the worst thing that could happen? You’d have to find another job”.  They had such confidence in me that I began to get the wheels in motion. Then my dad asked how much I’d need to get started.  So I canvassed my trusted clients and they were all enthusiastic.  If I started my own business, they assured me, they’d be on board.  So I told my dad I needed $2,000 to start, and that would get me through the first month or so.  Clients agreed to pay deposits on their first orders and that would give WB some operating capital.  I knew that no bank would take a chance on me.  There were no organizations back then to provide guidance or encouragement to women who wanted to start their own businesses.  I found out many years later that my parents remortgaged their house just to make sure I had whatever I needed to get Warden Brooks off the ground.

I never needed any more than that first $2,000 from them or from any bank in the forty years since that day.  Warden Brooks took off in the most unbelievable and wonderful way.