We are Female Founders

PlumAlley.co is a site where you can buy products from female founded companies that represent substance and discipline in creation and beauty.

Products for sale on PlumAlley.co range from housewares you want in your life, delicacies to sense or eat, experiences to remember, or items you can’t wait to wear. Each product we featured is chosen to honor the values we believe in.

Our core values:

  • Celebrating female founders who took the path to build companies and products that are a reflection of who they are and what they stand for.
  • Believing that substance and quality exist in female founded companies that are yet to be discovered.
  • Believing that luxury is defined by what goes into the creation of a product rather than its cost.
  • Offering a way to empower women and men to support female entrepreneurs by making purchases that are consistent with their values.
  • Ensuring that our products have been sourced, reviewed and determined to uphold a standard of excellence in value worthy of PlumAlley.co

We believe that discerning consumers want to know about the products they buy and the companies behind them. PlumAlley.co showcases only companies founded by women and showcases how the woman’s intellect, vision and determination manifests itself in her company and product.

The growth of women entrepreneurship is a key component to job and wealth creation, and is vital to the overall health of our economy. By celebrating female founders and sharing their stories, PlumAlley.co creates visibility for these women, heightens their success, and inspires more women to found their own companies.

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Our Vision

PlumAlley.co grew out of the desire to meaningfully support female-founded businesses.

When women and men consciously direct their purchasing power to female entrepreneurs, they make a tangible contribution to the long-term growth and success of her company.

When a woman's business is successful she creates her own wealth. Through her creation of wealth, her family and community also receive the economic benefit. Successful female entrepreneurs have the economic power to invest in new female founded companies. More women become inspired to found businesses and have access to a greater pool of investment funds. PlumAlley.co's goal is to facilitate this positive economic cycle.

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The Team

Deborah Jackson

Deborah Buresh Jackson: Founder and CEO of Plum Alley

Deborah Buresh Jackson

Founder and CEO

Deborah Jackson is the Founder and CEO of PlumAlley.co, executing her vision to see women achieve success through owning companies.

For the past 15 years, Deborah has been active in early stage companies as an investor and founder. Since 2009, she has been a member of Golden Seeds, the third most active angel network in the nation investing in female founded companies. In early 2011, she launched JumpThru, a for-profit company whose purpose is to encourage more women to use technology and create their own wealth by founding successful companies.

Deborah’s achievements and devotion to female-founded companies have been recognized in publications and organizations including:

  • Fast Company, 60 Women Heroes of 2012, August 2012
  • Forbes, Women Changing the World VCs/Entrepreneurs, August 2012
  • Columbia Venture Community, CVC 30 list, November 2011
  • Mashable, 44 Female Founders to Know, August 2012
  • Xconomy, Editorial Advisory Board

Additionally, Deborah is a co-founder of Women Innovate Mobile Accelerator and has served as a judge for numerous competitions including Startup Weekend, Technovation, Columbia Social Entrepreneurs, Vator.tv, Columbia Business Odyssey and Women 2.0.

Prior to JumpThru & PlumAlley.co, Deborah had a 21 year career in investment banking and earned her MBA from Columbia Business School. She has served on numerous governmental, charitable and national non-profit boards, including Legal Momentum, The Citizens Budget Commission, Heart and Soul Charitable Fund, and French American Aid for Children.

You can follow her on Twitter @dbdj1007.

Tina Gong

Tina Gong: Creative Director of Plum Alley

Tina Gong

Creative Director

Tina is the artistic director and designer for PlumAlley.co. Tina directs our developers and programmers in creating the technology used on our site and in our initiatives. She has experience with HTML, CSS, JavaScript, jQuery, and Ruby. Her infographic work for Jumpthru has been published in TechCrunch, VentureBeat and Mashable among other publications. Tina received her Bachelor’s Degree from NYU in 2011 with a concentration in linguistics and pattern systems. In her free time, she draws, illustrates, plays Pokemon and has exhibits of her artwork in the NYU Galleries. Her talent shows in the Plum Alley brand from the overall look and feel of the website to every graphic presented in materials and promotions.

Joan Costello

Joan Costello: Director of Merchant Services at Plum Alley

Joan Costello

Director of Merchant Relations

Joan Costello, Director of Merchant Relations, is responsible for all outreach and management of the merchants featured on PlumAlley.co. Since joining PlumAlley.co in June 2012, Joan has been responsible for recruiting over 40 female founded companies who have inspiring products. These accomplished female founders represent a wide range of talent and include CFDA winners, and have affiliations with the Museum of Modern Art, Vogue, TechCrunch, and ABC Carpet and Home, just to name a few. Joan’s background includes a Bachelor’s Degree in International Fashion Merchandising Management from the Fashion Institute of Technology, having studied in Florence and New York. She has a talent for photography and you can find her skill in photos on the Plum Alley site. Joan is obsessed with details and loves when there are surprises found within design. Her time out of the office is spent running in Prospect Park, letting loose to live music, and spoiling her dog.

Carol Pak

Carol Pak: Director of Operations at Plum Alley

Carol Pak

Director of Operations

Carol manages the day to day operations of PlumAlley.co and is responsible for the business functions of the company. In addition to implementing growth and customer acquisition, Carol manages Plum Alley’s strategic relationships and special events with influential organizations such as 85 Broads and 100 Women in Hedge Funds. A city girl at heart with ‘the sky’s the limit’ mindset, Carol graduated from Stuyvesant High School and the University of Michigan. Prior to PlumAlley.co, Carol held positions at 9-5 Non-Profit and NYC Council, as well as founding a mobile application company. Carol also co-organizes the New York Silicon Alley meetup. There is no stopping Carol who brings focus and boundless energy to Plum Alley.

Plum Alley Consultants

Anna Curran

Anna Curran: Strategic Advisor at Plum Alley

Anna Curran

Strategic Advisor

Anna serves as a strategic advisor to PlumAlley.co assisting with branding, communications as well as merchant strategy and acquisition. She is the founder of a print-on-demand startup CookbookCreate.com.

Charlotte Kellogg

Charlotte Kellogg: Director of Content at Plum Alley

Charlotte Kellogg

Online Content Advisor

Charlotte creates and manages content for Plum Alley, including the interviews and bios of our featured founders as well content for all our social media channels.

Pamela Castillo

Pamela Castillo: Director of Product

Pamela Castillo

E-Commerce Strategy Advisor

Pamela has an impressive career as both a strategist & product designer, as well as a Founder & CEO. Pamela has worked with clients such as Estée Lauder, The New Museum, Fashism and Chloe + Isabel improving the front-end product design. Pamela’s own company, Market Publique, which launched in 2009, has been featured in Lucky Magazine, Style.com, WWD and Daily Candy, among others. Pamela holds an MFA in Design & Technology from Parsons and has experience with several programming languages. She loves cheese, shoes, Instagram and Brooklyn. Oh, and that funny accent is because she was born and raised in Guatemala.

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Other Initiatives

Nominate a Female Founder to be featured on Plum Alley

Nominate a Female Founder

PlumAlley.co profiles female founders and their amazing products. Companies featured on PlumAlley.co must be 51% female owned, and have reached over $100k in annual revenue to qualify. If you know of a female founder or have founded a company yourself, please fill out a form on our website to be considered for PlumAlley.co.

Nominate
Digital Map of Female Founders: Launching Soon

Digital Map of Female Founders

PlumAlley.co promotes female founded companies on our Digital Map of Female Founders. Please let us know about your favorite female founded companies, boutiques, galleries, restaurants, by providing us with the information here (launching soon). Companies must be 51% female owned to qualify. Together we can elevate the awareness of female owned companies by literally putting them on the map!

Launching Soon

#FFFF - Female Founder Follow Friday

Female Founder Follow Friday #FFFF

Every Friday on Twitter, join us in tweeting the twitter handles for the female founders you admire. Your tweet should include their handle and the hashtag #FFFF (Female Founder Follow Friday). This action will help us find other female founders and amplify their presence.

Plum Alley on Twitter
BlogHer Entrepreneurs Conference

PlumAlley.co at BlogHer Entrepreneurs '13 Conference

Plum Alley founder, Deborah Jackson will be mentoring at this year's BlogHer Entrepreneur's Conference. Join her and other amazing women at Silicon Alley on March 21st - 22nd. We are offering a discount code for PlumAlley.co users: Enter E13InventYourFuture during registration!

Register Now
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