Lauren Egge
Founder and CEO, Noka Supply
When Lauren Egge decided to quit her corporate job and launch her company — a line of everyday accessories that help you take better care of your health — she not only needed income but also a way to build prototypes for her products.
Fortuitously, she found a gig that let her do both: working at a local maker space doing machine maintenance and member support. The downsides? "The job paid a fraction of my previous salary, and the only shifts available were Friday to Sunday, 4 p.m. to 1 a.m., so my social life took a serious nosedive," she recalls.
But she also had access to the space's equipment and could spend her free hours working on her own projects. "I was able to 3D print and test dozens of designs … a process that would have been prohibitively expensive otherwise," she says. "That job ended up being critical to the success of my company."
Dreamers // Doers mission is to increase the number of successful ventures launched by women. It consists of Collective, a high-impact community reaching over 25,000 women globally, and Onyx, a highly curated private members' collective for value-driven female founders, trailblazers, and change-makers.