Ep 59 -Finding Support for a Fresh Start: Featuring Olivia Howell
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Today we’re chatting with Olivia Howell, co-founder and CEO of Fresh Starts Registry. We’re talking all about destigmatizing the big life changes that we all go through, and getting the support you need for your own fresh start.
You can listen right here, on Apple, Amazon, Spotify or you can read the transcription below. Enjoy!
Carly: Hey friend, so today I'm really excited to bring you a conversation with Olivia Howell. I'm going to tell you her bio in a second, but I just need you to know that this episode is about no matter where you're coming to me from, no matter what your life experience is, this is a conversation that you're going to want to listen to, because we have either needed this in our own life, or we know someone who needs it right now.
So. Without further ado, Olivia Howell, is the co-founder and CEO of Fresh Starts Registry, the first and only platform for everything you need to begin again, including divorce or breakup, moving, career changes, stepping into your truth, or starting again after grief. After her divorce in 2019, Olivia had an aha moment when she realized that we celebrate weddings and babies with a registry.
But, in the moments where we really need to restock our lives, like divorce, job loss, or any brave decision and major life change, we need the support, both in the form of support items for your home, And the experts who become our hype team. So from there, Fresh Starts Registry was born, the first support registry and divorce registry, and the only platform that aggregates support experts for all life changes and supports the Fresh Starts experts in their marketing, business, and public relations.
Olivia is also the co-host of the top-rated Personal Journals podcast, A Fresh Story.
Welcome to the show, Olivia.
Olivia: I'm so happy to be here, Carly.
From Idea to Business: The Evolution of Fresh Starts
Carly: Thank you so much. I'm really excited to have this conversation. So, let's start at the beginning. I know that we shared the short version of how Fresh Starts came to be, but can you tell us a little bit more about how Fresh Starts bloomed from an idea to a full-fledged business?
Olivia: I think you'll appreciate this story as what you do. I was Separated in April 2019.
I had a five-year-old and a three-year-old. I have a marketing agency. That's what my background is in. So, I was going through it and anybody that's been through a separation, whether it's a divorce or just a breakup knows how traumatizing it can be. Yeah. My sister and I own the marketing agency together, we do everything together.
She's a couple of years younger than me. She came over and we were decluttering the house, going through everything. Obviously, my ex-husband had taken all of his stuff out of the house and it was a really, you know, we don't talk about the physicality of divorce and like what happens with all the things, right?
And so he took his guitars off the wall, and he cleared out his music studio, and what was left was the sheets we had monogrammed from our wedding, and our utensils, and all these things, and so I had this moment where I was like, wait a second, this is when I need to restock my life, I stayed in the marital residence, I was very grateful that I got the chance to do that, but it didn't feel like my house, it felt very empty like a ghost was living there.
So, I googled divorce registry. I honestly thought that there probably was something that was like that, and there wasn't. The only thing that came up were articles from places like Vogue that said, why is there not a divorce registry? I have my own theories now about why, So, I'm the kind of person that thinks if it doesn't exist, I will Field of Dreams that Crap.
Carly: Oh, and you can curse here too. You can say whatever you want.
Olivia: I will Field of Dreams that shit. And so, I came to my sister. At the time we had a six-figure marketing agency. We had clients all over the world. And I was like, Hey, Jenny, what if we build this registry platform, for people to restock their lives?
And at the time she was engaged. She was in a long-time relationship. She was supposed to get married in May 2020. This was like late 2019 that we were talking about this. And she was like, well, you know, I'm getting married and we have all these clients and we don't have time to build a whole other company.
Let's think about it. So, the pandemic came, she was supposed to get married, but she ended up pushing the wedding, obviously, they pushed it enough times that they just ended their relationship, and she had the opposite thing happen, so whereas I stayed in the marital residence, she was living in an apartment in Queens with her ex-fiance, and she literally left with nothing, and it's, it moved back here to Long Island, which is where we're from, and she got her apartment and she had nothing.
She had literally nothing. So she had to restock her life. And so she came back to me and she was like, Oh yes, I see now why this was such a good idea. Yeah. And so we were founded in 2021 and we are the first and only divorce registry. We are the first and only support registry. That's a term that we coined.
We're the first and only platform for both the items you need, but also the experts you need. So that was something really important to me. We did a lot of research and we found that the average person goes through about 14 major life changes in their life. Right. So between. Breakups, job losses, moving, grief, all of these things.
And for every one of those experiences, you use about 10 experts. And so for me, I wanted one place where you could come and know, I'm going to work with a Fresh Starts expert. They are vetted. We make every one of our experts. Well, they have to apply, first of all, and then we vet them heavily. We make sure they're not selling snake oil, that their social media is legit, and that they have to sign a waiver that says that they are inclusive, non-judgmental, and shame-free.
And we have experts in all different categories from all over the world, and they're amazing. And so, That was how we got started and we are just super proud of what we're doing. But the little thing about building a registry is that a registry doesn't actually make money. So we are powered by Amazon for a few reasons.
One of them was security. We had looked into building a registry platform. I had been social, a social media director for about seven years at a baby registry company.
Carly: Oh, wow. One of the first.
Olivia: Yeah. And so I had had a little background in, in registries and we looked into building it. And the problem with building a platform is that it can be easily compromised.
And if you look at the audience who comes to use Fresh Starts, most of the people are going through these pretty scary, big, brave life changes like a divorce or transitioning, coming out, all of these things. And so we stuck with Amazon because they are safe and secure. They keep your address hidden from everybody.
But we needed to make money, right? We were like, okay, well, how do we make money? And so we thought, well, we have a marketing background, so what can we do with that? And so we built out our expert community where we have this amazing membership community for anybody that wants to come join and be a Fresh Starts expert, and we provide them with support in building their business.
So social media coaching, business coaching, lunch and learn workshops, and we do PR for them, which for $37 a month is completely unheard of. We've gotten our experts into about 500 pieces of press over the last couple of years. So, it's pretty wild and we are just so excited about what we do. We do a lot of support education and teach people how to speak to each other, how to support each other, and really bridge that gap between the people who need the support and the people who want to support them.
Supporting Life Transitions: How Fresh Starts Can Help
Carly: Yeah, and you do an amazing job. I'm backtracking a little bit, but I really want two things to sink in. Number one, if you're going through a life change and you need support, this is a free resource that you can go to because anyone who needs the support doesn't have to pay anything.
There's no paywall.
Olivia: Correct. Nope, there's not. You can come to build a registry for free. And we have bundles based on rooms of the house, based on price points, and we're actually starting to do more branded bundles. So working with Companies like Raveleave and all of these awesome other support industry companies they're going to create their own bundles so people can go and see what they recommend as well.
And then you can also add anything you want. We've had people come and they add disco balls and really awesome pirate flags to their registries. We have a children's room bundle. We have. We have, we know we really thought about the user experience and who is building these bundles. And so you can go add all the things that we have added these products to your registry, but yes, Carly it's free to build a registry.
It's free to browse the experts and get in touch with them. And we don't collect user data. Yeah. So we actually have no idea who's using the website. We don't track user data beyond the cookies on the website. And so it's really safe for people to come in that contemplation stage and start building their registry.
Fresh Starts for Entrepreneurs: Supporting Your Business
Carly: And one of the reasons that I love it so much as somebody who works with people who are going through major changes is that there's so much Vulnerability in that moment, and I think a lot of times it's really hard to ask for help, Specifically, and if you're not at the place where you know what to ask and Maybe you're even contemplating divorce, but you don't maybe you don't want to talk to your friends yet Because you know that once you kind of say it you can't unsay it that sort of feeling that I know is So, so prominent.
This is a safe place where you can go to see who's out there, to connect with experts, and it's not like you have to give information to get their information. It's really, really beautiful the way that it's set up. The other thing I wanted to say as someone who has been part of the Fresh Starts Community on the expert back end, is if you are a business owner and you are listening to this and you're thinking to yourself, Wow, I love to write and I wish that I could be featured in different articles in major publications, For the love of God, join Fresh Starts registry.
You guys, I can't express to you how many times my name has been mentioned. I've been quoted in beautiful publications that I had not been featured in before, including, but not limited to, Apartment Therapy and Real Simple. I think I've been quoted in them something like five times in the last month and a half.
Olivia: A couple coming up too, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. \ and I think that it's almost hard, when you, and you understand this Carly, because you do a lot of things, right? When you have a startup that does a lot of stuff, right? You're like, well, how do I explain everything we do? And so, yeah, for us, we believe this support starts with support.
Right? So we are adamant about supporting our experts on basically, we always say like, we're your business backend. We come in, we have open office hours three times a week. You can come in and talk to us about whatever you need to do. I'm a certified life and business coach. I will help you. My sister is our COO and graphic designer.
She literally sits with people and helps them to redesign their websites. And this is all included for $37 a month,
Carly: which is wild.
Olivia: It's wild. Yeah.
Carly: You have so many resources that I haven't even had the bandwidth to utilize them all. Yeah. It's beautiful. And also, I didn't realize that Jen is your sister.
Olivia: Yeah, she's my little sister.
Carly: Oh my gosh. So I have three sisters and we're like, too close. And so.
Olivia: Sister sister. Yeah, yeah. No, we do everything together. She actually just moved to Scotland. She got married. She got remarried to somebody else. Not remarried. She was never married, but she married. She has a beautiful love story in which she got in touch with somebody from her past whom she had met at a museum and they got married just very recently.
So we have a global relationship and it works really well with us. Yeah. Thank God for technology. It's amazing. We're on Zoom all day together. We just hang out on Zoom. Yeah.
Carly: I have a friend who will likely be moving overseas soon and I'm like, you know what? We've got FaceTime. We've got all these things that weren't possible when we met.
So that's, I mean, Yeah, that's beautiful.
Okay, so, if someone's going through a big change, I know we've talked about some of the ways that Fresh Starts can help them on their journey, but I was wondering if by chance, and I know I'm springing this on you, do you have a story that you're particularly proud of that's happened in the Fresh Starts community.
Real-Life Stories from Fresh Starts
Olivia: Yeah, yeah, for sure. So like I said, we don't collect user data. I say my DMs are always open, and so we end up getting a lot of people who come, especially because I'm so open with my divorce story, and part of my platform, my personal platform is de-stigmatizing and taking the shame out of divorce.
And so I get a lot of women who will come into my DMs and tell me that they use Fresh Starts, and so One of the stories that I cry every time I talk about it is when we built out these bundles, the children's room bundle was really important for me because a lot of women are forced to leave their marital home. After all, they can't afford it and downsize, often to a small apartment.
And as a mother, it's our first goal is to make our kids feel safe, right? And make them feel like they're at home somewhere. But as a single mother, you're often really limited in what you can physically do, right? You can't actually build the furniture with two people because it's often just you in the middle of the night.
Yeah. So I put a lot of time and thought into building this bundle of children's room items that were affordable, easy to build, and would be really homey. And so we actually got a video from a woman who used our, I literally cry every time, our children's room bundle, sending us a video of her boy's rooms that she had set up with the items in the bundle and like thanking us.
I don't care how much money I make in this world. Like, that is everything to me. It's really important for me, especially with women, I mean, men too, but for women to know that they can leave toxic situations and get the support they need. And the beauty of Fresh Starts is that it is a community-driven platform.
Right? You build your registry and we have scripts that you can send with your registry in a text message that says, Hey, I'm going through this life change. If you'd like to support me, and it's so funny cause we've gotten a lot of pushback over the years.
We were in New York magazine and the comment sections were insane, you know, Oh, a divorce registry and this is ridiculous.
people will say,
Well, I'll bring over a bottle of wine after your breakup. Well, but maybe they don't need a bottle of wine. Maybe they need new sheets or maybe they need a toothbrush holder or cereal bowls for their kids, right?
And so we're really trying to shift that narrative for people on what does it mean to support somebody and like, it's okay to support them with the things that they actually need.
Carly: Oh my gosh. As someone who helps people declutter for a living, yeah, yeah. It's like when it's Teacher Appreciation Week and teachers are getting a thousand lotions, and then suddenly they have like a hundred lotions, they're like, I don't know what to do with this. Yeah. You know, people, what they need and what they receive are often two very, very different things.
But simply by asking, you can really help someone in a very tangible way.
Olivia: It's okay to ask for help too. And that's part of our mission. I'm also pretty woo. And so for me, it comes down to also just changing the vibration of the space you're in. Right. And like when you can, you know, when you can and I use this example all the time, but like, it's, we always joke, we're going to get like a gold plated toothbrush holder.
Carly: Cause this is like my thing, but When I was going through my divorce, and we had a toothbrush holder for four people my sister quietly changed it out for me. So it was like this beautiful little gold toothbrush holder from Target with three prongs in it. Coming into my bathroom and seeing that instead of the reminder of what I had, It literally made me feel loved.
It made me feel like I could keep making these brave decisions and snowballed my confidence. I think so much of and you know this better than anybody, Carly, but so much of the last couple of years have been about like, oh, let's do minimalistic stuff and like downsize and stuff doesn't mean anything, but stuff does mean something, right?
And so it's okay that it does mean something and it should mean something special when it comes from the people who love you.
I love that so much. And to your point earlier about shifting that energy. Yeah. And I think you said like changing the vibrations of a space. Yeah. I often tell people that by getting started, often by rustling up the energy in a space that maybe has been dormant for whatever reason, when you make any sort of change, it really does, it shifts that energy
it can do more than you think to just start making any sort of changes,
Budget-Friendly Space Transformation Tips After Life Changes
Carly: I have helped a lot of people declutter after divorce, after breakups, after someone left and they need to like never come back, and like us, you have to take this Decisive action in those moments to really physically reclaim your space in moments where, to your point, there can be like vacancies around a room because of whatever was there before.
so, I know that you talk about this a lot, but what are some ways, if you had like, okay, quick tip for you, what are some ways that people can make their home feel fresh and different without spending a lot of money in this time when money is probably, could be very tight?
Olivia: It always goes back to my top five.
Sheets, towels, utensils, dishes, plates, that, that's it. and if you look at our $99 bundles, you can have a completely fresh start. We have items for everything for under $99 and you can go add that to your registry. I always say it's the things that are tactile that are touched by the other person a lot, right?
So you change your sheets, number one. That's... Hands down, and donate the sheets that you have to an animal shelter or a church charity shop or something. I'm all about donations. And you can get amazing sheets on Amazon. I think most of the sheets on our bundles are from Amazon. My sheets are from Amazon Target, right?
Not a lot. And then utensils. utensils are huge and pick out something you love. I'm a small fork person. I'm a small fork girlie. And so I got rid of all my big forks. My poor boys who are now my size are like using the small forks. I'm a small fork person. So, you know, get new dishes and again, Target's so cheap, Amazon's cheap.
There are such great options. And then I would say. A lot of people tend to buy plants. Don't buy a plant unless you are okay with it dying, which some people are not, and so, you know, I waited a while before I bought myself plants, but stick with like, really and this was a tip from my therapist, was change the bed out first.
Bed has to be the first thing to go, get yourself a new blanket, and go with something soft, and lovely, and just yeah.
Carly: If that's your vibe. Go with your vibe.
Olivia: Your vibe. And that's the whole thing is like when you can start to make these decisions, which for a lot of these people, this is the first time in their life they've made decisions on their own about this stuff.
And that's so empowering.
Carly: Yeah, well, because you have been compromising for so long. And, you know, I have a long-term hubs over there. He would agree to this. Marriage ends up being just really a series of ongoing compromises. And to be able to look at your space with a fresh eye and say, what do I want, is beautiful.
Yeah. If you're afraid to kill plants, might I suggest a fake plant or some silk flowers?
Olivia: Oh, I never thought about silk florals. That's a good idea. Interesting. It took me a while. I do now love my plants, but I had to really come to terms with not being obsessive about taking care of them and just letting them live.
Carly: Yeah, it's hard. I won't point it out, but there is definitely one behind me that's dying that I'm like...
Olivia: Let's just pretend it's not there.
Carly: It happens. It happens.
Olivia: It does.
Key Advice for Those Going Through a Divorce: Lessons Learned from Personal Experience
Carly: Okay, so, for someone who's going through a divorce right now, what is the best piece of advice that you could give that you wish you had known when you started your journey?
Olivia: Always start with therapy. You always go to therapy first. Number one. Therapy, therapy. And then I'm going to recommend a divorce coach. And I want to talk about what a divorce coach is because they're kind of a newer thing. So, as we know forever, divorce lawyers are really f’king expensive, right? I think the average divorce lawyer's hourly starts at about 500 an hour.
And that's like... Not New York. My divorce lawyer, myself, I think was maybe $800 An hour.
An hour.
I say this because I want to explain, that we have amazing divorce coaches at Fresh Starts. A divorce coach helps you strategize and plan so that you can bring that to the lawyer.
And then it cuts down your time tremendously. They're also your emotional person to go to. Your divorce lawyer, God love them, is not supposed to be your emotional person. And I remember calling my divorce lawyer, and she was wonderful, obviously, but her job wasn't to hold my hand. saying things to her like, and he did it, and she's like, okay.
And I would say to my sister, she doesn't seem to care. My sister's like, she does this all day long. Why would she care about what he said to you, X, Y, Z? So. A typical divorce coach, you can work with them for, let's say six sessions, is under probably $2, 000 for six sessions, okay? They will do things with you, strategize a custody plan, and work on your inventory because something people don't realize is the first thing you do when you file for divorce is they will give you an inventory of your house.
I don't know, have you done this with clients, Carly?
Carly: I haven't, but I know what you're talking about, because then you have to go through and split everything, so you have to itemize what everything is.
Olivia: You itemize everything, and I'm talking about like the Tylenol for the kids, your like, chicken nuggets, like every single thing in the house, each person has to go through and itemize it, right, and then you give that to them because they have to see how much you spend on your regular life, so a divorce coach will help you through all of this, plus the emotional side I would say all of our divorce coaches work now, they work globally and they all offer free consultations. So if you are listening to this and you're considering a divorce, anything from considering to post-divorce and wanting to date again. Everything in there.
They also are really amazing about keeping it in a, keeping communication in a way that's safe for you. And so, we have divorce coaches who will use any form of communication to reach their clients. That makes sense, especially in that early consideration phase when they may not want their partner to know. So therapist and divorce coach, if you can manage to at least get a few sessions in with each of them, you will be starting the divorce process off in such a better place. And then my other kind of personal tip is do not post about it on social media. Like, keep it off social media.
People don't realize that your social media can be subpoenaed into court and used against you. It baffles me when I go on TikTok and I see some of these women talking about their ex-husbands and going through a divorce and blah, blah, blah. Any lawyer will tell you the same. So that's just my personal tip that I always give to people.
Also, if you're going through a divorce and your ex is trying to get you into a conversation to say you're going to give them something or do something, just keep using the line thank you for the information. We'll let our lawyers handle this and you can not. Keep that conversation going.
Carly: I love that.
That's beautiful. Very practical and fantastic advice. I really, really appreciate you being here today because I think, It'll be really enlightening for anyone who's in an early consideration phase, but also very practical for moving forward no matter where in either the divorce journey or, as you mentioned, it could be about grief, it can be about coming out, it can be about these other Life changes that are part of life, but sometimes very, very difficult.
Olivia: And also, I want to add too, Carly, we have a lot of people who are single women who come to make registries because they are not getting married or having babies, but they are getting their first apartment or graduating medical school or a Ph.D. And we see a lot of people talking on the internet about things like, well, I don't have children or I'm not getting married.
Where's my registry? It's at Fresh Starts. You can come to Fresh Starts. We believe that everybody is worthy of a registry.
Carly: I think that's so beautiful. As somebody who skipped the bridal shower and I don't have children and I'm not going to, I think that's really fun.
Olivia: I think that's really, really fun.
We're all about meeting people where they are. And you know what? Yeah. If somebody can't celebrate you and your accomplishments and get them out of your life then they don't need to be there.
Carly: So. Seriously, if anyone is a budding entrepreneur, this could be a really good opportunity for you to do a little new biz registry too.
Guys, let's celebrate everything.
Olivia: Oh my gosh, we have a bundle on there for business stuff, for sure. Yeah and like you said, Carly, before, especially if you're an expert who is becoming a life coach or starting to be an organizer, we have one of our organizers Shantae, who we love, Shantae, and she has been with us the entire time since we founded, we were founded, I think, And watching her journey, just as we supported her, she has been in the Washington Post and Real Simple and all of these places, right?
It's just amazing to be able to provide this web of support for everybody.
Carly: It's beautiful. And if you're an organizer listening, connect with them because they have more inquiries than everyone can answer at the moment. So, yes, please. Yeah, get in there. Please.
Carly: Any final thoughts to share before I let you go for the day?
Olivia: I just would love to say my DMs are always open and if you have a question about what kind of expert you need or if you just need a little hype, please always I always say my DMs are like a 24-hour diner and I'm happy to chat with you. I love it.
Carly: It's like a diner that comes with an emotional hug.
Olivia: Exactly. Always.
Carly: You guys are the best. Please tell our friends at home where they can find you.
Olivia: Yeah, you can go to FreshStartsRegistry. com to learn more. If you're interested in becoming an expert, there's a button there to become an expert. You can browse the registry and browse the expert guide.
Our podcast is called A Fresh Story. We are actually launching a full season about divorce in January, which is divorce month. And so it's going to be with a ton of our experts about everything you need to know about divorce. So that's exciting. We're on our fourth season now, and there are lots and lots of Fresh Start stories on there.
And we like to talk about the hard stuff, so it's all good. And you can find us at Fresh Starts Registry on Instagram. And my personal handle is @TheDigitalYenta everywhere.
Carly: Perfect. , we are going to have all of these links in the show notes as well, so feel free to just scroll down and click. And Olivia, thank you so much again for being here.
I appreciate you.
Olivia: Thank you so much, Carly.
We would love to make sure that your questions are answered for a question of the week or a future episode. So we love to hear from you. DM (on Instagram) or you can always email me, carly@tidyrevival.com. We love hearing from you. We love hearing your thoughts about the pod, and thank you so much for hanging out.
If you wanna learn more about how I can help you, feel free to head over to tidyrevival.com to learn how I work with people one-on-one or in our private community. If you enjoyed this episode, please be sure to subscribe so you'll always have access to the latest episode.
We would also love to hear your takeaways. Feel free to tag us on Instagram, Facebook, or TikTok. The Tidy Revival podcast is written and hosted by me, Carly Adams, and edited by Brittany McLean. Title Song Maverick is by Dresden The Flamingo.
and until next time, remember that…
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