Product designs from women are often inspired by personal wishes that can’t be found anywhere. That’s Sam Razzaghi’s story at a high level, but Sam is motivated by much more than wanting a more functional bag for the commute, as she shares in this episode.

Sam Razzaghi is the designer behind the brand new (soon-to-be-launched) Pensatta Bag. Like so many women, Sam still works full time as she builds this business, working late in the evenings to bring her creation to the market of women who are excited to finally have a bag that checks all the right boxes—naturally, it took an engineer to make it happen.

As an immigrant to Canada, Sam is driven to do more than simply make money selling bags. She wants to connect and empower women, help them build and fortify the resilience they already possess. 

Be sure to listen in on Sam’s story in this episode and follow her to hear all the news about Pensatta on her website, shop, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and YouTube.

Full episode transcript

Karen: Hello, and welcome to the Small But Mighty Biz Stories podcast. I'm Karen Wilson, and today I'm pleased to welcome Sam Razzaghi to the show. Sam is the creator behind Pensatta, a bag that I'm personally very excited about. Before we talk about this, Sam, please tell my listeners about you and your business.

Sam: Hey, Karen. Thank you for having me. As Karen said, I'm Sam. I am a petroleum engineer in the morning, and I just started this, let's say, side hobby as a business and designed a bag for women on the go. And I’m excited to be here.

Karen: That's great. Tell me, Sam, it's an interesting combination of work that you have going on as a petroleum engineer and handbag designer. How did that come about?

Sam: Yes, it's interesting. I always had an eye for fashion, I guess. I'm a bit lazy to carry multiple bags. In my day, when I go to the office and I saw lots of people at the elevator, they're coming up and they have multiple bags, one for shoes, one for laptop. 

Also in my commute, I always see people walking or women walking on their sneakers, and they have their high heels inside the bag they're carrying, which I didn't like, it is not hygiene. I see people really just carrying so many stuff. I was always thinking how can I combine them all together, which is not heavy, and I'm trying to encourage basically women, don't carry so many stuff, just be organized and have something that does not look like a gym bag. Let's say it that way. It's not like the tote bag that you can just pile up everything.

I think always guys making a joke about women bags that they say you can find everything in it, and everything is piled up. Now, basically the reason behind having Pensatta, and basically making it, is just when you look at it from the top, you know where your stuff is, and it's easy to access, and you don't have to carry so many bags. 

I tried, I looked at to see if there is anything outside that I can buy, and I couldn't find really something that basically fit my purpose of not carrying so many bags, and it’s still light and it’s still fashionable.

For that reason, I try to kind of make it myself. Interestingly, I talk with so many women about this situation, and during the last 15 months, I interviewed women that they are in sales, they are bankers, they are living in the corporate life. They all agreed that they don't want to put their shoes next to their laptop maybe, or the other stuff they have, the essential, and the-

Karen: And food, including water bottles. In a way, it feels wrong.

Sam: Exactly. I had a survey, which was really interesting, that everybody, kind of 60% to 70% of them they were saying, "Yes, we want a bag, we're carrying bags for shoes, extra bag, or for our food." I have a customer that she bought this bag just because she's carrying extra bag for her basically as a lunch bag. She said like, "I'm not going to use this compartment for shoes, but I'm going to use it for my lunch." 

It's very functional, and it's not too bulky. That was my goal. I had two prototypes to make sure it's not too bulky, too big. This hidden pocket, nobody knows it's there. It's basically a hidden pocket there.

The interesting part is, you can always fold it in, and it becomes such a normal bag from inside. I think the way I would call it, I engineered this bag, let's say that way.

Karen: Yes, it looked engineered.

Sam: Yes, that was the purpose of that.

Karen: Which isn’t surprising, because you're an engineer.

Sam: Exactly.

Karen: One of the things that struck me when I first saw it, and I shared with you that as soon as I saw your website and we connected through SheEO. You had shared on one of the calls we were both on your website. I went to it and immediately I was sold. If I was still commuting, I would have purchased it right away because it solves a problem that I had all the time, because I used to have under my desk, my supply of work shoes. That's not a great look, I never really liked having them there, but it was convenient, and I didn't have to carry shoes back and forth every day, particularly during the winter.

Then just the added functionality of being able to organize everything and all the pockets and little cubbies that makes it easy to find what you need, that just adds to this whole other dimension of usefulness to the bag because I'm not a big fan of the totes that have nothing in them. I feel like I have to go and buy organization tools to make it useful.

Sam: That's right. I'm glad you brought it up. If you're living in a corporate life and you have an office, you have some times, and I have the same kind of a problem, I have a couple of shoes at my office. Sometimes I want it for just grab it and just go for dinner after my work, then I don't have to go and just change. Or for a weekend, I want to have my nice high heel at the office for the weekend, and I have to carry it back home.

The other thing is, there are lots of people that don't have an office, and they're always commuting, like hairdressers, let's say, or like lawyers. They have offices but they are out. Like the realtors, they always see clients outside. Basically, we know women, they are very powerful, they want to always look good. When they see clients, first impression is always important. My goal is to help these women to be hassle-free, and hands-free, basically, and they can do their job in the best things they can. I won't see myself to have three bags carrying and be still focus.

It's funny, even in my engineering job. Because of my laziness, I have to come with some innovation or creativity to solve my problem rather than go through the shortcut maybe. Rather than going through those steps and things. 

I figured this bag can really solve my problem, and lots of other women out there. This is like team bond, as we are kind of like messaging it out in our website. It's you're not going to buy another laptop, you're not going to buy another kind of like, the let's say crossbody, because it comes with that little crossbody, which I found it is necessary to be there.

The reason is I'm in the office and I want to just going to go and grab a coffee. I don't want to get my big bag, and I am really a fan of being hands-free. I didn't want it to be a wallet. It's a little wallet basically, it still has some space for your credit card and even your phone. I made sure basically every phone size can fit.

Karen: Oh, that's so good.

Sam: Yes, even like the boarding pass if you're traveling, and passport, it's fitting really easily. I know we are in the world that right now we don't do much traveling.

Karen: It's going to come back.

Sam: It's going to come back. Right. You're not going to stay in this world, I would say. COVID basically taught us to be ready for everything. Anything can happen overnight. Going back to that. This is basically, it makes you to just do one single investment, and that's it.

Karen: Yes. It's so useful. Just looking at the pictures and the videos, I can see where it would be extremely valuable even for travel. Because I have yet to, when I'm travelling for business, have that perfect bag, that is a nice size, but it fits everything, fits under the seat in front of me, because you want that accessible, because if you're on a work trip, you're probably going to do a bit of work. This bag actually not only looks like it would fit comfortably under the seat, it would be easy to access what you need.

Sam: Exactly. Then you always have that cross-body for like, just like boarding pass and passport. You don't have to even like touch this bag. I did travel a lot with this bag. The reason is, I had like two prototypes until I get to the perfect one, and with my job, I was travelling a lot. 

One time I had my, not a big boot, but still it's like this small boot, and in the airport, I had to change because it was too hot in the airport and I'm just like, "I'm going to die here right now." I was just like, "Wow. Now I can change here and just have my flat on." As soon as I got to my destination, which wasn't a warm place because I used to go a lot from Calgary to Houston, and it's warm over there.

So you have your mini boots, and then you get there, and you have to have like flat or high heels on. It was very helpful during that. I tried it because I wanted to make sure the handles are good enough, and they can basically handle whatever we are putting in. This bag is light because I made sure it's calf skin, is a very light leather. I asked my manufacturer to don't use very heavy filling in it. They made it really light. When it's empty, it's very light. Then after that, then you're filling it in, is not going to be too heavy to carry, basically.

Karen: Oh, that's great. That's the other thing, is that so many bags, and I have a lot of really good quality leather bags, but they do get heavy if I'm, especially if I'm putting an iPad in, or a laptop it gets just too heavy.

Sam: Yes.

Karen: How long have you been working on this?

Sam: It took me exactly, I guess I would say I started two years ago. I signed up in a program with lots of other people that they were building products, and we were all in the same group, and it was very helpful for me because I was encouraged and the direction they gave it to me to be focused and go with it. It was really good. Yes, two years ago. I had this idea for five years. Let's say, let's put it that way. Then two years ago, I was just like, I'm going to do it finally. I have to. I have to make this happen. Because I wanted to be committed, I put myself in a program to make sure I'm going to do this. It took me two years, and the reason was, I was doing-- I was a little bit perfectionist, and my husband is very perfectionist too.

It doesn't help if you have two people, maybe I would say he's more perfectionist than me. If it was him, I wouldn't, I think, finish it yet. I was just like, okay, now it's time. I think it's perfect enough, we can become launch it. Yes, I started with the survey first. I was so loud and clear whenever I was going with my colleagues that the nature of my work is mostly guys, and I was telling them, "Hey, I'm excited. I'm just designing a handbag," and they were looking at me like, okay, but some of them, they were already encouraging actually, and they were like, "Okay, we're going to take it to our wife, and we're going to show them." 

A couple of them became my customer actually, which was, they were like, "We are going to buy it for my wife, she's a lawyer, and she loved it." 

I started with survey first, and women, they were telling me like, what is their struggle? I put them all together. Then I went with designer, and I worked with her. I was trying to like, yes, how we can put it. It was always thinking if it put where to put the pockets for shoes. I have seen in the gym bags, it’s always on the side. I was just like, if we put it on the side, it's really difficult to access it and like push it in. I don't want to have a very wide back. This is not going to a gym bag. Finally, I'm like, okay, we're going to go simple, sleek, and just put it on the front.

Then the second thing was finding a manufacturer that they can make it happen. I partnered with a really good manufacturer, and basically, they helped me to come up with a prototype. I wanted to make sure the inside looks luxury. It has a suede, nice suede in it, and make sure the shoe compartment, it's waterproof, and you can wipe it easily. I wanted to make sure also it's not a hard compartment, it’s a soft compartment. When I'm saying soft, it means it's there like the back that you can fold it back. From the inside, you have to fold it back. It took me like comes of conversation with the manufacture, like, and like, yes, can you add these and can you add that, can we do with this?

Actually, I would like to share my experience with anybody that wants to build something, any product, any physical product. Your first prototype, you are going to hate it. It's like it comes in, I'm like, no way, this is not what I was imagining. Then second comes in, and you're feeling like, okay, it's a little better. Just don't give up, just push for it and just make it better and better. It comes through.

Karen: That's great advice.

Sam: Yes, exactly. It's like, you go through those process, and you're just like, okay, I'm going to give up now. This is not, and maybe I changed my manufacture, and you blame others. Like I need to change like manufacture now. They don't know what to do. I just like, no, just work with them. 

I don't know, I can't really remember how many times I took this bag and took it to some other small companies that they are doing bags and things. I showed them, and they were like, you know what? They did a great job with swinging, because you will always like doubting yourself. I'm like, is it good enough? Is this sewing and this stitching and everything is, looks good. Then zipper.

Actually last week, I managed to go to a manufacturer here locally. They were telling me, you know what, we cannot make this bag here. This is zipper, because that was really important, the zipper is very smooth, opening and closing, and we cannot even have it here. 

It's like, okay, so I'm getting more confidence, and that's where you are like, yes, now I'm confident that what I'm selling is something that I can be behind it and say, yes, I tried it. I tested it. I gave it to a couple of my friends to test it for a week or two weeks to make sure they're comfortable with it. Then come back to me and give me some feedback.

Because I started two years ago, I have some people from Italy, Australia and around the world, as a customer and as a people, they supported me. I just went back to them again, and I said, "Hey, I'm building it, this is here, tell me what you want to be added, or what do you think about it?" 

Some of the feedback was very instructive. I basically went back and applied it. Some of them wasn't doable. You cannot do them all basically, but you have to listen to your customer, what they're looking for, before even jumping and building. 

Sometimes you have a really beautiful product and you haven't had that relationship with your customer, and they don't know what you have done, but I build community. To me, this bag is just a symbol. I'm trying to build a community around it for women on the go, resilient women. That's my big vision, is to create jobs for new immigrants and newcomers that comes to Canada and try to train them.

Karen: What is some of the motivation behind that for you?

Sam: I emigrated myself 12 years ago. When I say it out loud, I cannot believe it's already 12 years. I moved to Calgary because I was in oil and gas, and Alberta is the hub for oil and gas. I was one of the luckiest one that I came to Canada back in 2008 to present my paper, which was related to my PhD, in one of the conferences here.

On the spot, they interviewed me and hired me. I went back home, originally from Iran. I went back home to finish my PhD. I moved January 2009 to Calgary. Since then, I have been in oil and gas, and I'm one of the luckiest one, I have a stable job because of the oil crash back in 2014. In the oil crash, lots of people, they went through the hard time. 

I wasn't directly impacted, but we got also impacted with what we have done here in Calgary. As a newcomer, you have some skill set that you had back home. When you come to Canada, maybe there is no opportunity for that kind of the skill set that you have, and you have to rebrand yourself.

Karen: You hear stories about that a lot in the professional fields where their certifications don't carry over.

Sam: Exactly. I think you need diversification too. Especially in Alberta, we don't have to be always in oil and gas. Now, Alberta is becoming a good hub for the tech companies. I went back and I was just like, "How can I make a community around my bag?" There are tons of people that they're not in tech. Those people need jobs, too. Or they don't know what to do, or maybe they have the skill set.

I'm in the process of finding organizations in the immigration or women in need. I have a couple of meetings set up for the next couple of months and next week to talk and brainstorm. It's the vision for me. I'm driven that way. I don't know what's going to happen, but that's what I'm going for. The beauty of being entrepreneur, if I want to call myself, you have to be always creative and just work around it. That's one thing.

I started a blog next to my store. I'm trying to come up with the topics that helps women. The first topic we had was one of the girls that I was following on LinkedIn. She's based in Houston. She is branding herself as a petroleum engineer in the community. Because as a petroleum engineer, you always think, "How do you want to brand yourself?" Social media, it's going to be boring, I guess. That was my opinion. Then I saw this girl, I'm like, "Oh, yes, you could always brand yourself, it seems, in the social media as a petroleum engineer, too." I was so impressed with her.

I sent her a message and I was just like, "I would love to interview and talk about how to be career-focused." It's basically what she is. She's very focused on what she wants, and she's going through it. We can share with the audience, and they can go and just read about her. We have a couple more coming. One of them is about a lady. She's a TEDx talk. She's all about resiliency, and my community is about resilient women.

My interview with her is about how to become resilient. I believe that in our kind of life, we are resilient. Especially as you are an immigrant, you have to look at the bigger picture. You always have to check what's going on and how to move. There's lots of setback in our life. 

We haven't built our life here from age of 20. I moved here when I was 33, so I had to start from scratch. Buying a house, mortgage. People around me with the same age already paid off their mortgage, and I'm still new. You have to accept that you are emigrated to a new country, and it's a new culture. You have to be always ready to change.

I think now, with this COVID thing, it's very interesting. Sometimes we're laughing at it. The passport doesn't mean anything, what kind of passport you have, because you cannot travel at the moment. It doesn't matter where you are from. It's a new norm, and you have to accept what you are going. 

All of those things. I think from the family that my dad had his own traditional way of business. I'm still familiar with entrepreneurship, but the way that they were setting up their business was totally different from what we are in today.

Karen: What kind of business did he have?

Sam: My grandpa, he used to make jewelry. I was five years old when he passed away. That's what I heard. My dad and my uncles, they all had their own kind of jewelry store. It wasn't really wild things, but that's what they basically had. They had their own difficulties and things, and they built it from scratch, basically. 

The funniest part is they wanted us as kids to just study. They didn't want us to be entrepreneur or have business. That's the reason I got PhD, I guess. When I finished my master's, my dad called me, "Your next step is PhD," and I'm like, "Really?" He was like, "Yes. Okay." It's interesting. They came from the mindset that we have to educate and go to university and get degree, while they were entrepreneur. We didn't know that concept that time.

My mom, I'm going to talk about her because she just passed away back in February. We just lost her. She was an encouragement for us, like how to be strong, and pushing us to go through the time. One of the things she was always telling me or telling all of us basically, "Life is difficult, but it's the way that you look at it, it makes it easy." You can look at it like it's really hard things to do, or you can look at it as like, "Oh, it's easy. This is going to pass." That was very strong. I guess here I am doing kinds of things that-- It took me 12 years to get to this place that I am now, but maybe I can help the other people or other newcomers to make this faster.

Karen: I love a lot of things about your story. The fact that you are an immigrant. Like myself, as I shared with you when we had our pre-show chat, that I'm an immigrant to Canada. I've been here for 20 years now. I love that a lot of the immigrants that I meet are very interested in building community, and helping people connect in Canada, in their new home. 

I love that so much because it just shows such a commitment to being a part of the Canadian landscape. Then the whole idea of taking that resilience and turning it into a reason for community, is a lovely thing. Because, you're right, I think that we do all have resilience in us, and that community strengthens it because we have those connections with other people as a support system, and you don't feel so alone. Because I remember what it was like those first few months I moved here.

I had my husband's family, but I didn't really have anybody else. It's a great thing when there are resources out there that you can turn to and connect with people who understand what it's like to go from another country to another country as opposed from city to city. If you moved from Calgary to Toronto, the change isn't going to be as abrupt as it would be going from Iran to Calgary. That’s a big deal. It's a lot to take in. That's an exciting thing to have someone to turn to in that.

Sam: That's true. I guess this COVID-19 is basically I think one thing that we can learn from it. You need to have virtual friends also because you go from here to there, and technology now is different from like 12 years ago. When I came to Calgary, there was Iranian community. Now it's grown so much, and there's many, many of us, I guess, here. Even like you want to also be with other communities. You don't want to always be with your own community because you want to go out and learn from other cultures. That's the beauty of that.

I was in a wedding a month ago or something, as soon as they said, like, we can have 50 people. They had their wedding, and it was really interesting count, it was like, I think if I'm not mistaken, around 15 people from different countries in just that wedding. It was very interesting to seeing people from around the Europe, in Middle East, Africa, everywhere. They are sitting on one roof and kind of like celebrating someone else's wedding. That's the beauty of Canada.

Karen: It really is.

Sam: It is, right? As you mentioned, we are both part of this beautiful community of SheEO which I just joined like two weeks and see where I am here; I know you. It's like people are willing to help each other. Yesterday in one of our meetings, they were asking what I'm grateful, and I was like, "I don't have a family here. My family is SheEO, let's say. My family are people that I'm building a relationship. When you're building a business, really building a relationship, it's part of it, which is very important to have. These days, with all this technology and how fast we could become all Zoom experts or Skype experts, it's just like we are accepting new life. Let's say that way.

I know you are not asking, I'm just giving the advice to a new entrepreneur. It's just like building a relationship as we go through and try to understand your customer, what is their need, what they want, and just make life better, especially for women, that they haven't taken maybe sometimes seriously in their life, in their corporate life or whatever. You have to keep going.

Karen: The point you were making about all of us becoming experts on this virtual life we're living now: I think that we can look at it as limiting, or we can look at it as expanding, because before COVID, I don't know how easily you and I would have crossed paths. I have definitely connected with people who I don't know if we would have met. We might have, but it might've been different circumstances, different timing. There's definitely been some advantages to this situation, and we just have to figure out what they are and leverage them in the way that works for us, because it's also exhausting to be on Zoom for too many hours in a day.

Sam: That's true. I would say during the last 15 months, I had people from different countries to work with me. I wanted to get design first to see how is the bag look like. I hired someone, I think he was somewhere in Africa, and then I wanted some help somewhere else. It's interesting. Now those platforms that they were there before, now they're becoming more exposed to people. That's interesting. 

The other thing is, I always say to people, I would never accept no as an answer. It's interesting, and sometimes it's frustrating my husband. I always try to find a solution around it. If they say, "Okay, you want to do this?" This is no. I'll try to, "Can we do it this way, or can we change it to fit now in this new purpose?” Always work around what you want.

You can improve your idea. Maybe your first idea is a no, but then you can work around it. Make sure you have lots of support with the positive people around you. If it's a no, make it yes. It needs your encouragement, and you have to go.

I have set back, and it's funny I get so mad, angry, and then I tell myself, "You have two hours to mourn for it and that's it." It sounds better. Sometimes it's not two hours. It might be like a day or two days. You can make yourself happy with some small things and just start over and have a fresh thinking, and just go ahead with it.

Karen: I love that though because there's two steps there. One is, when someone does say no, why are they saying no? Is there another path we can take to accomplish the same thing or something similar? Then the second part that you talked about with grieving that loss, if the final answer really is no, I think that's important. Sometimes we don't allow ourselves to do that and really acknowledge that there is a loss there. It's okay if you're able to easily move on, but if it's something big and important to you, you might need that time. I think it's good to actually allow ourselves to take the time we need to move on from something like that.

Sam: That's right. I lost my mom back in February, when I was back home in Iran. We lost her. Then two days after, my flight got canceled because of COVID. Then I was basically stuck there. I had to come back. I had to work and basically here's my home. There was only two flights heading out of Iran, and I was just calling the agency, and I was just like, "Just give me any flight heading out. Get me to any flight that is going out of Iran, and then from there, I can find my way to get back to Canada." It's interesting. In two days, from Iran, I went to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, then Tokyo, and then Vancouver to get to Calgary. 

You have to work around it. It got canceled, what am I was supposed to do? It was stressful. Now I'm laughing at it, but it was very stressful. We went through a month of, my mom is in hospital. We didn't sleep. We had lots of stress. We didn't know what's going to happen. Then she passed away, and then two days after, my flight got canceled. Then everywhere they're talking about COVID. I'm like, "Okay, what's going on? Everything's upside down."

The funniest story is, I got back to Calgary, I had to self-isolate myself for 14 days. I got back to the office for two days, and then everybody started working from home. So, I started earlier than everyone else, I guess.

Karen: There were so many people who ended up in that situation. A lot of it was parents either ill, or other family members in other parts of the world that they needed to go and help care for family.

I know that you are very new in getting this all up and running. Let's talk a little bit about what it's been like to start marketing your bag. As I mentioned, we talked about it before we got started on the podcast, but the value proposition for this is so clear because as soon as I saw the pictures and just processed what I was looking at, I saw immediately that this is something that I could personally use. I know so many women who—it's this universal thing that we all deal with, this packing everything but the kitchen sink into our bag to go out to work every day. 

What's it's been like? What's the reception been like? Has it been easy to market it out to your audience? What's the experience been like for you?

Sam: As you mentioned, the value is there, and people see it, and I get lots of Facebook shares. People are like, "Oh, we want it." They share it with their friends and things, but it's not difficult to basically say what is this bag for. It's just as a new brand, you have to be on top of your brand and just communicate and make sure you're not going to go away. You're still here.

Sometimes I get that question, "How did you value this bag and the pricing and everything? How do I know that if you're here next year?" I understand, but you have to show up and say, "Yes, this is me." I put myself as a face of my business right now because it's me, who I am, and I'm really clear. I have a LinkedIn, I have social media, and they can come. The other thing that I do with my customer, they can book me in my calendar, and we can have a one-on-one call.

Karen: Wow, that is different.

Sam: 10 to 15 minutes, and they can tell me what they like, what they don't like. If they have any questions. Right now, the way is my business is set up, you can get in, subscribe, you will get the 30% off right away, and you will get directed. The reason we are putting it because these are both education. What is this brand about, and who I am. Then in second or third emails that it goes through, there is a link for them that they can book me for a phone call or a zoom call. They can ask the questions, and all of my emails, when it goes out, there is a message at the bottom and say you can reply to this email and I'm going to answer it. I have lots of conversations with my customer.

It's challenging for me because I still work and I have this, but it's my 5:00 PM to maybe 12 midnight, I'll go through with all these conversations, sending emails, and it has been amazing journey for me. I'm learning new things, and I'm all about the new stuff. Some of them, maybe they're just watching, seeing who I am. Some of them, when I launched on last week of June, they were just like, "Yes, we are going to get this right now." Because right now, we have a 30% off because it's the pre-launch and pre-order, so they get 30% off because right now they buy it and they will get it by mid-October.

Karen: Which is an amazing gift for new customers.

Sam: Exactly. I call them beta tester, so they can have it, they can have one bag, and it's a gift for them. For October also, if they buy, they can get a small gift. It's going to be a surprise gift for them on top of their bag. Yes, it's a bag that comes with a small mini crossbody and plus a nice dust bag. That dust bag, they can use it as their shoe bag if they don't want to put their shoe directly to their compartment. They can use it that also to go in.

My marketing and everything is more knowing my customer and what they are willing. For example, I started with the black color, and they were like, "Oh, we want another color." What kind of color do you like? We added a tan color. When they subscribe, they will get the direction that they can go in, that they will see that tan color that goes with everything. Right now, we're trying to be neutral.

I'm all about colors. Don't get me wrong. I love to have different colors. It's just to start with and then we will introduce more and more colors and different kind, and just be patient.

Karen: I think that the crossbody being included is such a genius part of this bag, because as someone who is heavily involved in networking, you're often going to an event before you go to work, or going to work and then going to an event. You don't want to necessarily take a separate purse. A crossbody that's small like that is so perfect. You throw in some business cards, you've got your phone, you've got the contents of your wallet in there, and you can go to a networking event, and your hands are free to shake hands, hold a glass of wine, whatever it is you need to do, it's perfect.

Sam: Yes, and you see the pain there when you have the clutch on, and then you want, as you said, glass of wine, and then you want to most probably go back to shaking hand again or maybe hugging and all of those things. All about being hands-free and just use it as a functional bag.

One more thing that I would add, we have a one-year warranty for this bag. If they get it, anything happen or anything get broken, it will be replaced.

The other thing is, we do have a QC (quality control) company that it will QC it before it goes out. Make sure everything is correct and things, because we don't want to bring any hassle to our customers. Just thinking about them and it's a win-win situation. We don't want hassle. They don't want hassle. They want to get their nice bag and just go around with it. If anything happens, just like a zip is going to be broken or anything's going to get broken, it has a one-year warranty on it.

Karen: That's great. Please share with everyone how they can learn more about the bag. What's your website, and where else can we find you?

Sam: The brand name is called Pensatta. It's the Italian name. The reason I chose this name is because it comes from pensar, and in Italian, it means thinking thought, and pensatta, make it feminine, and it means a great idea comes from women. This is all about women. If you go to pensatta.com, they can subscribe. Right away, they will get an email with their voucher and a direction to where to go and buy the Pensatta bag. 

As I said, until the end of October, we are going to have the 30% off plus a small gift. And I hope they will enjoy this 30% off. 

They can find us on social media, on Facebook and on Instagram. We do have nice YouTube videos that is downloaded on the YouTube, and is called Pensatta Bag. If they search it, they will get a good view of how to pack Pensatta. I think we are talking and people are like, "What is this bag?”

They can go and watch it, and you will see how to pack it. Just follow us, and I'm sure you will enjoy the blog that we're putting together. It's not only a bag. It's the bag that is going to build the community for resilient women.

Karen: That's fantastic. Well, Sam, I really appreciate you taking time to join me today and tell us all about what you're doing and why you're doing it. I'll be sure to include links to your website and all your social profiles in the show notes. Thank you again for sharing your story.

Sam: Thank you, Karen. Thanks for having me. It was a pleasure.

*****

Do you know a business whose story you’d like to hear on Small But Mighty Biz Stories? Send me your recommendations!