The Type A+ Podcast Episode 37 - On Doing It All With Amber Jones of Oloro World
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Episode Description:
Amber Elise Jones is a multi-hyphenate entrepreneur and all-around incredibly talented human being who connected with Beth via the Broccoli Mag Lonely Hearts Board, and whose do-it-all attitude inspired this episode. Learn a little more about Amber, including the many titles she holds and how she keeps it all 'balanced.'
Links mentioned in the episode:
Raw Cones
Vienero Cones
Podcast:
The Type A Plus Podcast Instagram
Host:
Beth Lawrence & Company Instagram
Beth will be back each week, delivering bite-sized tips (15-minute episodes or less) on how to optimize your life and work.
Episode Transcript can be found below:
Welcome to the Type A+ podcast with me, Beth Lawrence.
I'm a certified meeting professional, an award-winning event planner, and a classic over-prepared overachiever.
In each episode, I'll deliver bite-sized tips on organizing your business and life, even during your most hectic times.
So, let's get started.
Amber is the founder of Oloro World, a creative & consulting studio and 420-forward retail brand. Describing herself as someone who "kinda does it all," Amber has taken her years of skill-building and climbing up the corporate ladder to step into the baddest, unapologetic, multi-hyphenate version of herself. One day she may be on set leading productions with global brands, the next day she may be building a Fortune500 company's diversity strategy, and on another day she may be growing an inclusive community of cannabis enthusiasts with her girlfriends at The Hussle Lab.
Tell us about you! What you do for business and fun
What are you most Type A+ about?
Throughout my career, people have been telling me to niche down or specialize which I find very difficult to do...and I see you do too! Talk about how you buck tradition and make room for all of your interests.
What is your favorite way to consume?
BEth:
Hello and welcome back to the Type A+ Podcast. I'm your host, Beth Lawrence, and I'm so excited to introduce you to another type A+ woman in weed today. Amber Jones. Amber is the founder of Oloro World, a creative and consulting studio and four 20 forward retail brand. Describing herself as someone who does it all.
Amber has taken her years of. Of skill building and climbing up the corporate ladder to step into the baddest, unapologetic, multihyphenate version of herself. One day she may be on set leading productions with global brands. The next day she may be building a Fortune 500 company's diversity strategy, and on another day she may be growing an inclusive community of cannabis enthusiasts with her girlfriends at the Hustle Lab.
Oh my gosh, Amber, I'm so excited to have you. As soon as we started talking, we, I feel like we're lifelong friends already.
Amber:
No, it was on and pop and it's that Philly connection. That's what it is.
BEth:
Absolutely. So tell the listeners about you, what do you do for your business and tell them what you do for fun as well.
Amber:
Yeah, for sure. So of course, thank you for having me. I'm super excited to be here. You're just like an absolute dream, Beth. So truly obsessed with you. Yeah,
BEth:
Thank you.
Amber:
Of course. Of course. But yeah Oloro world is something that was definitely born out of being fed up and tired of just the bullshit.
I have just done so many great things that I'm really proud of in professional settings and done so many great campaigns for different brands. I've been an influencer wrangler and adult babysitter at Coachella for. Fashion brands, getting them all of their content. I have thrown amazing parties with Kelis and Amber Rose in la.
I have also been sent to Sundance with 24 hours notice and a company credit card and a dream, and I just had to go out and make it work. And so it's been really great getting all of this experience like with so many amazing companies. And, I've done a lot of productions. I've done a lot of, fun shoots and video productions and commercials.
I've also worked in tech companies and built them from the ground up, from nothing to something. And. I stepped into a corporate wheel and out of necessity, I wanted to make money. I wanted to climb up the career ladder. I wanted to make my parents proud and do the things that everyone told us, millennials, that we had to do in order to be successful.
BEth:
Yes, they did.
Amber:
And sold us a dream and look at where we're at right now. We're unhinged. We're mentally unstable. All of us are quitting.
BEth:
We need a vacation.
Amber:
We need a vacation. We're like becoming influencers and just saying screw the system, but. And all of that. I just found myself to be extremely unhappy and I've always been a hard worker.
I've always had like wild, like worth ethic overall, and I've always been a little bit of a perfectionist because everything I touch, if I'm gonna be involved in it, it needs to be quality.
After doing all of that for companies and other brands and really not feeling valued, really not feeling like my growth was being invested in being disrespected and having like really unfortunate like racist microaggressive things happen in all of these environments that are supposed to provide a lot of security and stability with an individual.
I was feeling so mentally unstable, constantly had to get on antidepressants, had to start going to therapy, like really had to make some big life shifts in order to navigate in these spaces where I felt like they liked the idea of me, but they never actually liked me. For me, I could never come into these spaces and really feel like I could show up authentically.
And I ended up getting laid off from my big corporate job when a lot of the tech layoffs were happening last year. And it was honestly just one of the greatest things that could have happened to me. You know what I'm saying? I felt free. And the moment I got that call saying Your services are no longer needed here, I felt like my creativity just turned on,
BEth:
Yes.
Amber:
It had been buried deep somewhere in the trenches for way too long. And I've always been someone who has dabbled in art. I've curated art shows. I have done really fun events like, on just a personal front, I love to entertain. My friends will tell you like they're so happy that I just turned 30 because they no longer have to be a part of my annual birthday committee where I just make them get me a cake. I make them go on trips like you know it. It's just like a whole,
BEth:
Oh my God. I love that. What is your astrological sign?
Amber:
I'm a Pisces, and so...
BEth:
I'm a Leo and my, so my family makes fun of me because they say that I have a month long birthday. So see, I'm not the only one. Sorry, go ahead.
Amber:
I'm not an only child. I have siblings, but I consider myself to have been raised as one because I really was the only kid in the house. So not only am I the youngest, I'm the little girl. I am the only child. I'm the Pisces, I'm the princess. Yeah. So that is like all throughout everything that I do.
So yeah, my friends are like, girl, like no more theme party.
BEth:
You're made for events, you're made for art. You're made for what
you do.
Amber:
I'm made for what I do, and I wasn't able to really tap into all of that creative stuff, like having these really demanding full-time jobs.
And me getting laid off from my last job, forced me to get into that mindset. So my creativity turned on, I got locked in and, with a little bit of just rest, to be honest, I was able to come up with Oloro world.
Oloro World is, really. Just like a brand that does it all. So really taking a lot of those skills from my years and professional environments to create brands brand experiences campaigns events. I want to work with brands to really make sure that they're elevating whatever they're trying to achieve.
If they need more brand awareness, I wanna help you unlock that with your audience. If you need to convert people to sales and customers, I can make sure I'm helping you communicate that offering really clearly on your website. And then I also have my experiences portion, which is focused on my own events not things that I'm doing on a consulting basis with clients.
I also am a part manager at a premium cannabis club and dispensary, in the Bushwick area called the Hustle Lab. So I do a lot of my events with them.
That's also my best friend in the whole world, so being able to work so closely with her and help her brand grow and she can help my brand grow, it's just like an absolute dream.
And then the final part is my major baby, which is the retail part of Oloro world. My hero product is something called the Alor Pimp Puff. And that is just like super interesting because. It's basically like a portable hookah that I bling out and it looks like a pimp cup. So it's...
BEth:
I love that so much.
Amber:
Yeah, it's so funny. It's so silly.
BEth:
It's a signature. It's a signature.
Amber:
It is absolutely a signature staple that you need. And so I basically curate a small selection of different smoking accessories, like bongs, pipes.
I also do lifestyle products such as Sex toys. I also do some homewares and things like that. I have really popular candles from a brand called Janie's. It was the first thing that sold out and it was just so exciting.
What I wanna do with my brand is show people that you can be yourself. Be the baddest, be super unapologetic about who you are, what you stand for, and let's run it up.
BEth:
Thank you so much for introducing yourself. I'm so excited that you're here and one of the things that's in your bio, which I think is one of the things that we clicked on just naturally as human beings, was the word multihyphenate. And,
Amber:
Yeah.
BEth:
I love that because I've always loved music. I've loved dance, I've loved performance. That I think is why I am so good at events because you have to have. There is a logical and logistical part of performance and of art and of events. It kinda is synonymous. And so that's what I have found to love about it. But when you talk about business, people always tell you to niche down or specialize, or you're doing too many things or oh, you're doing this and you're into cannabis and you have a podcast and you do events, and I'm like yes.
I find it very difficult. The concept of nicheing down or only doing one thing, and it seems like you do too. So how do you, as a type A+ person, as someone who obviously needs to have a schedule, what is your key to like making room for everything in your schedule?
Amber:
I mean it's super interesting because for real, it's like I have to make money so I have to do all of these things.
BEth:
Yeah.
Amber:
And especially when a brand is in its infancy, I might not have the thought of what my brand is today is not. What it might turn into in the next three months, the next six months. So I'm really all about doing it all! If you're good at a lot of shit, just go for it.
Make it happen and like you will eventually [00:10:00] find the thing that really makes you pop the thing that people really recognize you for. And I don't know, it's just good to Know as much as possible being one of the smartest people in a room.
BEth:
Yes.
Amber:
But in terms of just like how I keep myself organized, how I keep myself sane, being a project manager, you have to deal with a lot of different personalities. You have to deal with a lot of different types of organization styles, learning styles, working styles, feedback styles. I really have tried to make an approach as adaptive as possible into whatever environment I go to.
And I say I think having that experience professionally has really helped me organize my life, in my personal life and I very much am a person who lives by my calendar. I am that girl who's oh, you wanna hang out?
Okay, I'm booked up for the next few weeks, but how is it looking like you have to like, get scheduled in? Which sometimes I don't like, but I'm getting better at loosening that up and creating, some set aside days to just keep things a little bit more flow state. Spontaneous, you know what I'm saying?
Schedule the spontaneity. That is definitely.
BEth:
Important.
Amber:
You have to do it. You have to do it. So I literally color coat my calendar like a fend. Like I, I have one color for appointments, one color for entertainment, and fun. Yep. Anything that's money making related, whether that's an intake call, this podcast anything like that gets its special color of green because, we'd love to run it up at all times.
And I also am really big on notion as well to just really organize strategically what I wanna do right now. I think because I'm fresh out of my launch of the actual shop I am having a little bit of difficulty right now trying to wrap my head around what a normal day or a normal week looks like for the founder Yeah.
Of Oloro World. It's okay, I don't have active freelance work. I just wrapped up on, a two week production gig that, is taking care of me for the next few months financially. So that's amazing. I just did a whole weekend of events in markets and I don't have another market or pop-up plan for the next month or so.
So now I'm like what the hell am I gonna do? So this, so really this week, I, what I'm doing right now is taking care of myself. I'm resting I'm not critiquing myself. I'm not being upset at myself for waking up at 11:00 AM I'm not. Pissed off at myself for not answering some of these emails because this was the only thing that was on my list hanging out with you today.
BEth:
Yes.
Amber:
But really it's about making sure I do have scheduled time for actual self-care. I'm a person who is around a lot of people at all times, and my social battery gets drained like nothing, especially now more than ever because.
I'm working to build a brand and I want this brand to be profitable and I want people to know me, and I want people to know what we do and what we serve and what our mission is, with our audience and community, but, I'm like, I'm tired of networking events. I'm tired of meeting people. I'm tired of pitching.
I'm tired of all of this.
Yeah. I
What I like to say is like I go non-verbal. I like shut down, like entirely do not disturb, don't talk to me for a few days. Taking, a few days to just like rest, recharge is super important.
But I would be an absolute psychopath if I had no systems of organization, because it's if I don't have anything on the calendar, I'm just like, whoa. Hold on. Am I supposed to be doing something?
BEth:
Is there a glitch did I forget something? Yes, I know.
Amber:
What the hell is going on? So yeah, that's what I'm just like, okay, let me like go ahead and smoke a joint and like maybe I'll be okay.
BEth:
Yeah, maybe we can calm down for a second. That's so funny. I feel like when I was in high school, my favorite time was when we would get our agendas and I would write every single thing that I had to do and I would color code it. We are very similar.
Amber:
Yeah.
BEth:
So you mentioned smoking a joint. What is your favorite way to consume?
Amber:
Oh my gosh. I am honestly a classic like J person but I will tell you, I have not rolled a J in probably a good two years. Primarily because I'm a nail girl. It's just like a huge part of my personal style. So I've really been on like the cone life and so.
BEth:
Yes.
Amber:
My two choices of cones are.
Raw lean. I like the skinny long type of situation. It's very like Carella Deville. Like very, yes.
BEth:
Like a Capri Cigarette yeah, I like it.
Amber:
Yes. And I am very familiar with a Capri. Okay. I love a Capri. But yeah that is definitely one the raw lean. And then my friend Taylor has a brand called by Niro that like, she has like a very cute line of cones that have like little angels printed on them.
And the filter part is silver oh my gosh. Can you please type a
situation? You have to send me that link so we can link it in the show notes
because that sounds a hundred percent. A hundred percent. I love her brand, definitely a great friend of mine in the space and I'll also be getting some of her products into my shop eventually.
So I'm very excited to, support the homies and continue to push our products, yes.
Oh, definitely, and I'm excited to see your space and come up and support you for sure. We're not that far away.
Yes.
New Jersey and New York are not that far. No. No, you definitely have to come through. We're always thinking about like, how can we make money? How can we grow this place? How can we grow our community? How can we, really become names in the New York cannabis space. People are really excited about what is happening in New York because it's just like we're very early.
There's not a lot of rules quite yet. Yeah. And and I think that there's a lot of really great entrepreneurs in the space right now in New York, in the tri-state area who are getting ahead of the curve and really finding ways to carve out paths that. Hopefully regulation will like mold itself into versus build itself against.
Yeah. We're, we've really got like a great bustling community up here and I just think there's not enough women doing it. We touch everything with what we do with the Oloro world and at the lab, and we're just excited to get more people in. We're always looking for people to collaborate with. As long as you can bring people to the space and as long as people are smoking weed. Honestly, like come through hit me up because we're always trying to just diversify what we're bringing to our community and we wanna keep it super cool.
We wanna keep it super unique. Once again, unapologetic, real baddie shit. That's it. That's all we're about.
BEth:
Oh my gosh. I'm definitely gonna come through and I have a couple friends that I wanna bring through as well. So how can people find you?
Amber:
Yes, absolutely. You can find me on Instagram @oloro.World. My personal is @amberelisejones. And if you wanna follow my friends too, the Hustle Lab.
BEth:
Thank you so much, Amber for joining and I'm sure that everybody will be following you.
I hope to see if any of you listeners are in the tri-state area. I hope to see you at the Hustle Lab. And Amber, I know I will be seeing you at the Hustle Lab and probably sooner talking to you. But thank you so much for joining me today. And listeners, we will be back next week with a new episode on the Type A+ podcast.
Take care.
The Type A+ Podcast is written and produced by me, Beth Lawrence.
Our music is composed by Dan “Dilemma” Thomas.
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