She was a young pastor’s wife with two small kids who went on to build three businesses before being a #girlboss was even a thing. Shannon Wilburn, CEO of Just Between Friends, joins Julie Lyles Carr for an insightful and innovative conversation about how faith fueled her ideas and confidence to step out into the world of owning her own business.
Listen to “Building Your Life With What You Have with Shannon Wilburn” on Spreaker.
Interview Links:
Find Shannon Online: Website: Just Between Friends | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | LinkedIn
Transcription:
Julie Lyles Carr: You’re listening to the AllMomDoes podcast where you’ll find encouragement, information, and inspiration for the life you’re living, the kids you’re raising, the romance you’re loving, and the faith you’re growing. I’m your host, Julie Lyles Carr. Let’s jump into this week’s episode.
Well, this is an exciting day for me, because I get to introduce you to someone that I went to college with. I worked with when we were both really young moms, and her story, and where she’s at in her life today, is going to inspire you. She’s had some incredible adventures. Shannon Wilburn. Thank you so much for being on the podcast.
Shannon Wilburn: Well, thank you for having me. I’m honored to be here, Julie, thank you for asking me.
Julie Lyles Carr: Now, some of you may be going, Shannon Wilburn. That name sounds familiar. And I’m going to tell you why; she is the CEO of a company that she started called Just Between Friends, which is a consignment franchise business. She also has received a lot of press for donating a kidney to someone, she won the Bonnie Lavon award for franchisor. She’s been featured in Fortune magazine and on the Today Show. All kinds of things. Shannon has been all over the place. But I gotta be honest, shannon, when we knew each other back in college days, you were getting your degree in education and you were such a phenomenal teacher. I got to teach alongside you for a little while. We were both working at the same preschool for a period of time, and you were so amazing at teaching. I never really saw you doing anything else, which is not to minimize all of your gifts and talents, but you were such a great teacher. So take, take listeners back to that place where you can be really great at something and really fulfilled in something, and then sometimes God opens up an opportunity that you hadn’t seen coming and he can change course. So what was that like for you?
Shannon Wilburn: Yeah. So well, you know, our, our husbands, by the way, were roommates. They are the same age, and which, which was fun for us to also end up in the same, Yeah, Tulsa, Oklahoma. That’s where I still live. So I live in Jenks, Oklahoma. Anyway, Back in those early days, my degree was elementary education. It was not business. And I was, I think when we taught together, was I still in school?
Julie Lyles Carr: I think you were trying to get finished with school. I think that’s right.
Shannon Wilburn: Just a little bit younger…
Julie Lyles Carr: Show off. Whatever.
Shannon Wilburn: But maybe like two years, not like… You and Mike are the same age. So anyway, I think I was still trying to, when we were doing preschool, still trying to get my degree, and taught for a year and a half and then wanted to be a stay-at-home mom. I was trying to make that work, Julie, and you know, trying to supplement our family’s income. So, Mitch was a youth minister at the time. And while that’s not a valid poverty, it kind of was. So, I was just trying to look for a little bit of, you know, something I could do on the side to help supplement our family’s income.
And this was something, I know the Lord kind of put it on my mom’s heart. She, my mom was actually the one who came up with the idea and told me about it. And I actually have a co-founder Devin Tackett, was a friend from church when my mom told me about the idea to start Just Between Friends, you know, it’s, I know we haven’t really gotten into that, but I do have I do have a couple of businesses, or I think I’ve started ,three businesses.
Julie Lyles Carr: You’re really, you’re really getting busy with a lot of stuff now. And I, I think what’s interesting to me. I remember being at that first, Just Between Friends sale, it was at your house, oh yeah, yeah, I think you let me come. Pre-shop, because you didn’t, you know, you didn’t know if this was going to work. It sounded like a great idea. You got several of your friends together, you all had extra baby clothes and you set up in your garage. I came and shopped early for, particularly for my son, justice, now going to be 25 in a few days. So this gives some history on that. And I can remember at the time, what really impressed me was you were trying something you didn’t know if it was going to work or not, and you were using what you have.
And one of the things that I always appreciated about you when we were teaching together, is that you were so organized. You had a way of looking at a lot of material and content and putting it together in a cogent way. So you were using that skill set that I equated to the classroom, but actually also worked really well for organizing baby clothes and baby toys. And you had a lot of clothes and different things that you had from having your kids that you were ready to pass on. And that has really stayed with me. Shannon. I think a lot of times when I talk to moms who are wanting to carve out a different path for themselves. And they’re not exactly sure what that is going to look like, but they want the ability to be more available to their kids, and at the same time, they don’t really know how to start, or they’re looking at startup costs that are really expensive, or they feel like they were trained in something and this thing that they’re thinking about trying seems to be completely off track for that. That’s part of why I think I was, I’m so excited to have you for my listeners, because your journey to using exactly what you had in your hand basically, being open to some suggestions from family members and then this innate skill that I think you’ve always had for understanding how to organize complicated causes, or data, or teaching materials. That ability to me has translated into what you were able to be as a business. So get listeners to the point where they can understand how this business works, because what was interesting as you went through several years where it was just this, it became this huge consignment sale in Tulsa. And then you decided to franchise it. And what’s fascinating to me in the idea of franchising it, is it’s a consignment sale. Like it doesn’t seem like there would be necessarily a franchise opportunity there, and yet the system that you developed, that’s the thing to me that is so regulatory and really helps people actually do this as a business. So how did you begin to make that transition to realizing this is really working, and how can I offer this to other women to potentially be able to do something with it? How did all of that transition work?
Shannon Wilburn: You and I didn’t talk about like what this conversation was going to look like today, and man, I have a lot to say, so. I mean, it is my joy to give advice, but I, I love to mentor people. I love to help them see their own potential. And so, I didn’t do anything special, Julie. I mean, I didn’t. The Lord has just taken steps that I have taken and has grown them. And it takes faith, and it takes risks, and it takes putting one foot in front of the other and trying to make smart decisions. I do a lot of praying. And guess what? Some of those decisions that have, I fail at, and that’s part of it. It really is. It’s part of it and it doesn’t mean I’m a failure. It means the decision that I made was a failure. It does not mean Shannon Wilburn as a failure. And I think there’s a big that’s a big thing that you need to know.
Like, just because something that you tried didn’t work, it doesn’t mean you’re a failure. So, keep that in the back of your head for when that time comes because you can’t… I don’t really feel like you can grow without failure, so you have to do that. So, okay. So the first company that I started was just between friends of Tulsa with a business partner, Devin Tackett, we co-founded it together. She was a friend from church. And you mentioned coming to the first sale. I don’t know if you came to the first one to the second one, because the first one was in my living room.
Julie Lyles Carr: I was at that one too.
Shannon Wilburn: That was in 1997, September of 1997. So, I’m not sure where Justice was born.
Julie Lyles Carr: I bought a bunch of Jake’s clothes, your son’s clothes.
Shannon Wilburn: I’m about to turn 27. So that was, yeah. So anyway, had that first sale, the concept is basically a marketplace to bring families together to buy and sell gently used children’s and maternity clothes, toys, and baby equipment. So, we did not have any grand plan to franchise, this business, nothing like that. It was like, hey, that friend of mine, her husband is a doctor minus a youth minister and they get to buy really cute clothes and I don’t. I want to shop in her closet, and how can I make that happen? That was kind of the premise. And so, we kind of put our heads together, Devin and I put our heads together, and this was back before small business had a place on the internet.
The internet was just coming about. Email was just coming about, if you can think back to that time, those of you who are, who are, you know, 50 or older. So anyway, that’s what we were, we were trying to do was provide a marketplace for families, to make and save money on items that had value. You know, when families only their kids are outgrowing their clothes every six months. You’re having to change out the toys every six months because they’re needing different items. And then sustainability was not really a term that we used in the mid to late nineties. It was starting to be a popular term, but now of course that’s a big part of our business. And then we have a giving part of our business that I of course love to talk about if we have time. Okay. So that was the first business. I started that in, in my living room in 1997. Grew that for six years, to the Tulsa fairgrounds started the very first day of, I think we sold $2,000. By its 14th year, this the sale before I stepped away from that business, we kind of had a, we kind of reorganize the business in 2011… I’m getting way ahead of myself, but the last sale of that sale that started in my living room. $747,000 in seven days. That was that business. Halfway in there, we started a franchise because we, because people were like, how do I do this? How do I do this? Right.
And there’s a long story of how that business started to, but what I want your listeners to hear is that we didn’t know. Like we did not have, I didn’t know how to start a consignment business. But I just… what I do know is I do know how to ask good questions, and I do know how to surround myself with smart people. And so if I can leave your listeners with any advice for me are those two things, ask good questions and surround yourself with smart people, because there are people who do know how to do things, and so when we started thinking about franchising, whole long story of why we even started doing that, basically the gist of it is that we had people continuing to ask us, how do we do this? How do we do this? How do we do this? And so, we’re like, okay. Guess we need to figure out how to systematize this to scale it. And I probably didn’t even know those words back then, Julie.
We had proven the concept. I didn’t know that word proof of concept. We had done it in Tulsa. We had helped people get started. I didn’t know what trademarking, I didn’t know any of that kind of stuff back then, but we had helped people get started before we franchise. So, we had proven the concept in California, Colorado, Texas, Florida… and so people were doing this and we were, unfortunately, we were letting them use the name just between friends before we had trademarked it. So thankfully we worked all of that out and they became our first franchisees. So now we have maybe 150 something franchise owners in 32 states. And our system-wide sales this year, we’re, we’re on track to hit 30, between 34 and 35 million system-wide sales.
Julie Lyles Carr: Unbelievable.
Shannon Wilburn: Yeah, really cool about that is that’s not, you know, that’s not many in Shannon Wilburn’s pocket. That is 34 to $35 million worth of thousands of families across the nation, that that’s going back in their pockets, right? It’s, it’s people consigning their own. And then those items. Also, if they don’t sell, we partner with nonprofits, so the unsold items go to them. If, if the families want to do that, if they make that choice to donate their unsold items, so it’s really cool. But I, I want to also talk that my third business is something that Mitch and I just started, we have in Jenks, it’s it’s called Coal Creek Farm Jenks, and I only bring this up, it’s a photography business. It’s not me doing photography. We’re basically the venue where we allow photographers to come on the property. And, and Julie, I bring this up because if you have like a little idea, And you’re like, Hmm. I wonder if this could work. Like step out in faith and put one foot in front of the other and try it.
Like it is… You know, I understand that lots of businesses require a lot of capital upfront. So, if it’s capital intensive, maybe, you know, do more than just praying about it there, you’re going to have to do a lot more investigation and stuff. But if there is some idea that you can put one foot in front of the other, this, this photography business that, we just, when we moved out here, when we bought the land and we would come out here and people would be, we would come out here and there would be people coming out of the woods when we would just come out here to sit and pray, you know, we were just sit on our property. We didn’t, we had taken down all the fences and everything, so I think people just thought it was open land. And we would come out here. There would be cars on our property. We’re like, huh? And then we’re sitting here, and people would be coming out of the woods, dressed up. We’re like, oh, they’re taking pictures. And so that happened enough, or like, I guess people think this property’s pretty.
And so when we, when people found out from our church that. Purchased the property. They started saying, hey, can we use your property to take our senior pictures or whatever? And so, my husband, he said, we should we should charge for this. And what I heard was, you should figure this out Shannon.
Julie Lyles Carr: You come up with a way to make this actually a business.
Shannon Wilburn: I’m not a photographer. I’ve never done anything like this. So I’m like, okay. I know people and I can ask good questions and I can surround myself with smart people. So, the first thing I did was I called Holly PV house. I said, Hey Holly, what if photographers like when they go to take pictures? And she said, Hey Shannon, why don’t I come? And I’ll walk around the property with you for an hour and I’ll give you my advice. So guess what we did? She came out there. I took an hour’s worth of notes. And I was like, okay, that’s too expensive. I can’t do that. That’s going to take three or four years to do, you know, and I implemented, incrementally, the things that I could do. And then, then as people would come, they would give me a little piece of advice. And you could, you could do online scheduling. There’s this thing called the acuity app. You should use that because then we can schedule ourselves. Oh, let me do that. I mean, it has just gone gangbusters. We’re starting our fourth year, and it’s not that I have any secret sauce. It’s that I ask good questions and surround myself with smart people. And anyone can do that.
Julie Lyles Carr: Well, I love, too, Shannon under your model, and this is not to discourage anybody from something that might take more capital, or you’ve got to get more, you know, manufacturers involved or whatever, but I, I love what you’re saying in the two and the three businesses that you’ve built, because it really had to do with what you actually had in your hands. And this is something that I think we see, and I have young women ask me about where they’re wanting to start something, but some of that on-ramp seems so extreme and that’s not to discourage you listener if you’ve got an idea that, you know, might take a little bit more to get there. I’m always so encouraged when I look at your story and what you’ve done, because it hasn’t been something far, far, far outside of yourself. It’s oftentimes been something that you had access to as a resource, and it was just a different way to leverage it, which I think is a really beautiful thing. Talk to me about this, you, you know, you were boss-girling before #bossgirl was a thing, right? We were all, we were all watching this happen, going, this is amazing. Look at what she’s doing. Now I think that we, I think younger women have the, you know, kind of the approval a little bit more. Sometimes, maybe even the pressure a little bit more, oh, well, you know, you don’t want to just do something that was corporate or in the classroom. I come home and build something. I hope no one is taking that as the takeaway, because we need amazing people in our classrooms and in other roles that are more traditional nine to five kind of jobs. We need that. But at the same time, I do think it’s interesting at the time that you and I, young moms, we weren’t seeing a lot of examples of women starting businesses. And yet I’ve recently read some statistics that talk about, you know, where we’re still at in terms of glass ceilings. Where we’re still at in terms of wage and the difference between what men and women are still paid in this country, which has split, there is nothing like a female owned business to begin to close that gap when it comes to issues and benefits and pay equity. So, at this point, how did you manage? And again, with a nod to the fact that we were, we were young moms and a little bit of a different time, but how did you manage people within your friendship groups, within your faith community, wherever who we’re having maybe a hard time understanding, like how can you be fully supportive of your husband and his ministry when you’re off building these businesses? Or why aren’t you doing something more traditional? Why are you doing something that is so seasonal, and crazy in a season, and then a little calmer, and then crazy again?
How did you manage some of the questions I’m sure, sometimes well-meaning and maybe sometimes that felt a little judgmental, but came your way as you were doing these different endeavors and trying new things and building new businesses?
Shannon Wilburn: Really good questions. So, I think being a pastor’s wife so Mitch is now a senior pastor. I really think for one, I have lots of self-confidence and I think that has, because my husband instills that in me, number one, he’s a, he’s a wonderful spouse and always tells me he’s proud of me. You know? I mean, he tells me I’m beautiful all the time. Like he just, he instills that in me. So, so I walk it out. Right? So I feel confident. And so when there are naysayers, right? I think the word nowadays, is troll, or whatever. And people think that maybe I should be more traditional, and I should be leading the Bible studies and I should be sitting on the front row at church. And you know, I, I feel like that is an old version of maybe what a pastor’s wife should look like. And I don’t even know that that’s really a reality anymore because I’m just, women’s role is very different than it was 25 years ago. And I’m, I’m happy about that. I did not hear a lot of that and it’s probably because very involved in the youth ministry years when we didn’t use ministry for about 12 years.
And that was when I was growing the local Tulsa business, and it was part-time supplemental income. And so, it was a part-time business. And so I could be the youth minister’s wife and help in the youth ministry while I was growing that business. I was also a youth minister’s wife. So, I’ve been very, very involved in that. And then when Mitch transitioned to community outreach for three years, that was about the time we were starting to franchise. And that was a full-time job, while I had the part-time job. And because he was no longer the youth minister, I didn’t necessarily have those responsibilities, I think there was a transition time when the new youth ministers came in, I was still kind of helping them and mentoring them, and training them, and kind of what had been done, but I think because I had two other jobs, I think our, you know, our local church community, maybe they did not have a huge expectation for me. Or maybe I just didn’t know it.
And I think I gave myself permission to be involved in my church where the Lord led me. And that was where I felt my giftings were. And not necessarily where people put their expectations on me. And I still kind of feel like that. I’m like, just because you have an expectation does not mean that that’s a reality. And, and I’m not afraid to gently let people know that in love when they think I should be doing something. And not, of course, not in a mean way at all. Just, that’s not, not my way. But you know, some people have been taught specific things that maybe aren’t correct. Yeah.
Julie Lyles Carr: And what an amazing word Shannon, in terms this, I love what you said about, you’re letting God lead you where you’re supposed to be serving, and not just because of an expectation that you’re the spouse. It’s been interesting for me, and I think there is still at times a current we place on women who are married to people in ministry, about what those women’s roles should be within how the church hierarchy and structure works. And it’s pretty fascinating because in many other places and many other jobs, you would never expect that if you know, your husband was hired to be at a bank, that you within ipso facto also be expected to do this, this, this, that, and the other, without being paid. It’s a pretty interesting setup that has been around for a long time. I, in my time, in my tenure as a pastor, it was interesting because I felt supported and, and, you know, great things at the church I was at; however, it was interesting because I would remark at times, I felt I felt it was just a dichotomy. Nobody ever expected Mike, my husband to be doing certain things or to give of his, a huge block of his time. It was always understood that he was off running his business. And yet at times, there would be, you know, some voices in the faith community who felt like that, some of the wives of some of the pastors I served with, should be showing up doing this, doing that. And it was, it was pretty interesting. And we began to see a shift where there were a lot of women who were the wives of these pastors, who were working full-time, or running businesses or starting businesses. Like there was not this, there wasn’t wiggle room for that anymore. And it’s interesting to see churches having to grapple with that.
How do you feel like churches can show a lot of support for spouses of people who are on ministerial staff, and I’m talking husbands and wives, show support, hey, we love you? We want you to be here in serve where you’re led, but at the same time, not put some kind of expectation on spouses of those who are in pastoral ministry, all positions in a way that is kind of maybe crossing some boundaries?
Shannon Wilburn: Tell him that!
Julie Lyles Carr: Yeah, yeah.
Shannon Wilburn: Verbally. Not, I mean, say it, say, hey, we’re not hiring you. We’re hiring your spouse. If you want to serve, we would absolutely love to have you serve. Is there a place that you want to serve? Like how can we support you in, in these places? And if you don’t have capacity right now because you’re raising two humans that needs full time, you know? And do you have a job? Like we totally get that and support them in that. It’s, it’s very easy. I do it to my own kids. Right. I do it to people that I love. Like I put my expectations on them. And well-meaning people do that, but it’s also incumbent upon us in ministry to not take that on. It’s just because someone has an expectation of us does not mean that we have to accept that. Right. Right. And, you know, I think also that’s a, that’s a conversation that you have to have with your spouse. Mitch has done me a huge favor all along he will say. And you know, if he really wants me to do something, he doesn’t tell me to do it. He says, Hey, What’d you have time? You know, and then he’ll say your presence counts.
Julie Lyles Carr: Oh, nice nicely done. That’s a great way to present that.
Shannon Wilburn: Your presence counts, which I know. I know it. And sometimes I don’t, I don’t want to be there. When he says your presence counts, I’m like, it does. I should probably go.
Julie Lyles Carr: Yeah. That’s a beautiful way to frame it.
Shannon Wilburn: And so that’s one of the things he does. And then I was trying to think there was one other thing he does. He’s just really good with making me feel wanted, but not placing his expectation on me.
Julie Lyles Carr: That’s beautiful. I, I think too, that we are hopefully in a season where women hear, loudly and strongly, if you’re in a season where you want to be home with your kids and you can do that, and you’re not wanting the distraction of having to quote unquote, build a business or be a quote unquote, boss girl, do that. Shannon and I had seasons where we were home with our kids and that was precious, precious time. And it was hard. I mean, for both of us. Mike was starting a business. Mike was young and, or Mitch was young in ministry. I mean, it wasn’t easy stuff. There was lots of hamburger helper. It’s like, remember back in those days. But at the same time, I hope that we’re growing to a place, and I, I began to see, I began to be more comfortable in this, in the women’s ministry, in which I worked for so long that there was more of an embracing of if you’re home, if you’re trying to start a part-time thing, if you’re in a corporate situation, whatever you’re doing… I saw women linking arms a lot better than it used to feel a couple decades ago where it seemed like this really strong dividing line of, oh, well, those were the stay-at-home moms, and these are the working moms, and those two groups didn’t seem to have a lot of crossover. So, I’m seeing a lot more support in that way.
What do you think God taught you, I know he taught you many things, but if you’re reflecting back on the lessons of starting these businesses, Learning really where you jive the best in being a pastor’s wife and what that means in terms of supporting your spouse, but it also having your own lane that you’re running in terms of trying things that people haven’t really tried before there wasn’t a model for, and you were just putting stuff out there to see what would work… what are some of the top things that God taught you through all of that?
Shannon Wilburn: I feel like, you know, being in business for yourself, it requires faith. And one of the things that, Devin and I started this business together, we started both the Tulsa business together and we started the franchise system together. And so, in 2011, when we decided to reorganize the company, so we were, it was just too difficult to run both companies together. We had lack of focus because we were trying to run the Tulsa business while we were running the franchise system and the franchise system was full time and this was part-time, and we were kind of, it was very different.
You had consignment over here, and you had franchisees over here. It was just very two vastly different businesses. And we figured out like we have, one of us has to focus on each of these businesses, so we have to reorganize. And so, Devin was taking the Tulsa business and I was taking the franchise system. And we, June 1st, well, May 31st, 2011, we’re getting ready to sign on the dotted line the next day for the reorganization, and maybe having a little bit of a freak out moment and started like crying, like I’m going to be running this business by myself and I’ve never run a business by myself. So, I called my twin sister who by the way, is also married to a pastor Dallas area and I called her crying, and I was like, what am I doing? I’ve never run a business by myself… and she got mad at me. She said, Shannon, you are not in business by yourself. You are yoked with the Lord and when you don’t know what to do, he is going to be there. And she gave me this picture, you know, what a yoke of oxen might look like. And it’s just, you know, when you get to oxen and they are having to work the field, and it’s difficult work. And when one gets tired, that yolk is meant so that the other carries the load. And I was just like, oh man, I needed that. I needed, I needed to know that because then it gave me that mental picture and you know what, Julie? Man, running a business is difficult. It, there are challenges. And whenever I give advice to especially young women who are starting their business or in the midst of running their business, and they’re up against what I might call an inflection point, like it’s going to go or no-go right? It is, it’s difficult. You’re always going to have challenges in your business because that’s the nature of business. It’s problem solving around the next issue. And you have this, I guess, unrealistic expectation that business is going to be easy, you should not go into owning your own business. Just don’t do it.
It’s 100% not easy, but if you’re a good problem solver and you can figure your way through challenges and issues and have a way to do that and have a good team around you and have support, then go for it because there are, everything is figureoutable. Yeah. And so anyway, back to the, just what I learned in that moment, was that if you can yoke yourself with the Lord and know, and I, and in my business, I’m a Christian and I know that these businesses are not mine. They’re the Lords. And the Lord has given me this business to manage and some days I’m a great manager. And some days I suck as a manager,
and wear my pajamas. And then some days I do a better job. You know, and he’s either gonna appoint me as manager or he’s gonna fire me. And give this business to someone else. And I’m going to try to be the best manager I can until he’s ready to have someone else manage the business. And if we can go into whatever endeavor we’re looking at and know that we’re yoked with the Lord, it feels less daunting. So if that’s the, that’s the best advice I could give to anyone, and then it doesn’t feel as daunting to step out in faith to do something.
Julie Lyles Carr: Beautiful. Shannon. You are so full of wisdom and insight, all kinds of great ideas and faiths. Thank you so much for being part of the podcast today because I know my listeners, this is going to be a very needed and welcome message. And we didn’t even get to the part where we talked about you donating a kidney and all of the Great Danes that you’ve owned, and all kinds of things. We’re gonna have to have you back on at some point, but Shannon, where can listeners go to connect with you to find out more about you, specifically in your family? And the new grand baby, and also more about the businesses that you’re running, and where they can see what you’ve been up to and the fruits of your labor?
Shannon Wilburn: I hate to say Google, but LinkedIn is probably the best way to connect with me. So yeah, Shannon Wilburn on LinkedIn.
Julie Lyles Carr: Alrighty. And Rebecca will have that in the show notes for our listeners. Go and check that out. Shannon again, what a delight to get to connect with you and see you. It’s been too long, my friend. And thank you so much for all of the wisdom and heart. And you just the transparency that you bring to the table. I know that you’re going to encourage a lot of moms out there. Thanks so much.
Check out the show notes for all the links, info and other goodness from this week’s episode with a big thank you to our content coordinator, Rebecca. I’ve got a request, please go like, and leave a review wherever you get your podcasts. It really does make a difference in helping other people find the show. And I’ll see you next week here at the AllMomDoes podcast.