This week I had the chance to catch up with Mary Esposito (@moneywithmary1). I’ve gotten to know Mary over the past two years as a stand out young entrepreneur with a particular penchant for community building. Mary has a following of over 750,000 followers across her various social media accounts and platforms, as well as a crochet business and a modeling career. This is all while pursuing a full-time undergraduate degree at UNC Chapel Hill. She knows how to keep herself busy.
Mary is outspoken about where her story all started: as a 13 year old hospitalized with an eating disorder wanting to take control of her future. She taught herself to knit in the hospital, “I couldn’t do much else” she remembers. Then she decided to turn it into a side hustle. By earning income through her knitting business a natural curiosity about financial literacy emerged. She read a book by Motley Fool on investing and it “started everything.” Her mindset had shifted. By discovering that she could define her story, instead of being defined by it, she started writing her next chapter.
That next chapter became “Money with Mary,” a Tiktok account with the goal of creating conversations for Gen-Z females about money in a typically male dominated space. Mary spent the next few years building a 6-figure social media following and earning brand deals with various fintech platforms. That’s when Mary sensed her next critical move: staying agile in a rapidly dynamic social media landscape. “Predictions become preparations,” she said, remarking on how she was exposed by only building a following on TikTok during the first threats of a TikTok ban in the US.
Like a true entrepreneur, she adapted by building a new following on other channels (primarily Instagram). She compared this move to a lesson she learned about finance - that money was a “bigger equation.” She shared her take on how a prudent financial strategy included building a sustainable income stream, saving and managing money as well as building an investment portfolio and understanding credit products. It’s clear Mary is the proactive type.
Recently, Mary embarked on her next chapter: a shift from creating conversations about what to do with your money to creating conversations about creating more income via your career. This shift has brought her into a whole new set of topics from legislation awareness and other political conversations to female rights and advocacy. She described this move as “personal” and “transformational.”
I asked Mary where this all goes; what is her goal with her creator brands. She echoed a sentiment I’m hearing among many young entrepreneurs - building a community is the “foundation of my business.” Pre-tech, most young entrepreneurs got their start by building hustle-based service businesses. In the modern tech-era that shifted to coding, building and iterating on technology products. Mary is a reminder that day one for the next wave of entrepreneurs starts with community. And I might add, it's working.
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