Visual Eyes - The Community & Collaboration Podcast

S2 Ep 06 - Empowering Women & Building Stronger Communities with Lali Safavi: The Skirt Foundation

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In this episode of Visual Eyes, host Chris Baker sits down with the inspiring Lali Safavi, a dedicated advocate for women-owned businesses and a leader in nonprofit collaboration. Lali shares her journey from the corporate world to nonprofit advocacy, highlighting the impact of women-led initiatives, mentorship programs, and community-driven solutions.

Women-owned businesses play a crucial role in shaping the economy, fostering innovation, and driving social change. Lali discusses the challenges women entrepreneurs face, from funding gaps to societal barriers, and offers actionable strategies to support their success. She also explores the importance of collaboration between businesses, nonprofits, and community leaders, showcasing how these partnerships create long-term, sustainable impact.

Throughout this episode, you’ll learn about successful nonprofit and business collaborations, how to effectively use storytelling for fundraising, and why investing in women’s empowerment programs leads to stronger, more resilient communities. Lali’s insights offer a fresh perspective on how both individuals and organizations can step up to create real, lasting change.

If you’re passionate about women’s leadership, nonprofit growth, and the power of collaboration, this episode is for you! Tune in to hear inspiring stories, expert insights, and strategies that can help you contribute to positive social impact.

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Special Thanks to Stacy Daugherty for the beautiful wall artwork in the background. Socials: @artographybystacy

Chris Baker:

Welcome to Visual Eyes, the podcast where collaboration fuels change. I'm your host, Chris Baker, and each week we'll explore incredible connections between nonprofits, businesses and the community. This is a space where we highlight inspiring partnerships, uncover strategies for creating meaningful impact and share stories that show how working together can make all the difference. Whether you're a nonprofit leader, a business owner or someone just passionate about building connections, this podcast is for you. Welcome everyone to Visual Eyes. Today we have Lali, and I'm not going to be able to say her last name, Safavi. I know I was going to get her first name right because I've worked on that for a while now.

Chris Baker:

Lely, welcome to the show. We're going to have a little bit of a laugh on this one, because we are good friends.

Lali Safavi:

Yes, thank you, chris. Thank you for having me.

Chris Baker:

So can you share your journey from practicing law creating the Skirt Foundation?

Lali Safavi:

Sure, it's been a pretty long journey. When I I guess I was practicing law in the mid 2000s, I was in Washington DC. I studied tax law. I was actually practicing immigration and family law practice for a few years. I didn't care for it and so I I transitioned in a very unlikely way that that's not really what we're talking about here today, but I transitioned to small business and I ended up, maybe around 2009, purchasing a small business that I owned for about 12 years. I ended up selling that small business in 2020 when COVID started taking that money and moving down to Florida from the DC area. So I moved down to Florida September of 2020.

Lali Safavi:

A couple of years after that, I started a women's arts and lifestyle magazine called Spurts SoFlo. That's based in Fort Lauderdale. I have two other women who run that with me, diane Papafotis and Pamela Boucher and we've been doing that for the last couple of years, but always with the intention of expanding it to move it into the nonprofit space with a foundation. The magazine itself is a for-profit business, but it's a very mission based for-profit and we, you know, we advocate, we highlight unknown women in South Florida who are doing amazing things, we advocate for them, we promote them and in a sense, that's what we're doing with the Skirt Foundation as well. So we just launched that in September of 2024. And we just had our first full board meeting last night.

Lali Safavi:

And so you know, exciting things are happening.

Chris Baker:

Here's to 2025.

Lali Safavi:

Here's to 2025.

Chris Baker:

Yeah the Skirt Foundation. This will be amazing. All right, so some of the collaborations so I want you to think about. You know, has there been any collaboration efforts that you worked with other nonprofits for business that really kind of like highlight and help you succeed in getting the foundation off to the ground?

Lali Safavi:

So right now what we're doing is we are planning our very first fundraiser, which is scheduled for February 7th at Independence Hall in Bolton, manors.

Lali Safavi:

Collaboration is something that I believe is essential with nonprofits essential with nonprofits, you know, a lot of the time we human beings, being what they are and having a natural sort of competitive sense, want to oftentimes stay in their bubble, fight with others for donors, for donor dollars and things like this. But at the end of the day, in a community, I think that when you collaborate and you collaborate honestly and effectively with other organizations, it only makes you stronger. It's one of the areas that we really emphasize on our website, in our mission and really every CEO that I speak to with other nonprofit organizations. When I speak with them, I always open that door and say listen, if you know, if they're a like-minded organization, I always say if there is an opportunity for us to work together on something down the road, just know that we're very open. So in the in creating this fundraiser, I reached out to an organization that actually supports women's causes a great deal that our fund founded, based in Wilton Manors, and they, you know we're a grant funding organization.

Lali Safavi:

They're a grant funding organization and so there it was kind of like why, you know, does it make sense for us to support you? And so I actually went in there and I spoke with their CEO, david Jobin, who's very, who's just an incredible guy, and you know I put it out there I said, listen, you know, I know that we're fighting for the same donor dollars, but at the end of the day, you know, this is a women's organization, that if we become strong, we only make our community stronger. You know the community that we all live in. And so he was like okay, well, let me go talk to my chair and everything. And then for two and a half weeks I didn't hear from him and he comes back and he's like, yeah, we'll support you.

Lali Safavi:

I can't tell you how much of a difference that money makes in allowing us at this stage, where we are a tiny little acorn in this landscape, to get our operations up and running and start doing the work that we really want to be doing. I will never forget that. We will never forget that as an organization. So if our fund down the road comes back and says, hey, you know, we would like to partner on X, there won't be any question. You know what I mean, because the partnerships are more than just strategic business. They are they're, they're human connections.

Chris Baker:

So collaboration is huge. No, I completely agree and I think you said it extremely well. You know you're opening up those doors and you're making those connections that are going to have lifelong ripples, not only in just the human interaction that we have, the connections that we're making, but also, as like you said, the community Skirt Foundation is going to be doing so much more, Our fund will be able to do so much more, and the collaboration is just going to be amazing. I love it. That's fantastic.

Chris Baker:

So, launching a foundation dedicated to gender equality prevents a unique challenge. So what key lessons have you learned in establishing the Skirt Foundation, particularly to engaging with the LGBTQ plus community?

Lali Safavi:

Well, it's very interesting because I am not actually a person who pays a whole lot of attention in my own personal life to oh, this person didn't treat me like they treated that person.

Lali Safavi:

It's not something that I'm aware of, but in putting together the website for our foundation, in doing research into the treatment of women across the country and also in South Florida, the treatment of women in other nonprofit organizations in the arts, in areas of health and wellness, it was very eye-opening that we have not really moved the needle much in the last 20 years.

Lali Safavi:

Women still get paid 80 cents on the dollar and 20 years ago they got paid 80 cents to every dollar earned by a man, and that's pretty much across the board. Women's health issues are not as well funded Women in nonprofits. Stats for that are pretty staggering. Close to 80% of employees of nonprofit organizations are women and only about 20% maybe a little over 20% are in senior positions in nonprofit organizations. So one of the main criteria that we are going to be using in our grant funding is we want to provide resources to organizations that have a dedication to their people equally, their people equally, paying their people equally to having selection processes, promotion, hiring practices and policies indicate to us that they are dedicated equal treatment, to gender equity, to gender parity. What I found in our this is a very long winded way of answering your question.

Lali Safavi:

What I found is that the exact same inequities exist in the LGBTQ community as in the exact same thing that women have fought for outside of our community. The exact same conditions exist here. Same conditions exist here. So I think that you know we're doing good work in that regard. I think that we have our eye on a good outcome. You know, as we kind of go through all of the proposals that are coming and deciding what to fund and what not to fund, what organizations to fund and not, A little bit more about you know that engagement.

Chris Baker:

I know you're still very new, the foundation has just been started, but how is the the community, the lgbt community, really kind of responded to it so far? I mean, like I said, you just had your first board meeting, but I know that you've had this in talks and you've been bringing it up, probably through skirt, so flow magazine and other and other avenues of trying to get people aware. So what has? How has the engagement been?

Lali Safavi:

The engagement has been. I think it's been terrific, because I don't. I think that this kind of came out of left field for a lot of people, because they're just sort of settling in with us only having the magazine in print for about a year, even though creating the foundation was always our plan, was always on our radar. It completely came out of left field for a lot of people, so it surprised them. It's really being viewed as a huge stepping stone, a huge elevation in the women's community. We are an organization.

Lali Safavi:

At the end of the day, we don't do projects of our own. We deal in money. That is what we deal in. It is the lifeblood. Any initiative, any organization, any business, any arts endeavor. It all comes down to resources, and to have an organization that is 100% dedicated to providing resources to 100% women is a huge. We want to be a pillar in our community, allow the health, the wealth, the arts in the women's community. That's what we want. That is our vision and I think people are starting to really pay attention. We'll see. The gauge is really going to be at the fundraiser to see how people react to our sort of. It's going to be kind of like our coming out party.

Chris Baker:

Yeah, no, no, it is.

Lali Safavi:

It's more of your welcome party and you know you're probably going to have to have more.

Chris Baker:

But definitely know it's. It is it's more of your like welcome party and you know you're probably going to have to have more but yeah, definitely this is going to be a really good start. That's awesome skirt, so slow magazine spotlighted like contributions from the lgbt women. Uh, in art and in business, can you describe some of the or discuss some of the impact that that has made? Maybe a success story that really stands out to you guys as an organization?

Lali Safavi:

Yeah, you know it's. Having a magazine is really strange because you create this thing and you can only really create what you are interested in. You can't really write too well about things that you think people want to write but like you don't really care about. So you kind of put yourself out there and you're like okay, I'm going to create this magazine, I'm going to put it out, let's see who picks it up. Is anyone picking it up? Is anyone reading it? These are questions that we still ask ourselves. Really, the only times that I can feel 100% good is when I get feedback from people on how something that we've written or what we're doing is affecting them. So a success story. It's very interesting.

Lali Safavi:

Our March issue, which was only our second issue, had the cover, had a photographer, a Mexican photographer, who I didn't just like, maybe a couple of weeks before beforehand, had didn't even have, you know, money for paper to print her photos on. I came across this woman at Untitled Art during Miami Art Week 2023. I saw her photographs and I spoke with the woman who was representing her. The artist wasn't here. She couldn't get a visa to come into the country. I spoke with a representative. This woman Guadalupe. She runs an arts collective in Mexico City. So she was telling me about this photographer whose work I was seeing on the wall in Miami Mitzi Falcon, so Guadalupe and I actually ended up doing an interview with Mitzi on the phone from Mexico. That's how I got to know them. So she ended up on the.

Lali Safavi:

Mitzi ended up on the cover of our March issue. A couple of months later, in May, we put Karina Mask, who's a very well-known photographer down here in South Florida and a good friend. We put her on the cover of our magazine. Didn't think anything of it. It was great. Everyone was like oh Karina, that's fabulous.

Chris Baker:

We love your work.

Lali Safavi:

Two months later, all of a sudden, I find out that, untitled, art 2024 has the theme going of East meets West. Okay, karina is. Okay, guadalupe is Mexican. Out of nowhere, the two of them partner up.

Chris Baker:

Oh my gosh.

Lali Safavi:

Create the most incredible exhibit at Untitled, art 2024. And at the end of Untitled, we're invited they were the only booth from that entire show invited to Tokyo to show the exact exhibit that they were showing in Miami. And then the exhibit is coming to Mexico to be shown in Mexico. All of that got started because of these two covers, sort of making the parties aware of one another and putting these people on one another's radar.

Chris Baker:

that is a success story oh, that's a huge success story. Yes, and I mean the whole reason for our podcast is collaboration. That is collaboration like on, like global level absolutely incredible.

Lali Safavi:

Yes, and we're hoping to get three or four of the pieces that can be put on easels because the exhibit is massive. Yeah, um, we're hoping to get three or four of the pieces that can be put on easels because the exhibit is massive. Yeah, we're hoping to get three or four of those pieces to be able to show them at the fundraiser. Guadalupe is also on our board because we have very, very big plans for our arts program in Broward, so you know we really want her involved.

Chris Baker:

That's fantastic. I'm so glad that, like that whole connection you met, you talked and now, like between what you said, it was March and April.

Lali Safavi:

March and May. Between March and May, when we put Karina's cover out there, Guadalupe called me like 10 minutes later and she goes Lali, that's what you're supposed to go. She said Laliali, I cannot believe karina is on your cover. I was just thinking about her. I want to do this work with her and I titled, and I was like guadalupe, I mean it was. It was just, it was hilarious it was hilarious just like I cannot believe this, but some things are just meant to be yeah, no one you open up a door you open up a door absolutely so the magazine has gifted that collaboration and I definitely feel like that magazine also our connection, yes.

Chris Baker:

So I mean we got to briefly see each other passing by in Lesbian Tasmanians as they were doing some performances I know you do some volunteer work for them as well and we were filming for them. But it wasn't really until we actually started talking about Skirts of Flow magazine that really kind of opened up our collaboration efforts.

Lali Safavi:

Talk a little bit about that. Well, I had always seen you.

Chris Baker:

I had always seen you.

Lali Safavi:

I'm like, who is that man? Yes, so you and I were also part of the chamber together, so this all kind of happened contemporaneously, right? So this, it's like we had the lesbian thespians connection and I can't you have to remind me how we actually got started talking, like sitting down and talking. I think it was all a whirlwind, Like it was all we went from like just being acquaintances and seeing one another to all of a sudden like I'm parked in your office for four hours at a time. That's what happened.

Chris Baker:

Um, I know I know it was the chamber that really kind of helped that and I think also um, like didn't you know you introduced us to diane yes, yes, that's right. So no, it was a chamber we we just met at multiple events. We saw each other everywhere. That's right. So no, it was a chamber. We just met at multiple events. We saw each other everywhere.

Lali Safavi:

That's right.

Chris Baker:

And it just started to go. We need to talk, that's right. That's right, we need to talk.

Lali Safavi:

Because up to that point we had just been doing print advertising, Correct?

Chris Baker:

Yes.

Lali Safavi:

And you do video marketing for nonprofits and even though the magazine is not nonprofit, you took us on as a charity case, which I'm forever grateful for. So Chris takes us on and says, OK, we'll wants to have print and a little bit of video included.

Chris Baker:

We can help them, yeah, yeah.

Lali Safavi:

So that's how you and I ended up collaborating, but I think that you and I are collaborating on.

Chris Baker:

Multiple Since then. Yeah, multiple things, so many things, so many things.

Lali Safavi:

So I know you guys are going to be doing video work for us during Wilton Women's Week.

Chris Baker:

Yes, that is something that's coming up. Yes, yeah, we've got that and you know, you introduce us to Diane, which then we got to start doing more things for the Pride Center and being more involved there. So that was fantastic and we're actually doing a collaboration right now.

Lali Safavi:

We are, we are, we are. We're actually doing a collaboration right now. We are, we are, we are.

Chris Baker:

So the Skirt Foundation is one of the recipients for this current quarter of Headshots for a Cause, and so if you're looking to get a new headshot, this is the time to do it. There's three nonprofits that are being gifted the proceeds from these headshots that we're going to create and Skirts of Flow, the World's AIDS Museum and Global Dreams USA. Those are the three. So anybody that goes to Headshots 4 a Cause and that's number four, headshots4 acause. com you can choose where the money goes One of those three, or have it evenly distributed between all three of them, and so you get a new headshot and you get to do something amazing for a nonprofit. This is a wonderful opportunity that I get to continue our collaboration efforts and move forward.

Lali Safavi:

Yeah, you guys have been doing that for a while.

Chris Baker:

So we started at the end of 2024 as kind of like a test pilot and we touched a couple of non-profits and then we saw the potential for bigger, and now we've got more of a system in place. We've got three different photographers that are going to be working with us and we're going to, you know, expand this.

Chris Baker:

so we're really hopeful that this can get off the ground. And then, you know, we're writing thousand dollar checks at the end of every quarter to every non nonprofit that's being involved. That is our ultimate dream, so that we can help the community thrive and grow, because everybody should get a new headshot every year.

Lali Safavi:

Lord knows, I need one.

Chris Baker:

Everybody needs a new headshot. Looking forward, what are the strategic priorities to help further empower the women in the arts in the South Florida here Okay, so there are three areas that the Skirt Foundation focuses on Health and well-being LGBTQ and allied women.

Lali Safavi:

We don't, it's not just LGBTQ women, economic advancement of women and women in the arts. So those are our three funds. We provide primarily grant funding in those three areas. Provide primarily grant funding in those three areas. We are going to be doing if people, organizations, approach us with programs that are kind of in our wheelhouse in one of those three areas we will get more hands-on and work to sort of put together programs and collaborate in that way. But primarily what we do is we give money women to do the things that they want to do in these areas. So for the arts performing arts, visual arts, curation, arts, education, the art, business, art collection all of these areas. All of these areas are equally important With health.

Lali Safavi:

What we're really focusing on, you know, women's health. Oftentimes, really, people only only talk about it in October, we only talk about breast cancer and that's really. That's really it. It's like once we do that, then we sort of put the lid on that. Women have many, many health issues that go completely unaddressed. Women in HIV is a huge concern. We have to get it. You know. We really need to get into the communities where that is felt most strongly. I'm not sure if that community is Hilton Manors. It really isn't. It's minority communities.

Chris Baker:

Yeah, it's not always.

Lali Safavi:

Yeah, women's health before and after menopause in different, you know, different, different times in their lives, very, very different concerns. So, you know, mental health, all of these. We really want to support comprehensive women's health and well-being and we actually have been talking to a couple of organizations about collaborating with them, one on the nutritional front and another in care for young women who I, until yesterday, I was not even aware of how shoddy the care that they, that a lot of them, have been receiving. So you know, it's, it's, it's a learning, it's a. It's a huge learning curve, you know, as we sort of get into it with these, with these other organizations who are dealing with it on a day-to-day basis. Right, but we definitely want to put resources toward that. The Women's Economic, the Economic Advancement Fund, the money, the grant funding that we're going to be doing there is going to be specifically for seed money for women to be able to launch organizations, exactly the same way that the hour fund did for us.

Chris Baker:

It is going to.

Lali Safavi:

It is going to pay dividends. It's going to grow exponentially. What that? That little amount that they gave to us $5,000, organizationally speaking is not a huge sum, but it's huge for us. That is what we want to do for other organizations. Organizations is to be able to give them seed funding to be able to get their organizations off the ground In terms of programming for women's advancement, economic advancement. We would really love to put together some sort of training series where an organization like yours comes in and talks to women, either in business or in the nonprofit arena, about video marketing, about using AI, about automations, about effective social media marketing, about writing a business plan about calendaring about blocking off your day, about routines and things that allow you to move efficiently through your day, efficiently through your organization, efficiently through your life.

Chris Baker:

So important.

Lali Safavi:

Absolutely. It's incredible and it is the downfall of so many people right here, right here, okay, because you, just you know there's just so many, so many tools out there that we can use too.

Chris Baker:

And it gets overwhelming Totally. If there's too many options, it can get overwhelming and then like, well, I tried this one, now I have to try this one, and then it just becomes this waste of money yeah because you're I tried this one, it didn't work. Tried this one, it didn't work, and then you just don't know where to turn.

Lali Safavi:

So yeah, and everything is on a subscription basis too, so it's like you're paying five dollars here, seven dollars there, eleven dollars there. Before you know it, you're you're spending four hundred dollars a month on subscriptions that you're not using effectively, correct?

Chris Baker:

so and, and. That adds up.

Lali Safavi:

It adds, it adds up and in.

Chris Baker:

It's good business for that subscription model, but it's not for you know, you have to find the ones that this is what I need and this is what I need and I don't need all these other ones strategically planning what programs are going to make the most impact and the most difference for your business?

Lali Safavi:

You don't need them all. No, you don't.

Chris Baker:

You only may need one or two, and that will survive you for the first year, the first two years, and then at that point take another strategic look. Do I need something else? Will this help benefit me or not? But yeah, it's taking those moments you know it's that.

Lali Safavi:

It's that saying of drill one or two holes very deeply instead of drilling a whole bunch very shallow.

Chris Baker:

You know it's not going to get you anywhere it's just not going to get you so true, all right. So, as we wrap up, I have one question I ask all my guests, yes, and that what is the legacy that you hope to leave behind through your work for future generations?

Lali Safavi:

We, the Skirt Foundation, change the face of South Florida entirely for women right now and this might come as news to people who are not in the LGBTQ community South Florida is really known for. It's very well known in the gay male community with Wilton Manors and with South Beach. It's really not, you know, women kind of don't see it as a destination in general. I hear all the time there is no women's community here. In actuality there is an enormous women's community, far more yeah far more than people realize.

Lali Safavi:

They may not constantly be on Wilton Drive, but they are there and what they need is a glue to bring them out and bring them together for you to see where they are and who they are and what they are. We want to transform the face of South Florida and make it an absolute destination for women's organizations, for women's business, for women's tourism. Me personally, in the back of my mind, because I love the visual arts, broward County is zeroing in on revolutionizing the visual arts, women's visual arts, in Broward County. Miami-dade cannot be, and I love Miami-Dade. Please, there's nothing, I have nothing, but Miami-Dade cannot be. The only county here is viewed as an arts. You know, an arts, a creative Mecca, it just can't be. Is viewed as an arts, you know, an arts, a creative Mecca, it just can't. It can't be. We, we are absolutely ready for it, in need of it. I'm so excited about what we're going to be doing in the arts.

Chris Baker:

I'm looking forward to this. It sounds amazing.

Lali Safavi:

It's going to be terrific. It's going to be terrific. That is a much longer term. You know that's we really have to lay the foundation like a but. That's going to be a longer term project. But I guarantee you that in five years, if you and I sit down at this table again, you'll be like you told me that this was going to happen. I'm telling you, amazing things are going to happen.

Chris Baker:

No, honestly, I hope that we're still making episodes for Visual Eyes and five years from now, you come back on the show and you're like this is exactly what happened. This is what I was looking for, Absolutely.

Lali Safavi:

When you have your network, that'll be when you have your network.

Chris Baker:

Yeah, let's, let's turn that into our own network. I'll take that, I will. That would be an amazing legacy for Visuals by Momo. That would be amazing. So again,L ali, thank you so much for coming on the show and everyone, stay tuned for our next episode of Visual Eyes. Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you for joining me on this episode of Visual Eyes. We hope that the inspiration and practical insights can help you foster stronger connections and meaningful change. Don't forget to subscribe, share the episode and leave us a review. To learn more about Visuals by Momo and how we support collaboration and storytelling, visit visualsbymomo. com. A huge thank you to everyone out there listening. Until next time, remember, collaboration fuels change and your connections can inspire the world.