A powerhouse in the world of entrepreneurial disruption, Miki Agrawal has made a name for herself by providing the world with solutions to prescient problems. More than just another successful entrepreneur, Miki Agrawal has risen through the ranks as a Canadian innovator who uses every opportunity present to spread her messages, inspire others, and create something important.
Who Is Miki Agrawal?
What you know of Miki Agrawal will likely define who she is to you. A disruptor and inventor, Miki attended Cornell University, where she would graduate in 2001 with a Bachelor of Science in Business and Communication. After departing from Cornell, Agrawal would spend a chunk of her time working at Deutsche Bank in New York City, where she was profoundly impacted by the tragic events of 9/11. Shifting her focus to creating something that adds value to the world, Agrawal would choose to redefine her career path entirely.
Disruptor and Innovator
More of a disruptor and innovator than a conventional business professional, Agrawal knew that her passions could guide her to solutions that customers would enjoy. This would end up being the ace as she found success in a litany of different industries including farm-to-table dining, bidet toilet attachments, book publishing, sustainable underwear, and even podcasting.
Underscoring all of Miki Agrawal’s efforts in the entrepreneurial world has been her consistent ability to generate interest in her ideas. A natural speaker and orator, Agrawal has made the rounds on podcasts, interviews, and other social outreach programs to make sure that her words are properly heard.
Let’s dive into Agrawal’s world and see how her work with Podcasting has helped to create new ideas and spaces as an entrepreneur.
Working on Podcasts
If there is anything in life that Miki Agrawal stands loudest for it is the idea that we should subvert the status quo whenever possible. Agrawal rose out of Cornell University with the idea that she was going to work in banking. While her life and ambitions were changed by real-world events, her willingness to adapt kept her pushing forward.
Miki Agrawal, the founder of Thinx and Tushy, has been making the rounds on podcasts and in public speaking engagements to share how people can follow in her footsteps to disrupt industries of their own.
Attacking the Status Quo
Agrawal was featured on an episode of The Cathy Heller Podcast and it was there that the disruptor and best-selling author took time to outline the ways in which she has continued to engage in disruption throughout her entrepreneurial career.
Disrupting the status quo, according to Agrawal, can lead to unreal results and breakthroughs that can change lives.
In her featured podcast episode, Agrawal asked her listeners, “What is a pain point in my life? Is it a pain point for other people? Can I be passionate about this for a long time?”
For Miki, a pain point in her life for a long time had pertained to issues in the bathroom. Health problems had made what should have been an easy experience into one that was anything but. Spurred on by the toilet paper shortage of the COVID-19 pandemic, Miki Agrawal would find success in her bidet toilet attachment, Tushy.
Tushy was an invention not just of necessity but also of her own cultural background. The toilet attachment that was so normal in her multicultural home was suddenly foreign to her regular audience. By pushing the envelope and embracing her authenticity, Agrawal was able to develop the Tushy bidet into a huge success.
The Tushy bidet is said to help individuals with bathroom cleaning while addressing several potential health issues. Bidets are notably beneficial to individuals dealing with IBS, Crohn’s Disease, diarrhea, colitis, and other conditions causing frequent bathroom visits.
Building a Team
Attacking the status quo requires intense effort and effective team-building. Miki Agrawal’s success has been defined by her own hard work but it has been supported by the hard work of others, as well. Agrawal advocates during podcasts and in speaking engagements that you should surround yourself with people who care about you, who you are, and what you are going through.
Agrawal found success with her foray into entrepreneurial work because she had fostered a community of supporters all interested in seeing her succeed. By fostering a supportive community and developing a team, Agrawal was able to find support for her efforts and innovations.
Crafting and Branding With Taboos
In addition to her work on podcasts, Agrawal has also been a presence at speaking engagements throughout her industry. After penning the book Disrupt-Her, which broke down how she built her multi-million dollar brands, Agrawal would spend time on The Capitalism Conference podcast to share the insights that she had gained thus far.
Throughout the podcast, Agrawal detailed how important it was to build a brand that not only is fun and entertaining but also authentic to yourself and your values. By refusing to compromise on her values, Agrawal was able to stay true to the work that she wanted to do.
Always willing to break into conversations about taboos, Agrawal understood that it would be worth fighting for solutions even if those solutions made people uncomfortable. So when the COVID-19 pandemic caused toilet paper shortages around the nation, Agrawal was ready to talk and spread the word.
Agrawal would find herself at the center of the public’s spotlight when she and her sister had a high-profile spat with the NYC Public Transit system over marketing for their period-proof underwear, THINX. The transit system found the subject matter too “taboo” and refuse to put the marketing material on display.
Gutted by the response and infuriated by the senseless taboo over the word ‘period’, Miki and her sister would go to the press and before long their story would break out. Through the use of her voice and her willingness to confront cultural taboos, Miki Agrawal was able to get her marketing campaign on track.
Working For Success
Miki Agrawal enjoys attacking the status quo while branding herself with her values. Agrawal points out that many companies require people to be fundamentally reprogrammed to fit in with the status quo, but that isn’t something Miki is interested in.
Agrawal said of her experiences conforming to other businesses before embarking on her own entrepreneurial journey, “I realized I wasn’t my sparkly true self. When you’re a light, when you’re super good at something – people are attracted to you.”
Understanding the importance of working for success while maintaining a sense of self, Miki would leave behind the office in exchange for her pursuits. In the intervening years, Agrawal has helped to develop disruptions within the multi-billion dollar hygiene industry for feminine products.
Looking to the Future
As Miki Agrawal continues to build upon her efforts to disrupt the entrepreneurial world, she offers one piece of prescient advice to those following in her footsteps: bring things back to first principles. Agrawal suggests that her followers break down concepts into their different parts and pieces, understanding each component before deciding how best to build it in the future.
Agrawal also advocates for treating business like art, creating products, emails, and ads that all create and add value rather than simply relay messages.
