Naperville woman launches book project to help young girls

Cindy Harris of Naperville has raised three daughters, worked with young girls over the years and has seen how peer pressure can be a problem while growing up.

An aspiring writer, Harris developed Rising Empress, a package of posters, stickers and related products with a book that provides inspirational role models. It is for girls ranging in age from 3 to 12 and promotes creative and interactive play with trading cards featuring fictional empresses and their talents.

Rising Empress was recently launched in Salt Lake City, Utah, and also was introduced recently at Anderson's Bookshop in Naperville.

"I saw a need for creating more empowering products for girls in the market place," said Harris, 47. Read more in the Daily Herald.

Study: Illinois is 'powerhouse' for producing female founders

Illinois boasts three of the universities that produce the most female entrepreneurs.

Northwestern University, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the University of Chicago are among the top 25, according to a report by CrunchBase on female founders.

Northwestern is tied for 12th, the University of Illinois is No. 18 and the University of Chicago is tied for 21st in the report. Analysts studied more than 3,600 female founders whose companies had raised money since 2009, CrunchBase said.

“Illinois is the powerhouse” of the Midwest, CrunchBase analysts wrote in a blog post announcing the results.

Ilesanmi Adesida, a provost at U. of I., said the university is proud of its graduates' accomplishments. "But it is even more exciting to us to see the impact these women are having in their industries and in their communities," he said in an email. Read more in the Chicago Tribune.

Illinois businesswoman's hard work and determination has positive results for the family farm

Sarah Frey-Talley, chief executive officer of Frey Farms LLC, headquartered in Keenes, IL, founded the company 20 years ago — when she was 16. Today it farms approximately 12,000 acres in numerous locations, in addition to sourcing from growing partners.

“Growing up, we had a small, 100-acre family farm,” Ms. Frey-Talley explained. “My mom had a small route of about 12 grocery stores that she delivered melons to in the summer. When I was 16 I bought my own truck and took over her route. Mom went to work for a radio station, and my four older brothers went off to college.”

Her brothers, she noted, knew that the family farm was too small to provide them with a living, so their intentions were to go into other careers.

Once she had taken over the melon route, Ms. Frey-Talley began marketing to more stores. Ultimately she had 150 stores on her route, forcing her to source melons from other farms in Illinois and Indiana to fill her customers’ needs. Produce News has the story.

Read more about Sarah Frey-Talley and her business.
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