Becoming An Industry Pioneer With Paige Adams-Geller

This is the show where we inspire lives and empower entrepreneurs. You are maybe in a place in your life where you want to start a business. You have this big dream and vision, but you’re worried that people won’t take you seriously. You’re maybe a pioneer starting a new territory, a new path in your life and people aren’t the quickest to join you. In this episode, I have such a treat for you because I am sitting down with the beautiful, talented and incredibly successful Paige Adams-Geller.

I’m Paige Adams-Geller, the Creative Director and the Founder of PAIGE Denim. I’ve watched our brand become a true industry leader. One of the things that I’m most excited about is our fabric innovation. Transcend has taken us to a new level and successfully proven that we can merge technology and fashion to create a real gene that is unparalleled in fit, comfort and innovation.

Paige, thank you for welcoming me into your gorgeous home. I am moving in shortly. I have had the pleasure of getting to know you a little bit over the last couple of years. I love your story and I’m excited for you to share it with our readers because I think when people look at you, they probably think, “Of course, she’s successful.” You didn’t get hit with the ugly sick Paige. You’re a beautiful woman, but it hasn’t always been that way for you. You used to be called “Pudgy Paige” I can’t even imagine that.

They used to call me Pudgy Paigey and Ms. Piggy, and kids will literally throw spit wads at me on the bus and exit me when I got off the bus. It was pretty trying. It was like Little Miss Sunshine. It was tough. I’d come home and I’d try to have a stiff upper lip. I didn’t want to tell my mom and dad that I was being bullied at school and I try to stay strong about it, but kids can be mean and cool.

Especially having a little one at home now. It’s like, you want to protect her from that, but that is part of like growing up in the world. When did you transition into that? I know you started modeling early on and we both have a little bit of a beauty pageant background. When did that turn around for you?

When I was about probably morphing from junior high into high school. I started to become a lot more aware my body and a lot more aware of what I could do to change my body and physical fitness started to become something that I paid attention to. It was important to start working out. I’d get up in the morning. I started doing Jane Fonda workout before I’d go to school, then I’d go to cheerleading practice.

Did you have the leg warmers and the leotard going on?

You have to. The weight started to shed off and I started changing my eating habits. I went from being Pudgy Paigey and Miss Piggy to the opposite. It started to become an obsession, and it started to get unhealthy the other way on the scale. Literally, I’d wake up every morning, get on the scale, see how much I weighed and became obsessed with getting thin because what was happening is the compliments would start to come, “You’ve got such a beautiful face if you just lost more weight. You could model, you could go into the entertainment world if you just lost weight.” It’s an obsession. I went the opposite from being overweight to being anorexic. I didn’t want to eat. I didn’t want food in my stomach and was obsessed. I got very thin, but I got a modeling contract.

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It’s funny how that works. How did you work your way through that? I know men deal with this too, but I feel like many women were scared to be seen. We’re scared to put ourselves out there. We’re scared to start that business because of that fear of being judged. You’ve been on both spectrums.

I felt like I was like scrutinized when I was out in the entertainment world, auditioning on a daily basis. You’re either too tall, too thin, too blonde, too this and too that. You are constantly put under a microscope. When I started my business, the first thing that people said was, “She’s just a model. What is she going to know about business?” The immediate judgment of, “She’s blonde and she has a Barbie look, she cannot be intelligent. Don’t take her seriously. This is a stupid idea.”

How did you fight that?

I feel that when someone tells me that I can’t do something, it makes me want to try all the harder to prove them wrong. I have a little bit of a rebellious streak, which I like about me because I get fiery. When I get angry, I think there’s nothing more that can propel you into forward movement than anger. When someone says no, I’m going to prove them wrong. I found that as my opportunity to take on a challenge and say, “I am not going to let anyone say I can’t do something.” I’m so grateful for that.

What propelled that forward movement was hard work, doing a lot of research, and making sure that I knew what I was doing before I started doing it. Surrounding myself with people who are brilliant at things that I might not be brilliant in and making sure that I try things and not stop myself from fear. I’m going to try it no matter what. It’s like that field of fear, but do it anyway concept. I don’t care. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I’m going to try my best and give it my A-plus effort. I was always an A-plus student.

You were an honor student. You graduated early. It is funny how people want to put us in a box and say, “You look this way. You have this background. You’re from this side of the street. You can’t achieve that.” I will find that in most people I interview, there’s this veracity that’s, “I’m going to do it anyway, that little bit of a rebel.” When you started PAIGE Denim, you were the only woman to have a premium denim line. You were a fit model at that time. For people who don’t know what that is, explain a little bit about what that is.

After suffering from anorexia from being a print and runway model, I had to get to a healthy weight and not be the size zero or size two that usually graces the runways and be a hanger for clothing. What happened is I started to get meat on my bones and became a healthier size like 4, 6, 8. Clothing companies hire you based off of being the median of a size range. Let’s say there’s a clothing brand that goes from a size 0 to 12, they’d hire a size six model to be the person that they use as a live form to design the clothes off of. You get to work with the pattern makers and designers as a fit model. They put the clothes on you. They drape on you and they see how it looks on a real body. You are like a live mannequin and then design off of.

Except for when I was doing fit modeling, I was very vocal. Instead of being a body that the designers would put the clothes on, I’d literally look in the mirror and probably because of my body dysmorphia, I would straight out say to the actual designers, “I would never wear that. Look at how big my hips look. How about if we’ve changed this seam and put it here, or we put this pocket here, we moved this belt loop here. We put a princess seam or a dart here? Look how much thinner I look.” I became obsessed with transforming the body in the mirror and making things look as beautiful as they can on a figure with curves.

I’m sure they appreciated that too or did they appreciate that at that time?

They did. At first, they would look at me like, “Who are you to be talking? You’re not supposed to talk. You’re just supposed to put the clothes on.” Finally, because they were all men, literally they would look at me and be like, “I think she knows what she’s talking about. I think we’d sell this better if we try that.” That became my expertise. I was known as a fit model, a fit expert, and a design consultant for a lot of different brands in the clothing arena.

It’s such a journey and then you decided to launch your own denim line and you had a lot of people who were saying, “Don’t buy from her.” The first woman to launch a premium denim line, having the stereotype that, “She’s just a model. Don’t take her seriously.” People telling the showrooms not to work with you. How did you overcome that? I think that when people start businesses, there are constant roadblocks and some might say, “It’s too hard.”

I think that having a strong support team around me is one of the things that keeps me steady and balanced and in a very positive mindset. I have a girlfriend that always says, “I’m a positron and #positron.” I feel like I wake up every day with that mindset. I’ve got my workout clothes by the side of the bed, I wake up, get on my workout clothes, go do a workout, get my endorphins into a positive place, meditate and set my intentions for the day and say, “This is what’s going to happen.” This has been part of my routine for years.

That is a great way to start the day.

The endorphins helped me with everything, staying positive. The workout helps me with my food for the day so I can eat and be healthy and have a great day. The intention setting helps me clarify what is the goal that I need to get through this day that I want to make sure happens and focus on that intention. With negativity around, I don’t like toxic people. I don’t have a toxic work environment. I don’t like toxic people around. I don’t like negative energy around. I fill my space up with all of that positivity and then literally focus on those goals.

When people were saying, “No, you can’t do it.” In my mind, there was no such thing as a glass half-empty. It’s a glass half-full and I am going to make this happen. I will set myself up for a success instead of setting myself up for failure. Some of those obstacles along the way of people saying, “You can’t do that. We’re not going to work with you.” It was pretty scary. Literally, I went to our first trade show, which is called COTERIE in New York City. I brought my first collection to the trade show. I was petrified. It caused anxiety like, “Does even anybody know that I’m launching a line?”

There was this little blurb that was in W Magazine that was saying, “The former fit model turned designer is launching her own brands. Go see her at the booth at COTERIE.” People showed up in masses at the booth. I was excited because it felt like a classroom talking about what the line was and why I started the line and showing people the different fits. I wrote more business at that first trade show than I projected that I would do in a year. That was the fuel that I needed of like, “If you build it, they will come.”

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The way that it propelled me into the positive intention thinking going forward was when wash houses and manufacturing facilities said that they wouldn’t work with me because of my competitors saying, “If you work with Paige, we’re going to pull our business.” I was able to have that in writing like, “Here you go. This is how much business you’re going to get for my first show. If you take a risk with me, I’m super loyal. I’ll be loyal and I’ll ride this adventure with you. Take a chance on me. I promise I’ll be loyal to you.” Thank God, they did.

How important has trusting your intuition been to growing your business? You’re now in 80 countries. You’ve opened three new stores. I’m happy for your success. I was with a girlfriend the other day and she was telling me about her fabulous new PAIGE pair of jeans. You have people give you advice all the time. I know you started a men’s line as well. Talk about intuition because I feel that as a woman in business, our intuition is imperative.

It is what saves me on a regular basis. I have learned over the years to trust my intuition because of mistakes. From times that I didn’t trust that voice, that’s either in my head or that guttural instinct that’s in my gut and started listening to the negative voices or to other voices and going down a path that didn’t feel quite right. Every time I’ve done that, it has bit me in the butt. It’s been anything from when I’ve worked with department store. Let’s say, someone will say, “Will you design this jean and give it to us as an exclusive?”

My gut will say that doesn’t feel right for the brand. Maybe it’s a drop crotch or something masculine. It’s something that doesn’t feel like it’s in alignment with what we stand for. Just because I want to please someone or please the retailer, I’ll start to say yes and go, “I better do this or they won’t probably do business with me anymore,” and I go into that fear and say yes. Every time I’ve done that, it has turned out for the worst. They end up wanting to send it back because it didn’t sell. I’ll be like, “That wasn’t my idea to begin with. I did it for you, guys.”

I realized what has happened is I’ve gone against the grain of what I stand for and our customer doesn’t see it as authentic. They go, “I don’t believe that that’s from you. I don’t believe that’s from your brand.” Every time I have to do that check, “Is it authentic? Does it feel right? Does it feel true? Is this what I stand for personally? Is this what the brand stands for?” I put that checks and balances in place. The more I’ve done that, the more I’ve trusted my intuition and know that intuition doesn’t steer me wrong.

That might be one of my favorite things I’ve heard. I could not agree with you more. It doesn’t matter what business you’re in. People will see whether you’re congruent and in integrity with your brand and they smell it when you’re not.

It’s no different than being around people that are not your tribe and you’re trying to pretend you are. They can smell it, see it and feel it. It’s like, “This doesn’t feel good. I’m feeling like I’m being a phony baloney.” That’s my intuitive gauge.

That’s a brilliant business advice because it is easy to want to please and say, “If they’re not buying this, let me come up with this.” You’re like, “That’s not who I am like. This doesn’t resonate with our brand and what I stand for.” You and your husband worked together as well. You work together and you obviously live together. How is that dynamic?

I have to say that I am pleasantly surprised at the dynamic and how well it works. Part of it might be that I came from a family that was like that. My mom and dad at one time in their life were entrepreneurs and had a business together, and that’s when I was little. I was raised around what I would joke around and call shop talk. They’d come home every night and they’d have shop talk. I’d be like, “All you guys talk about is work.” I had a brother who was in business with his wife, and then a sister who was in business with her husband. It’s something that is again authentic. It is natural for me to be around a system that works that way. When my husband decided that he thought he wanted to go on adventure with me, we complement each other. He doesn’t like to be in the limelight or on the center of attention or the ambassador of the brand. The things that he likes to do are the things that I don’t like to do. We complement each other that way. At the same time, I know that the bigger question is probably, “How do you get along?”

I have to say, we don’t fight. We get along so well. I can go through a whole day and never see him at the office because we’re multitasking and doing different things. We don’t interfere with one another’s jobs. Yet at the same time, it is refreshing to know that I have a partner who has my back and has my best interest at heart at all times because he wants the business to succeed as much as I do cause it’s our future and our kids’ futures. It does work well. The only thing that we have to find good balance in is not bringing too much shop talk at home.

Take a break and unplug. Twenty-four hours of no shop talk. It’s interesting because more women are becoming very successful in their businesses and more of their significant others are jumping on. It’s amazing. We’re in such a beautiful time in the world where that does work and it’s not about the woman always supporting the man and vice versa. It’s symbiotic and figuring out how you can build something together. I love that.

One of the things that I love so much is having a very beautifully female empowering work environment is very important to me, and it is to him as well. Being able to know that I have faith and trust in my partner that he is going to treat the women within the company the right way, and help empower them too and has the same philosophy. He has the philosophy, “Behind every great man is a strong woman.” He’s been my biggest fan. I’m grateful.

#MeToo is a huge movement. I know we’ve both been affected by that. That has been a huge part of why you have created this positive safe environment at PAIGE. Tell us a little bit about that and that decision.

It’s important to me and I feel that one of the things that motivates me even more than financial success or business success is having an empowered environment. My number one motivation is to have a successful business where women can be successful. Within PAIGE, there are many that are the breadwinners of their own homes, and the men stay at home and take care of the children. They have great jobs at PAIGE. To build that super safe work environment is important to me. The reason why in my history is that I was a victim of rape at the age of sixteen and never told a soul. I was in Alaska. I didn’t have anywhere to go. I didn’t have anyone to talk to. I was super scared and ashamed, and thought it was my fault. I didn’t tell anyone.

Fast forward to fourteen years later, when I’m a model in the workplace and I get attacked in the workplace on the job and had been in an environment for years, going on auditions and being treated in ways that were very disrespectful. After getting attacked at that workplace and knowing of a safe place to go get help, I went to the Rape Treatment Center and that changed my life. I went to the Rape Treatment Center and had free counseling. For the first time, I was able to go to therapy, I’d never been to therapy. I talked about what happened to me at the age of sixteen. I start to process everything that happened to me while I was out in the field as a model, actress, singer, and then start healing. I had to go away to deal with my eating disorder and I get treatment for that.

While I was working on all of that healing, at the same time that’s when I started to find my voice. I took on my attacker. I found my strength. I found that survival instinct from within of like, “I am going to get through this and I am going to make something out of my life. I am not going to depend on a man. I am going to do this on my own and make it great.” That fight within me is what propelled me into forward movement to find my voice and that guttural survival instinct from within to know that, “I’m going to be a success. I’m going to fight in this world. I’m going to do my best to be the best person I can be. I’m going to get through this.”

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That led me to a life coach. I met this amazing woman, Elizabeth Gamza, who I started talking about what I wanted to be when I grew up. It wasn’t healthy for me to be in front of the camera. I needed to take a shift change. I was still fit modeling and loving it, but I wanted to find my purpose and my passion in life. She is the one who planted the seed and said, “Why don’t you think about starting your own clothing company?”

I said, “I can’t do that. I didn’t go to business school.” She’s like, “Think about starting your own company because you love empowering people. You love women. You love clothes. Put together your dream team and take this as a homework assignment and think about if you were going to start your own brand, what would it look like? Go home and think about it, put it on a board, manifest it and come back to me with your homework next week.” That is how PAIGE was born. I went home and did my homework. I mentioned it to my husband. He said, “If you don’t do this, you’re going to regret it the rest of your life.”

What a story because if you didn’t go to the Rape Treatment Center and find your voice, that instinct, that fighter, you wouldn’t be anywhere near where you are now, and not just commercially but with everything that you’ve created and how you empower so many other women. Now you’re on the board there as well and mentor these young women that are going through these tough times. Thank you for sharing. It’s a beautiful story.

I think it’s my responsibility to share and to hopefully help someone. If they have ever been through something like this, know that there are safe places to go. You are only as sick as your secrets and the healing begins when you start talking about it, not stuffing it and holding it inside. Once I started doing that and Humpty Dumpty in a sense got put back together again and started to heal, it’s when I had the energy to finally pay it forward. I started a company, create a safe work environment, lift people up, support them, and have women never go through what I had to go through in our work environment at PAIGE. Now, I get to mentor other people. There’s nothing more. The most fulfilling part is being able to pay it forward.

There’s something that I often say, which is difficult when you go through something traumatic, “Everything happens for us, not to us.” When you go through something like that you think, “How in the world can this be happening for me?” Look at the woman that you are now, Paige, and what you’re able to do because you went through those horrific times. That’s why everyone should go out and buy PAIGE Denim. They are amazing. I always ask my guests, what are the three things that you would tell someone who is looking to grow a business? What three tips would you give someone?

The three tips I would tell someone if they were growing a business is to be authentic and not listen to too many chefs in the kitchen. I feel that there’s one thing that you can do when you’re asking for advice and you can take in all of the information and all of the advice, but run it past that intuitive authenticity meter. Make sure that it sticks and feels right for you and for the business or for what it is that you’re thinking of doing. If you don’t, you’ll be in that people pleasing mode and it gets tough. You have to be focused.

The other thing I would say is don’t be afraid to make mistakes because it’s the mistakes that you learn from that make you even better. Not everything can be perfect and it’s about progress and learning. If I wouldn’t have made some of the mistakes many years ago, I wouldn’t know how to problem solve on the bigger scale when it’s even more critical that I make a decision now. Don’t be afraid of that. Third, have fun. I don’t think it’s worth working as hard as I do running a business, running around the country and trying to stay relevant and fashion if I didn’t love it and I wasn’t having fun. I have a fun team. I like being around fun people.

My last question for you is what does inspired living mean to you?

Inspire living means hope. I think it is a hope every day that you are going to live the life that you’ve always dreamed of. I don’t ever want to feel like I’m not inspired on a daily basis because then I feel like my spirit would get crushed. Inspiration is everything. It’s what keeps me going. It’s something to look forward to. It’s looking at everything around me and trying to breathe it in and see why I met someone on a certain day and what it is that they said to me that might make a difference in my life that day, or if there’s a message or a hidden meaning on a sign that I see when I’m driving or a color that I see when I’m out walking my dogs. it’s like hiking in nature that all of a sudden, I go, “I didn’t even notice that last week, but this week that’s the prettiest color palette for the next season.” It’s like breathing everything around and not being stuck in a place without being able to look at the beautiful gifts that are around.

You are certainly hope for a lot of people. A lot of people who work with you are inspired by you and all the work that you’re doing in the world to help empower other women. Thank you for sharing that hope. Your lines are all over the country, but if someone wanted to shop online, how do we find you?

Paige the brand is at PAIGE.com and we are a full lifestyle brand now. It’s not just about denim. We’re not even called PAIGE Denim anymore. It’s PAIGE. It’s lifestyle brand for men and women. You can complete your wardrobe from head to ankle.

I’m going. I hope you will join us. Thank you for reading this interview. I hope you are inspired and we would love to hear from you. Please post your comments and when you are inspired, you inspire others. Please share this with someone that you care about. Thank you again, Paige. Until next time, remember to keep dreaming it, living it, and being it.

Important Links:

• COTERIE
• #MeToo
• www.Paige.com

About Paige Adams-Geller

From the beginning our Co-Founder & Creative Director, Paige Adams-Geller, embraced change, aiming to inspire as her story evolved. Her journey began in Los Angeles, where her entrepreneurial spirit took her from working as one of the top fit models in the industry to launching her namesake collection in 2004. In late 2006, Adam-Geller launched a men’s line with the same commitment to quality and attention to detail. With the help of her leadership and vision, what started as a women’s denim brand quickly expanded into a full lifestyle collection for men and women, sold at premium retailers internationally. Today, she sits at the helm of PAIGE continuing to lead with her commitment to cutting edge design and passion for creating pieces that you will live in. Adams-Geller’s true passion in life is inspiring and empowering others. She is a dedicated board member of the Rape Foundation, a trained volunteer at the Stuart House and a proud supporter of many other charitable organizations including NEDA and the Advot Project.

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