HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO SLEEP TONIGHT KNOWING @taylorswift just wore @anayah_jewellery necklace for her new album ???????????
I am just a regular girl / mum / wife building my brand what is happening !
Image @mertalas
Thank you so much, Grazia, for featuring us! Sometimes I can hardly believe how far we’ve come. As I was reminiscing, I came across this photo from the early days when we had just begun. With a £2000 investment from my father, my husband, brother, and I were building our website and taking product photos using DIY lightbox in our London flat. The journey has been anything but easy — 4 house moves, 3 branding changes, losing my mother to cancer, 2 babies, and navigating through COVID — but we made it. I never gave up, and I’m incredibly grateful for the amazing support system I’m blessed with. Thank you to everyone who has played a role in making Anayah what it is today. This is just the beginning — there’s so much more to come!
Seeing myself in print in Forbes feels surreal.
A bit of imposter syndrome, a lot of gratitude.
Thank you Forbes India for featuring Anayah’s story.
@forbesindia@anayah_jewellery
We take the jewellery seriously.
Everything else, not so much.
Behind the scenes of our latest shoot — and yes, it ended with homemade cake baked by our stylist’s mum @by_jvk
New pieces dropping soon.
Shop current collection via link in bio.
#AnayahJewellery #BehindTheScenes #AnayahShoot
Nobody in my father’s generation completed school.
Not my dad. Not his brothers. Not my uncles on either side.
Education was never the priority. Business was. If you’re Gujrati you might relate to this.
And from the moment I was old enough to understand anything, business was all around me.
I remember collection days at my grandparents. My mum’s brother and my granddad would come home with bags of cash. They would sit down and count it by hand.
My cousins and I would circle around them.
We helped count. We wrote in the books. We sat in the godowns where the stock was kept and listened to conversations we were too young to fully understand.
There was an accountant everyone called Mehta Saab. I can still picture him.
On my dad’s side I was the only girl. Every cousin was a boy. And all they were ever told was that one day they would run the business.
Nobody said that to me.
So I spent most of my childhood trying to prove I was just as good as them.
Turns out that is not a bad foundation for building a company.
#FounderJourney #Anayah #FamilyBusiness #Entrepreneurship #Gujarati
For those who don’t know me
Hi, I’m Nilofar. Former investment banker turned mumpreneur.
I left a decade-long career in one of the most demanding industries in the world to build a jewellery brand from scratch.
No investors. No blueprint. No idea what I was doing.
Just £2,000 from my father, a lot of sleepless nights, and a product I believed in.
That brand is now worn by Taylor Swift, Doja Cat, Mariah Carey, Lisa from BLACKPINK and countless global celebrities. All organic. Not a single paid placement.
I’m a mum of two boys. I built this while still at the bank.
While raising them. While going through the hardest years of my life.
If you’ve supported me in any way - thank you. Genuinely.
I feel like I’m only just getting started. And I have never been more ready.
Being a mother while building a business is one of the most challenging things to balance.
I started my Anayah journey when I had my first born, and then my second child very soon after.
They’ve watched me work. They’ve been involved, helping me pack orders and organise deliveries, and seeing the countless hours spent trying to build something meaningful.
And like many mothers trying to build something, there are moments of doubt.
Am I doing enough?
Am I present enough?
Am I getting the balance right?
But then I see how curious they are about what I’m doing. How proud they are to be involved in small ways. And I realise they are witnessing something important.
They are watching their mother build.
To all the mothers raising young children while also building businesses, careers and dreams, the strength it takes is extraordinary.
Happy Mother’s Day to all the incredible mums doing both.
#MothersDay #WomenInBusiness #FemaleFounder #EntrepreneurLife #WorkingMum FounderJourney
