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Q & A with Megan LaMothe, CEO of FORAY GOLF

This summer, the Children’s Museum is thrilled to welcome FORAY GOLF as the title sponsor of our Annual Golf Outing (as well as a sponsor for July’s Ladies Night and the Family Fair Fundraiser). We recently spoke with FORAY GOLF’s CEO & Founder, Megan LaMothe about starting the company, her advice for kids, and why empowering women is so important.

Could you tell us a little about your background and how you started FORAY GOLF?

Life is rarely linear. After graduating from Colgate University in 2004, I worked as an assistant to Jack and Suzy Welch while they were working on their book Winning. While we were on the book tour, I was able to visit a bunch of business schools and decided to pursue my MBA at NYU. I always wanted to work in fashion and retail, however, there was no MBA track to that world. I really had to hustle to make it work…I think I had 5 or 6 different internships during grad school. Counterintuitively I landed in marketing at Fox News after I graduated in 2009. From there, I apprenticed at a woman’s fashion boutique in Boston . I left after a year to work at Victoria’s Secret where I was Director of Design Operations. During my time at VS, I met my now husband, got married, had my daughter whose name is Rae.

The thing that shook me from the corporate world was that I had had changed so much as woman over the length of my time there. It no longer felt authentic to work for Victoria’s Secret, so I was left trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. More than anything I wanted to demonstrate to my daughter that if you truly believe in an idea and work hard towards it, you can achieve anything. I left VS and started FORAY in 2016. It’s really all about her. The company is even named after her…for Rae, get it?

The Children’s Museum is a firm believer that kids and grownups need to play. How did you become interested in the game of golf?

It was figuring out what to do on my third date with my husband. I knew he loved golf, so I said, “Let’s go to Chelsea Piers.” I had never played in life. The ball teed up, I swung and it went about 200 yards perfectly straight. It just kind of took. Coming from being a competitive tennis player, it was great to feel that way again. I didn’t realize that feeling was even missing until that day. Now golf is a huge part of our lives. My husband even proposed to me on a golf course.! It’s one of those games that you can really play as a family. And it opens up so many doors, particularly for women in business.

One of FORAY GOLF’s goals is to empower women to be avant-garde. Why is that important for you?

For me, it means really owning who you are. The FORAY woman can look like anyone, but she’s confident in who she is. She knows how to speak, how to stand. I see her being really proud of her accomplishments and knowing what’s she’s capable of. She’s unapologetic, but not in a confrontational way. It’s important because it’s been relatively well documented that we, as women, are culturally more likely to apologize or give deference—even though it doesn’t serve our needs. I am working on taking the word “just” out of my vocabulary and admire women that have extracted themselves from this counterproductive behavior.

What has been your biggest challenge (or surprise) with getting Foray up and running?

I knew what I wanted the company to look like and the biggest challenge was to work backwards—figuring out the supplier and production relationships to get us there. Our whole goal was to build a supply chain that’s quick to respond to consumers. That’s why our products are all produced in limited quantities and why we aim for constant newness.

If you could offer one piece of advice to kids, what would it be?

If you believe that you want do something, you’ve got to wake up every day and try. If one way doesn’t work, try it a different way. And it’s OK to fail—I have learned more from my failures, bad grades, tough jobs or bosses than good ones—but you have to put in the work and try. No one is going to do it for you. And try and say “yes” to everything you can. The power of yes is so important.

What’s your favorite hole in the Museum’s Mini Golf Course?

All the holes are amazing, but my favorite is number 9. You can play that hole over and over again it will never sound the same. It’s truly like the game of golf… always different no matter what you do. But it’s most overt when you play number 9. The ball never falls in exactly the same way so you’ll never make the same song twice. Every experience is completely unique.

In addition to serving as the Title Sponsor of the Museum’s Golf Outing, you’re sponsoring an activity at the Family Fair Fundraiser. Can you describe what it will be?

It’s going to be amazing. We wanted to acknowledge all types of animal—even that some animals can be imaginary—so we are celebrating the Balloon Dog! We created a balloon dog logo t-shirt and an entire collection of iron-on patches. Kids can choose patches—a leash, sneakers, bow tie, mustache, hat, clown nose—and decorate their own t-shirt to bring home. It’s completely unique to them!

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