Spotlight on Juliette Brindak
Founder of Miss O & Friends By Girls…For Girls®, a lifestyle brand created and managed by and for girls.

At 18 years of age, Juliette Brindak heads a company, Miss O & Friends ™, which Juliette co-created with her sister Olivia, and her parents, Paul and Hermine Brindak.

Juliette conceived the idea when she was only 10 years old.

“At age 10, playing with Barbie no longer did it for me,” reflects Juliette. “Tapping into my creative side— um, make that bored side—I started doodling these cool girls on my way home from a family vacation. With the help of my Mom, sister and other girls, and after five years of just playing around all together, we ended up talking to lots of girls. We showed them Miss O & Friends, and they all loved it!”

As a result, in April 2005 Juliette founded Miss O & Friends. By investing Juliette and her sister Olivia’s college savings, the company could grow and reach hundreds of thousands of growing girls.

“Our vision was simple,” says Juliette, “to help girls build a positive sense of self in a fun, self-directed way so they'll be less vulnerable to the pressures of fitting in and being popular.”

The company also has the support of several industry visionaries, such as Maxine Clark, founder of Build-A-Bear Workshop, Len Lodish, the vice dean of the Wharton School of Business, Greg Coleman, the No. 3 executive at Yahoo, and about 30 other industry veterans. Supporters consider Miss O & Friends as hip yet age appropriate, wholesome yet not Pollyanna-ish, and fun yet authentic.

For starters, Juliette and her supporters launched www.missoandfriends.com in 2005. The company Web site serves as a safe place for girls to gather. There is no chat room on the site to ensure online visitors to Miss O & Friends remain out of harm’s way when it comes to Internet predators. Parents also love this about the Miss O site, which is endorsed by Common Sense Media as a safe site for children.

“The real-life girls directing and managing the company with me are my sister Olivia (Miss O), our Asian-American cousin Harlie, Justine, inspired by a local tween, and Isabella, Olivia’s friend from South America,” says Juliette. “Our Web site and all Miss O products foster a healthy lifestyle, not fad based, building confidence, promoting a sense of self, encouraging personal best, not perfectionism, and looking good, but not being sexually inappropriate.”

The site is composed what tween girls say they want, like interactive games, polls and advice columns, as well as opportunities to create art, jewelry, clothes, electronic newspapers and original stories. Some such stories were published in one of Miss O’s books, Write On!, which is available wherever books are sold.

Last year, Miss O launched a national writing contest. After more than 10,000 tween girls submitted original stories, girls visiting the Miss O site voted on their favorite narratives. Consequently, Miss O helped 15 tween girls from around the country to realize a dream of being a published author, including a girl from Thailand, Bangkok. The resulting book is part of a six-book Miss O series, sold on www.target.com, www.walmart.com and at national book retailers.

According to Juliette, the success of Miss O & Friends relies on the fact that anything the company does must get the OK from Web site visitors. “Our licensing partners like this too,” says the teen entrepreneur, “because anything they produce is validated first.”

More than a mere teen entrepreneur, Juliette wears many professional hats. She presents to partner companies and potential licensees, and she serves as the Web site managing editor, company spokesperson and reporter for TDMonthly Magazine. In addition, Juliette is a syndicated columnist for “Kids Counsel,” Miss O’s “Dear Abby” Web site column for tweens that dually appears in the Family section of The McClatchy Corp. newspaper network, comprised of over 700 newspapers worldwide.

The latest company initiative is Miss O Music™. Launched in the summer of 2007, the initiative encourages girls ages 8 to14 to express themselves musically— online and in the real world. By submitting their original songs on www.missoandfriends.com, tweens can win the chance to have their songs produced and recorded.

To select winners, the Miss O & Friends online community casts votes on www.missoandfriends.com and along with other leading Web sites. Winners will perform “Best Original Song,” produced and recorded at Miss O Recording Studios either in New York City or Los Angles.

“Girls tell us they love singing and they’d love to get their own songs published,” says Juliette. “So, we created Miss O Music, giving regular tween girls the opportunity to get their tunes produced and recorded.”

Spearheading the Miss O Music initiative with the recording industry is veteran producer/songwriter John Boylan, who has worked with The Muppets and Sesame Street.

To enter the Miss O Music competition, girls must be a registered Miss O Club member, which is free. For full details, please visit www.missoandfriends.com.