The CEO Behind Dreampro: Ariel Schiffer

I decided to go to grad school at the same university as my undergrad (even though I was told not to), and I decided to get an internship right away (even though I was told not to. See a pattern here?) I was really excited to get into the workforce. I did my internship at Diesel, an Italian denim company with headquarters in Manhattan. Working in the luxury fashion industry was honestly just as cool as it sounds. I stayed as long as I possibly could and then moved on to a job at a bank. The bank job was an okay first job, but I got over it reeeeaalll quick. I actually remember calling my dad in the parking lot of my job one day sobbing. Literally sobbing. I couldn’t believe I had spent so much time and money at school for this. And I thought, “Is this seriously it?” 

 

So while it was scary, I decided to apply for jobs in the south. I ended up hearing back from Lowe’s Home Improvement, based in North Carolina. They invited me to come down for an interview. Well, just a little backstory-- the interview was scheduled to be right after my honeymoon, which I, unfortunately, got very sick during. So I had to go to this interview with an ear infection. I was pretty miserable from feeling sick, and I also wasn’t sure if I really wanted to move out of New York, where pretty much everyone I knew lived. I told myself that if I didn’t get the job, I really didn’t care.

 

But when I got there, I immediately fell in love with the gorgeous campus. And I nailed the interview and got the job. So I moved to North Carolina with my first husband and started my job. I absolutely loved it. I got to work on some really cool shit building professional and leadership development programs. I’ll always be thankful for that experience. 

Here’s where things get kind of crazy. While I was working for Lowe’s, my first husband was working as a corrections officer at a maximum-security prison. One day I got a call in the middle of the day, and the woman on the other end of the line said my husband was being taken to the emergency room. When I went to the hospital, I found out that he and three other CO’s had been stabbed by inmates. Thankfully, my husband's injuries were temporary and he was able to recover. But after that, life really changed. He was not the same mentally after that. He had to deal with a lot of trauma. At first, after the incident, we grew closer, but we eventually started growing further apart. I found out that he was growing closer to a nurse who worked at the prison. I eventually knew we couldn’t fix things and decided to get a divorce. Soon after that I actually got laid off from my job at Lowe’s. Thankfully I got it back a few weeks later. I’m able to say I’m thankful for how things turned out now. But that time was really crazy. 

 

I eventually left Lowe’s and started working at a nonprofit health care organization. I thought I would eventually integrate into the culture, but when management got mad at me just for dyeing my hair pink, I decided I never wanted to work for anyone else again. I wanted to be my own boss. I started a coaching business on the side. I’m so glad I did that because it propelled me forward into my true passions. 

When I left my job and started focusing my energy on my business, I bought a course from another business coach. I was really excited to take it, but when I got in and opened it up, I was like, “What the fuck is this?” Things just weren’t polished, and it seemed like it was thrown together last minute. And as someone who knows a lot about instructional design, it was very disappointing. This isn’t to shame this person. This is just to say it was a major turning point in my life. I realized that people don’t know how to build courses well. And I realized that I had the knowledge and skills that other people needed. And that was really exciting for me. I decided to focus my energy on designing courses. This is my space. This is where I feel really fucking good. 

 

My mission for Dreampro is to improve the quality of online learning in the online business industry. And my vision is to be the go-to when it comes to online course creation. So I am here sharing my entire story and starting this whole podcast because there are so many things that I know, and I just need to tell everybody! I need to share my unique perspective. My whole life, I’ve gone against the grain. And inspiring others to do the same feels really important to me.

I am so excited for what’s to come in this podcast. There are so many podcasts out there on how to sell something, and that’s fine. But I want to talk about how to make something high quality and transformative. It’s not about creating something quickly and selling it. It’s about creating something worthy of being sold and resold, and something people will talk about. I can’t wait for more episodes! 

 

Thanks so much for stopping by The Dreamer’s Lounge! I hope that hearing my story in this episode inspired you to go against the grain in your own life and business. If you enjoyed the episode please take a second to rate & review. Each review helps me fulfill my mission of improving the quality of learning in the online business industry. Don’t forget to take a screenshot, share it in your Instagram stories and tag me @dreampro_. See you next week!