Both an entrepreneur and Tufts Entrepreneurial
Leadership professor, Felice Shapiro cites “business and teaching” as her two
biggest passions. Shapiro’s decision to become an entrepreneur stemmed from her
desire to establish a balance between her personal life and her work. She began
as an employee in strategic planning at PepsiCo, where she met her eventual
business partner, who immediately saw an “entrepreneurial spark” in Shapiro.
When Felice and her husband were ready to have
children, she realized that there was no adequate resource material available on
raising kids and on parenting in New York. Seeing an opportunity in the market,
Shapiro and her soon-to-be partner decided to capitalize on the need. The shift
in media at the time to “controlled circulation publications” helped Shapiro and
her partner to launch their free parenting publication.
In 1986, Felice quit her job as a strategic
planner at Pepsico Bottling Group and launched
New York Family. That same year, her first child, Jake, A08, was
born. In 1988, her second son, Cal, A10 was born and
Westchester Family was launched. Felice found the timing of each of
the magazine launches and the arrival of her children particularly rewarding, as
she was able to celebrate motherhood, parenting and running a successful
business: her work became truly integrated with her day-to-day life. Shapiro
went on to launch Connecticut Family.
With the creation of their multiple publications, Shapiro and her partner
noticed there was a grassroots explosion of parenting publications. Within five
years of the magazine’s launch, there were over 100 local parenting publications
across the country. Felice saw that as another opportunity and helped develop a
trade association, Parenting Publications of America (PPA). The biggest shift in
the business came with the launch of the Family Marketing Network, an
advertising representative business. Her company became the advertising/sales
arm of the entire parenting publications group, a hugely profitable business.
The most important thing that Felice cites in
the rapid development and growth of her business is that it was all
organic. As the market shifted, her
company responded to the public’s changing needs. While focusing on sales and
marketing at the Family
magazines, she soon realized that she had a passion for growing and training the
sales teams. She maintained a family culture at the company during the 14 years
of her leadership, and by the time she sold the firm, she was managing 25
people.
With the ongoing development of her publishing company, Felice turned to
yoga to relax and was soon teaching yoga in Larchmont, NY to many of the locals.
From that point, Felice was asked to aid a fledgling not-for-profit spiritual
conference center in Rye, NY. To do so, she founded an on-site yoga center to
increase traffic and awareness. She turned the center back to the not-for-profit
after successfully reviving it in just one year. As more people asked for her
help, Felice became a business coach for entrepreneurs, with an extensive client
list based in Boston and New York. In 2006, Felice decided to make a change and
follow one of her original passions; she began teaching an entrepreneurship
course at NYU. Felice continued to teach there from 2006 through the fall of
2008, during which time she met her future husband and Tufts alum Bill Kress.
Her career change brought her up to Boston, where she has taught in the Tufts
Entrepreneurial Leadership Program since Spring 2009.
As a professor at Tufts, Felice makes sure to bring her business
experience into the classroom. She explains that it not only gives her greater
credibility as a teacher, but also creates more interest among her students. She
aims to always put a personal face on what students read in textbooks and learn
from case studies. Felice is overtly passionate about teaching and
entrepreneurship, and she considers it crucial to have experienced guest
lecturers in the classroom, in an effort to empower students. Felice believes
that “channeling that [empowerment] is what this university is all about.” Her
passion for teaching ELS101 is apparent when she talks about her students. Even
if few of them do choose to start their own ventures, the unique classes can
teach them to think logically and innovatively. Felice looks forward to
continuing to be part of the growing entrepreneurial spirit at Tufts University
and bringing her creative energy to the department and her students.
