LEADERSHIP LESSONS FROM EXITED SEXUAL WELLNESS ENTREPRENEUR LEA-SOPHIE CRAMER
Lea-Sophie Cramer founded and sold Amorelie, one of Europe’s leading sexual wellness companies, scaling the company to $65m annual revenue, 15 markets, and 150 employees. She now runs a female leadership Academy, 10morein, and serves as an Industry Advisor to KKR’s Private Equity business.
Tell us more about Amorelie, your first business.
Together with my co-founder Sebastian Pollok I founded Amorelie in 2013 with the aim to build a European lifestyle brand for love toys. We contributed to liberating and de-stigmatizing (female) pleasure and sexuality.
What was the hardest part of your journey?
Founding and leading a company was a constant rollercoaster ride. One of the toughest parts was when my co-founder Sebastian Pollok decided to leave the company after our exit to Pro7. Although I 100% understood and respected his decision, the founder and CEO-role became quite lonely without him. What helped was building an extraordinary management team, who supported me and Amorelie in so many ways. I am grateful we had the foresight to start distributing responsibility onto more shoulders quite early in our journey.
What sustained you in the low moments, and what was the source of your resilience?
Definitely my co-founder. I like to say: With a co-founder the highs are higher and the lows are less low. That was really true for us. We also had a “codeword”. When one of us said “#bauchschmerzthema” (stomach-pain-topic) we both knew, this has top priority now and the two of us need to speak and act right away. Another source of my resilience was my family. Both of my kids were born during my time as founder and CEO of Amorelie. Having this huge responsibility as a mom next to my job, was of course often challenging but also kept me grounded and helped to not over-stress about company topics.
If you could start again, what are the things you would do differently?
I would put health first sooner. During my active years as Amorelie-CEO I often worked beyond my boundaries. Today, in my new venture, I put health first: for example the treatment I get for a knee injury is a non-negotiable appointment. 5 years ago I would have probably skipped physiotherapy and doctors’ appointments much more often to get to work sooner.
What's changed in the venture ecosystem since the time you started out?
First of all, venture capital in general is much more well-known as a source of capital. When we started with Amorelie in 2013 in Germany, not many people knew the term “business angel”. Today, any university management student knows what’s meant by that. Secondly, the ecosystem simply grew enormously – for example in Germany startup investments have increased from €5 to €17billion from 2020 to 2021. Lastly – and this is a recent development where I don’t know yet whether it will be a long-term trend – profitability has become a priority. In the recent crisis more investors want to see clearer paths to profitability sooner.
What are the changes you'd like to see more of/make yourself, and how does what you do now contribute to that (if at all?)
I am convinced that a world that is led side-by-side by male and female leaders is a better one. Therefore I want to see more women in leadership positions in business, politics and entrepreneurship. With my new company 10 more in, we are contributing to that development by supporting women in their leadership skills through our online academy.
What are you up to these days?
Other than that, and next to building 10morein, I just finished my own coaching education as a systemic coach, and I invest in startups (mainly health tech, food tech and space tech). I also spend time advising KKR’s Private Equity portfolio companies, I am a business podcast host (Fast & Curious) and I love to spend time with my kids, friends and simply enjoy life :-)