On this episode, I Zoom in Britney Robbins, Founder, and CEO of The Gray Matter Experience, and we chat about her company and the importance of teaching entrepreneurship to young people.
Britney Robbins is the founder and CEO of The
Gray Matter Experience, a non-profit organization founded in 2016 to help Black high school
students learn about and practice
entrepreneurship. Britney hails from Quincy, IL
but moved to Chicago in 2009 after graduating
from The University of Illinois where she received
her B.A. in Rhetoric with an English minor.
Britney has worked within Chicago's
entrepreneurship and tech community for the
past four years working within some of Chicago's
top venture capital firms and incubators including
Sandbox Industries, Lightbank and 1871. She has
been recognized as one of Ariel Investment, BMO
Harris and WVON's 40 Under 40 Gamechangers,
Essence Magazine's Woke 100, a finalist for
Ebony Magazine's Power 100 People's Choice
Award, featured on Fox32, Chicago Inno,
BlackEntrepreneur.com, DNAInfo Chicago,
Chicago Tribune, and Essence Magazine for her
work through Gray Matter. She was also named
as one of five investees for Goodcity Chicago's
Women's Innovation Fund.
Prior to starting The Gray Matter Experience, Robbins worked for Honda Financial Services for two years post graduation. Upon leaving HFS, Britney worked for Chicago-based startup, Doggyloot as an Account Executive. It was in this role, she realized her interest in entrepreneurship as the company was a portfolio company under Sandbox Industries, a local
venture capital firm. After Doggyloot, she worked for three years as a Program Manager for Future Founders, a non-profit exposing youth to entrepreneurship. After helping low-income
students across the city learn about entrepreneurship, Britney recognized a gap that needed to be filled, thus The Gray Matter Experience was created.
Britney is passionate about the intersection of entrepreneurship, education and youth and
believes in empowering others to use their passions and strengths to create opportunities for themselves. In 2015, she authored and published her first children's book, The Adventures of Buster & Duval, and is working to release the second in the series this fall. Britney is committed to inspiring youth to reach their full potential and and aims to continue to create channels for them to do so.
Be sure to follow Britney at @graymatterexp on Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.