Emily Ley v. the President of the United States

Hear the details on tariffs from an owner who writes the check to pay them.

Today, we talk with

Emily Ley

, whose small business has put her into an unexpected role: plaintiff against the Trump administration. She candidly discusses how recent tariff policies are impacting her business, employees, and will impact customers in the weeks and months ahead. Listen for a revealing conversation about the personal cost of trade politics for American entrepreneurs.

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Episode Resources

Pantsuit Politics Resources

• Sarah and Beth’s Mother’s Day Gift Guide

• We’re collecting messages and stories to use in our 10th birthday celebrations. Share your birthday message here!

Emily Ley Resources

• Emily Ley’s Substack

• The Impossible Math of Modern Motherhood (Emily Ley Substack)

• Emily Ley Website & Products

Show Credits

Pantsuit Politics is hosted by Sarah Stewart Holland and Beth Silvers. The show is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. Alise Napp is our Managing Director and Maggie Penton is our Director of Community Engagement.

Our theme music was composed by Xander Singh with inspiration from original work by Dante Lima.

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Episode Transcript

Sarah [00:00:07] This is Sarah Stewart Holland.

Beth [00:00:09] This is Beth Silvers. You're listening to Pantsuit Politics, and today we are going to get very detailed about the effects of the president's tariffs. If you're like me, I'm reading a lot of articles that say here are things we need to stock up on before the tariffs start to impact your shopping. All of the reporting recognizes that for us as consumers, there's kind of a lag between the Liberation Day announcement and feeling the effects of those announcements. But small business owners have not experienced that lag. They are feeling the heat right now and sounding alarms about how the tariffs are impacting their businesses. So we wanted to bring you a conversation with someone who understands these tariffs very well. Emily Ley is the owner of Simplified, which I love. I'm sure many of you do too. I've used her planners and office products for years. And she has really been trying to educate people about what the tariffs are, who writes the check for them. And how they impact her business. She has also filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration for enacting these tariffs through a process that she says is unconstitutional. So we're going to talk with Emily about all of that today. And then we're going to talk with her next Tuesday, May 13th on Substack Live to answer follow-up questions. You can email us Hello@pantsuitpoliticshow.com. You can comment on the episode on Substack. Let us know what else you want to hear from Emily and we'll have that discussion next Tuesday.

[00:01:30] Before we dive in, two quick notes. If you are doing your Mother's Day shopping a little late this year, we have an instantly available gift for you. We would love for you to subscribe the special women in your life to Pantsuit Politics premium. You'll get access to all kinds of episodes that you don't see in the free feed. You also get to be in conversation with some of the most thoughtful people on the internet. We really have a wonderful premium community there where people feel very free to be vulnerable with each other because we're all invested in healthy, fruitful political conversation. So take a look at our full Mother's Day gift guide and gift a premium subscription through the link in the show notes. No wrapping paper required. And finally, it's hard to believe that we're celebrating 10 years and 1000 episodes of Pantsuit Politics this summer. As part of that celebration, we would love to hear from you. We occasionally get emails saying, here's what Pantsuit Politics inspired in my life, or here's a person I've met, or something I think about differently. We would love to hear any of those stories and feature your messages in our live show in Cincinnati in July, or on one of our celebratory episodes later this year. You can find a link to submit your story in the show notes and thank you so much for doing that and for being part of this amazing work that we are so privileged to do. Up next, our conversation with Emily Ley. Emily Ley, welcome to Pantsuit Politics.

Emily Ley [00:03:01] Thank you so much for having me. This is a pinch me moment. I am such a fan.

Beth [00:03:06] Well, for us too, and we will definitely talk about that as we go along here. I wanted to tell you first, I was reading your lawsuit against the Trump administration and I think you have crystallized in this lawsuit better than anything I've seen anywhere, that this is both bad policy and it's been made through a bad process. And I really love how you set out both of those pieces. So can you tell us about your company for people who aren't familiar with what you make and how you make it, and just lead us up to this moment?

Emily Ley [00:03:40] Well, about six weeks ago, I was doing a lot of media talking about the best pot roast to make on a weeknight when your kids are at soccer because I wrote a cookbook. And suddenly I found myself thrust into international trade war. My company is Simplified. I started it in 2008. We make planners, organizational products, desktop goods, paper goods for busy women.

Sarah [00:04:04] Really beautiful products, thank you.

Emily Ley [00:04:06] They're beautiful, yes. They're minimal and meaningful, we like to say. We have hundreds of SKUs. We sell them in our online store and then also in stores like Target, Walmart, and Office Depot. I employ nine women, myself included, all here in the States, and we manufacture our products overseas in China. We initially made them in the United States, but it wasn't profitable and we didn't have the opportunity or the manufacturing infrastructure to make what we wanted to make. So we manufacture in China. A couple of weeks ago, I was just really tired of seeing so much misinformation about who pays the tariffs. This was actually maybe about two months ago. I made a post on Instagram sharing just facts, not feelings, just the facts that I have signed the checks for $1.17 million in tariffs since 2018. This was before "liberation day". And the New Civil Liberties Alliance out of Washington, D.C. reached out; they're a nonpartisan law firm who focuses on government overreach. I knew the illegality of how the tariffs were implemented, but I didn't realize that I would end up partnering with them to file the first civil complaint against the president, and here we are.

Sarah [00:05:25] Well, here's my question. What have you learned paying those first rounds of tariffs that both prepared you for this round, but also left you unprepared? What's new and what's old here, I guess is what I'm asking.

Emily Ley [00:05:49] In 2017, when the first tariffs were being discussed-- and those, by the way, were implemented legally, according to the Constitution, they had congressional involvement. People like me were able to make our voices heard. I just thought, maybe in a young and naive way, if I worked really hard and my team worked really hard and we were successful in bringing in new customers and growing our revenue streams and doing all of those things, then that just meant that the future was bright. I didn't realize how much these policies could impact me. And I feel kind of dumb saying that, if we're being quite honest. Looking back, I was a new mom-- well, not a new mom, I had new twins. So I have a 14-year-old and 10-year-old twins. And at the time they were all babies. But my head was in the sand. I doing my thing and living in my corner and just trying to be the best me I could be.

Sarah [00:06:45] But I also think that's the narrative we sell about business in the United States. That's the narrative Trump perpetuates, right? That it's total freedom. That being the business owner is what gives you total control.

Emily Ley [00:06:57] Yeah, and it was all outside my control at that point. So we were hit with 25% tariffs. And I kind of felt like this was just a wave we needed to ride and it would eventually go away. And I started to become more informed about politics, if you will, and the people we were electing and the decisions that were being made that were going to impact me and the people I employed and our customers, my family. And those tariffs stuck around. We weren't able to grow the way we wanted to grow. I wanted to hire new people that year. We weren't able to do that. We had other growth opportunities we weren't able to pursue. And then this year happened, 2025 was going to be our big growth year at Simplified. We have four big pillars we're focusing on, massive growth things. We were going to greatly increase the number of skews we are offering, get back into wholesale, launch on Amazon, do all kinds of things. And our tariffs went from 25% to, seemingly overnight, 150%. So I'm looking at anywhere between $800,000 and $1 million this year on a budget that was already finalized, that had very little wiggle room. So my entire team is now focusing on how do we survive this? How do we not close our doors? We're not looking at coming back to the United States. Well, coming to the Unites States, we were never here in the first place, manufacturing, because there's no infrastructure to do what we do. We're now looking at other countries with lower tariffs. And so what's being told to us in the media about what these tariffs are doing is not always accurate. And I speak from the driver's seat.

Beth [00:08:48] Emily, you rattled this off so quickly that you are in Walmart and Target, but I was just listening to you thinking like this is the American dream. You have built a business that has scaled up to a level that people wish and hope and pray for, and you employ these people in the United States, and it sounds like you were on the cusp of a year of making massive investment in a U.S. business, in U. S. employees, in U S. products and you are being prevented from doing that because of new essentially taxes on your business from our president.

Emily Ley [00:09:29] Yeah, it's painful. And what's wild is when I first looked at our budget and thought, "Where is this money going to come from? Are we going to cut salaries?" We're still trying to figure out plan A, B, C, D, E, because it changes every day. It was, okay, we can take money out of the philanthropic good that we do. We have an arm of Simplified called Simplify Social Good, and we contribute to organizations that are taking care of women and children in need. We're looking at taking dollars from that to simply keep the doors open. Salaries and bonuses that we pay the nine women who work here, we're looking at making changes there. The domino effect-- we're also not just looking at cutting those expenses, but we're meeting with service providers also in the United and saying we can't afford to pay you, advertising agency, or you, copywriter, freelancer, what we used to because now we're paying it to the government. And again, just to keep our doors open.

Sarah [00:10:36] I think hearing from you is so important because I think most people, even at this point, are thinking about the tariffs through the lens of a Walmart or a Target, which is so amorphous and so clouded, and everybody's kind of just like, well, they'll just make a little bit less money. What's the big deal? And I think what's so powerful about what you've done through the lawsuit and through your very, very fabulously aggressive voice on social and on the internet where you're like, uh-uh, I'm not, I am sorry that this makes you uncomfortable that the lady with the beautiful planners is in your face telling you the truth, but I'm going to stop. Which, bravo. Because I think there's two elements here that you're really touching on. One, small businesses. Because even that just becomes that's just the words. We ask those words to do a lot, small business. And so I think you putting like a real face and some. Facts and figures around what this means for a small business. And I think the way you have been speaking about being a woman-owned business has been incredible. And I'm tearing up right now. I was getting emotional about the way you’re talking. Like this is what women went out and did because this was the promise. We go out the way, the corporate structure didn't work for us. It certainly didn't work for Beth and I. So we go out here and we build our own businesses in order to find not only financial freedom, but the ability to be the wives and mothers that we want to be, and here we are. So those are two big things, but I want you to speak on those because I think they're getting lost.

Emily Ley [00:12:16] Thank you for mentioning both of those. On your first point about small business, I did not realize until I got thrust into this. And I was on an airplane when the press release hit and my publicist just so happened to be going to the same conference I was going to speak at. We door dashed a webcam to a hotel room. I was suddenly very well versed in all of the nuance of what's going on. I read this study. This was from the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council. And this is in 2021. So this is actually an old stat that's probably a much more profound number, if you were to look at it today. But 77% of importers, importing businesses that are importing products into the United States, employ less than 20 people. And 99% of the importers are "small businesses" that employ less than 100 people. So, when you look at, yes, the Walmarts and the Targets of the world are going to be impacted by this, and we're going to see prices fluctuate there, but the real profound human impact of what is happening is wild. And like you said, when you look at the disproportionate impact this is going to have on women. Women have founded 48% of small businesses in the United States are owned by women.

Sarah [00:13:40] I was really struck. That statistic got me. I was like, I knew it! I knew it dep in my heart!

Emily Ley [00:13:46] And by the way, I was sitting with my husband who works in mergers and acquisition, private equity type stuff. And so he's real well versed in all this, but I was with him and I was doing research and I read the statistic, and I think it was from the Harvard Business Review. And I looked up at him and said, can you just explain to me if this is accurate, that 2% of venture funding, I mean quote unquote investments, 2% of investment dollars go to women owned companies? And he was like, yeah, that sounds about right. And I wanted to throw rocks. Like, why? Why is it that everywhere we turn as women, we get doors slammed in our face? We get our legs knocked out from under us. Just like you guys, I wrote this Substack piece about the impossible math of modern motherhood. Like in 2008, after the economic collapse, I was like I want to be a mom eventually and my first son wouldn't be born for three more years. This job that I want doesn't exist. Where I can have the flexibility to be this kind of mom to be there for the fevers to be there for the school field trips and pursue this professional dream that I have. I'm going to have to make it myself. And I did from the ground up with no investment at all, no capital, no debt. The company is still debt free. And these policies are being implemented, and we're being fed this lie that it is impacting just these giant companies or that China's paying the tariffs. No, I am. Me, my nine employees, my three kids, my family. It's the women-owned businesses that were started because a structure created by men for men didn't work for us. We're the ones getting our legs knocked out from under us.

Beth [00:15:31] So I want to ask you about the manufacturing side and ask you to go into a little bit more detail about choosing a manufacturer in China, what that relationship is like and what it means when you have to look at moving that side of your business. Because, honestly, Sarah and I are having a hard business week right now ourselves; and the emotional exhaustion of trying to make big decisions and we're not even talking about international shipping, I can't fathom what all goes into thinking through moving all of these skews from one factory to another or building a new relationship. So can you talk about that a little bit?

Emily Ley [00:16:13] Yeah, the first thing that comes to my mind is that these women who work with me, there's eight plus me, nine, they are some of the most brilliant, incredible women. My COO has triplets and another child. She's Chief Operating Officer of Simplified. She's spending almost all of her time right now dealing with this when we have all these other things we could be doing, but no, we're trying to figure out--

Sarah [00:16:35] That's what really just sticks in my craw. It's like I could be making more money, but I have to deal with this bullshit.

Emily Ley [00:16:42] I have to deal with this. Exactly. Exactly that. To go back a few years, our first planner that we ever made, it was a first of its kind. I was like, I want this thing-- I have one somewhere. I was, like, I want this thing to have gold corners, gold spiral binding. I wanted it to have pockets and stickers and all these things that didn't exist. And every manufacturer I went to in the United States was like to do all that, it's going to cost you a billion dollars or you're going to have to go overseas. I found one company in the United States to work with me and we made-- I wish I had it and I could show it to you. It's like laminated with white oil and that's it. Because all the options they had cost me $38 a unit and it was my first year. So I knew if I sold them for $38 per unit, I was still working full-time at the time in university advancement. I'm trying get this thing off the ground. Sold them for $50. But I knew even if I didn't make a profit, there was options. I could have enough to go to an international manufacturer or another manufacturer in the United States if I could find one and make more. Those sold out, went great. I took that money and went to manufacturers in the States again.

[00:17:57] And everyone was like, no, we can do white binding, that guy can do printing in New York, and then you can get them packaged in Los Angeles. But the supply chain wasn't there. The math wasn't mathing. And so everyone said you got to go overseas because there are areas of the world that specialize in print and production and packaging. And that's when I found his name is Joe, that's his English name, in Shenzhen, China. And every manufacturer I emailed over there said, are you missing a zero? Because I was only trying to make $500. It's all the money I had. And Joe, whose Chinese name is Xi Kuan, his name is Xi Kuan, and he told me I was the first person to ever ask his Chinese name because he always used his English name. So we developed this funny friendship and he said, "I'm going to take a chance on you. I feel like what you this idea you have is cool. Let's work together." And so he made my first $500, and we were able to make them at a profitable price. So we try to make everything at 25% of retail. So let's just say we're selling a product for $40. We try to make it for $10 so that we can sell it retail $40, wholesale $20. But he was wonderful. He sent my kids baby blankets when they were born.

[00:19:15] Just this last year, we outgrew him and moved on to other manufacturers, he sent them red scarves for Chinese New Year with a note explaining why the color red is significant for best wishes of good fortune in the new year. I mean, there's a very human relationship side that's being lost as well. So fast forward a few years, we're manufacturing now with two manufacturers also in Shenzhen and they are so amazing. And this is the piece that gets me. I have not been to China because I don't have the money to go to China and make sure these guys are doing things ethically and all that, but they have certifications and references in the United States from massive companies that I'm not allowed to name, that these certifications are being done by these other companies that show me that they are taking care of the people who make our products. They have working conditions that are acceptable and wonderful. They are paying them a good living wage. And so I feel good about where we're making them.

[00:20:22] Now I'm being forced to look into other companies, other places that I don't have that reassurance; whereas, I do have it in China. And this is kind of a long-- sorry, I'm being very wordy here, but I want to tell you one more thing about Shenzhen. It was explained to me that in China, one of the reasons we love China for making these types of things is that they have districts that are like if you consider them a cul-de-sac. So you have a cul-de-sac with houses all around it, and these neighbors are all friends and they're their little village, right? Well, in the districts in China you have factories that are all related to one another. So you might have a packaging factory, a gold corner factory, a printing place, all around the same little area and they make similar products and they're near each other. So we're reducing all kinds of things by having those together. When you go outside of China, that does not exist on the scale and with the expertise that they have there. So all of that to say, everything is flipped on its head.

Sarah [00:21:25] Yeah, and it's not like something someone's going to be able to reproduce on a dime in the United States or anywhere else. I was listening to I think it was Thomas Friedman on the Ezra Klein show and he was talking about how we're getting left behind by China with regards to manufacturing. He's like you don't understand. They have factories where you're like I want a smiley face button that plays the Chinese national anthem backwards, and they're like, got you, here it is.

Emily Ley [00:21:48] Okay, that is such a great point. This is a tape dispenser. And this manufacturer that we're with-- we were dreaming about what kind of products we could make next that would help people at their desk and all of this. And we were, like, a tape dispenser. And we mocked it up and had the whole diagram, the whole thing. They were like tape dispensers. On it. High quality, amazing price. Here's your beautiful tape dispenser.

Sarah [00:22:11] Yeah, just like whatever you can dream they can build because they have that manufacturing infrastructure. I can hear people think well we should have that here, but why? You evolve as an economy out of manufacturing, evolve into a services economy, you evolve into another type of economy. You don't drag yourself back to a manufacturing company. And China understands that, too. That's why they're evolving tech. That's why they've turned Huawei into a car company. They get that you evolve. You don't stick. There's not one way to be.

Emily Ley [00:22:49] There is not one way to be. And so many dreams and businesses and wonderful things in our world were built on the idea of global opportunity. My husband keeps saying we don't need to be the best oven makers. Like, why do we want to be the best of oven makers? They're doing that. Let's do what we're best at and let them be best at what they're best. So it just feels like we're all--

Sarah [00:23:14] Well, but that's what you're getting. That's the assumption. It's that there's other things we're not the best at. And that's so insulting about this. You are clearly shown an example of what we can be the best at. We don't need to be the best tape dispenser manufacturer if we can just be the best Simplified.

Emily Ley [00:23:34] Make it make sense. I said early on in this, it feels like we are cheap red and black checker pieces in a board game of international trade. It doesn't feel like anybody's playing chess. It feels like checkers and it's awful.

Beth [00:23:49] So tell us about that political activity. So you start to become more aware of this during Trump 1 as you see these tariffs. And you mentioned that you started to think about leadership and your lawsuit says so clearly, I should have an opportunity to call my representative and hear something other than [inaudible]. So can you tell us about the conversations you've had with elected officials?

Emily Ley [00:24:13] That is something I'm working on right now. It's getting in touch with those people, setting meetings with those people. This is not my typical day to day. I've been walked through a doorway now that I feel very called to, I feel very proud to be part of, I feel very much like silence would be not okay right now. I have to say something. And looking back, if you look at the lawsuit itself and what it's about, I've had people reach out to me and be like, well, this is why tariffs are good and this is what tariffs are bad. And I can argue that till I'm blue in the face, but what the lawsuit is actually about is that when a tariff is put into place, it's required to have congressional involvement. And that means that constituents, people like me and you are able to get in touch with our elected officials, make our voices heard, share how these will impact us, good, bad, or in between. And then they go and they have hearings and they have votes and then they're able to make their voices heard. None of that was done. The president decided multiple times earlier this year that he was going to put tariffs of 1% over here and then this percent over here. And then it would change the next day. And to be honest, there's also a story to be told about the chaos of it all of us going, "We love a plan over here. We're trying to make a plan." And then the next day the plan is on its head, so we got to make a new plan.

[00:25:43] So we have multiple plans being made for multiple scenarios all at once. But yes, I am learning and I am very invested right now in how important it is for us to make our voices heard on the things that matter deeply to us. And this matters deeply to me. I care a lot about this dream that I've built from the ground up. I care lot about the women I employ and their families and their livelihoods. I care about our customers. I don't know what the future looks like. But for me personally, I'm oddly grateful to have woken up over the last couple of years to the reality of you can't say this doesn't impact me, or I'm not going to care because I'm too busy doing X, Y, Z. No, we all have to care. And I've been told multiple times to stick to planners, not politics, which it's quite interesting. The overarching response to the lawsuit and to me speaking out on more of these bigger issues that matter to people and to women has been very encouraging on both sides. Yeah, very, very, very encouraging. But there has been the one or two that will sneak in with the stick to planners not politics. Politics impacts planners greatly and this conversation is just even a part of it. And I said to one commenter once I don't know about you, but my planner holds a whole life in it.

Beth [00:27:19] Also, you love to stick to planners, not politics. Like, wouldn't you love for this to leave you alone?

Emily Ley [00:27:23] I would love to be choosing colors for 27 right now. I would love to not have to worry about this and for our successes to just keep propelling us forward with no roadblocks, but it's not the way it's going down. And as a woman in particular, politics impacts every inch of my body of my life of my freedoms and of my future.

Sarah [00:27:49] Well, and what I really want to say to people, okay, you're not a small business owner, fine. Let's say you're a manufacturer and you're just anxious to get the factories back here, whatever, or you think that's a good idea, cool. Do people understand that as consumers, and we've already experienced this once post-COVID, once especially large corporations understand the price point you can bear, they're not going to drop it. It's not going to go back down.

Emily Ley [00:28:20] Not coming back down. We raised our prices in 2018 a little bit to offset a little bit of the tariffs and they didn't come back down.

Sarah [00:28:29] Right. So do you think people understand that? Because I'm afraid that they don't.

Emily Ley [00:28:36] No. I think we are a reactive society many times. And a lot of that is because there's just so much happening in the world and chaos in the word, but we can't put our heads in the sand. We have to look proactively and look at what's coming down the pipeline because it's coming and it's coming real fast. And it's scary. And that's why people like me and you and all of us, we have to do what we can in our own little corners of the world with what we have. And that's why I said yes when the NCLA came knocking. I had the opportunity to stand up and be the face of this and be the first plaintiff on this lawsuit. We just added three more yesterday. Three more companies in the state of Florida. And I want to say it was not a no-brainer because it's a lot to put a target on your back, but I also felt like I had to do it. It had to be done and we all got to do what we can.

Beth [00:29:32] It seems to me that the Chinese tariffs have to be existential for you. Like, you're going to have to move if this doesn't get sorted out quickly, right? Because how much would you have to mark up your products from here? Could you sell a planner at the price that would be required to pay the tariffs?

Emily Ley [00:29:53] This would be like $120 if I wanted to cover it. And I did an interview with this amazing reporter from CBS Mornings and she was like, "$120, would you pay that?" And I was like, no, the market can't bear that kind of increase. And so if I could ask President Trump, there's many things I would ask him, but one of them would be, where do you expect these dollars to come from when we are the ones paying the tariffs? And you let me know which one you think is best. Philanthropy, American salaries, growth opportunities? He's a businessman. It's just tanking American companies. So make it make sense.

Sarah [00:30:40] If this is a finite situation, it has to come from somewhere.

Emily Ley [00:30:44] It has to come from somewhere. Yeah. It's math, truly. And it's already a hard time to be a small business with so much chaos in the world and people are holding their purse strings much tighter. I know we are personally. We are going to have to move out of China.

Sarah [00:31:02] That sucks.

Emily Ley [00:31:03] And it takes at least a year--

Beth [00:31:06] I was going to ask about lead time. Like how do you make decisions when it is kind of day-to-day right now?

Emily Ley [00:31:11] So the way that we do things, we produce everything in one batch for one year. So like 2026, all of the products for 2026 that we'll be releasing in our four launches that year, we are going to sign the POs on those June 1st. So the clock's ticking. Because we make stuff with paper and that kind of thing, there's just a lot of steps in the production line and supply chain that they have to nail down. So it takes about nine months to make a whole batch. And then it all ships before Christmas to arrive, before the Chinese New Year. So we luckily got most of our stuff before all the tariffs changed. We're waiting on a few straggler shipments right now that will be the first tariffs we'll be paying under the new rules. Yeah. So we have about three more weeks left. My team has lots and lots of quotes. We have reached out to lots and lots of other companies to get referrals. And it's interesting competitors coming together to say we have to figure out how to get through this. Let's share ideas, let's help, let link arms. That's been really cool. It's scary though because I could tell you three hours’ worth of stories of how we perfected the quality of the paper so it doesn't ghost, so it's the right shade of white. The corners, how they stay on, they don't fall off. The binding, if you push it too hard when you're closing it, it goes flat, if you do it too loose, the pages fall off the back. Like getting it just right has taken so many years and so many people's efforts. Moving is so [inaudible] getting around my head around it? But we do what we got to do.

Beth [00:32:56] I was just thinking from a cashflow perspective too, you have to pay those tariffs before you sell the product.

Emily Ley [00:33:01] Yeah, that's fun.

Beth [00:33:04] And so planning for that, that's a lot.

Emily Ley [00:33:07] Cash flow has always been one of the hardest parts of our jobs because we run it debt-free and we did that starting out because we didn't know what it would grow into and then we just never wanted to risk more than we could afford to lose and put our family at risk and put jobs on the line and that kind of thing. And so many of the women who work with me have been with me for over a decade. One of the girls she manages all of our customer service. She used to pack planners in my living room and I paid her with cheese and crackers. Charcuterie for lunch in the kitchen. She's amazing. But it's a whole thing.

Sarah [00:33:47] It's a whole thing. That's probably going to be the title of this episode.

Emily Ley [00:33:54] It's a whole thing. But you know what, for better or for worse, I'm always the person that's like I need to know the worst case scenario so I can plan for it of anything. But also we're aiming at the best case scenario that we're going to be okay. We're going to find an amazing manufacturer somewhere. It won't be in the United States because it doesn't exist. We're going to find a way through. We made planners during the COVID years when everyone's plans got canceled and we survived that. We built the business during the greater recession of 2008. So I'm determined that we're going to keep going.

Beth [00:34:41] Well, I am grateful for your lawsuit and for you bringing so much awareness to this. If you will stay around for a second for Outside of Politics, I would love to tell you about how for probably five years now, I've had a magnetic calendar of yours on my refrigerator. And so I really feel like I know you because you would just hang in my kitchen all the time. But I have found that the mission of your company kind of comes through that product because we have used it in so many different ways over five years. So as you have evolved your business, what's been the most surprising thing to you, the way people use your stuff or interact with it or what it means in their lives?

Sarah [00:35:27] Yeah, I want to know about planner trends because mine has changed so much.

Emily Ley [00:35:34] Me too.

Sarah [00:35:36] My planner, the type of planner I've uses has really evolved.

Emily Ley [00:35:39] When I first had this idea, I was like a young-- well, I started out making organizational notepads and things like that. And then the planner came about when my oldest son, who is now starting high school, was born. And I was like this overwhelmed mom trying to figure out how to do life and have a business and keep the laundry going and the dog fed and everything like that, and everything I found was just overwhelming and I needed a tool. I literally went to Target with my son looking for a Trapper Keeper. Like, I needed a thing that could house it all. And I couldn't find anything that wasn't making me feel like more of a failure than I already felt. So I made the Simplified planner. And when I first told my husband I wanted to do this, he was like, huh? Like, the iPhone just came out. Like, no, this is bad. This is real bad. And I was like no, listen, I there's something about pen and paper that is just so satisfying because it doesn't crash, doesn't fail, you don't have to read the news every time you open it. And that has stayed very relevant and very true over the years. My own way of using a planner and paper goods like that has changed as my kids have gotten older and that kind of thing. But I still see, and I even see now, this resurgence of and analog living coming back because every time I open this I want to throw it. And I think there's just something so basic and calming about having a piece of paper where you can keep all the things and it doesn't change.

Sarah [00:37:25] I just saw a big thing on slow houses like the like the uber rich, they want houses that don't have any tech.

Emily Ley [00:37:30] No smart.

Sarah [00:37:32] No smart homes. No more smart homes. They're like taking out-- well, but first of all, it's another thing that can break, or another thing you don't know how to use. Like I just recently got a top loading regular old washer dryer like you have in the 90s.

Emily Ley [00:37:48] Me too.

Sarah [00:37:48] I love it so much.

Emily Ley [00:37:49] I got a Speed Queen. I love it.

Sarah [00:37:51] I just love it. I don't have to think through some complex flow chart. I'm just picking what kind of clothes I want to wash. It also holds so many more clothes. It's amazing. And I don' have to clean it. Because you know what? I don't want to clean my washing machine.

Emily Ley [00:38:09] We got enough to do! We're trying to [crosstalk].

Sarah [00:38:14] That's stupid.

Emily Ley [00:38:15] That is real stupid. Who should have to clean the thing that cleans?

Sarah [00:38:18] I don't want to clean the thing that cleans. That's all I'm saying. Well, here's my other question for you though. Because I also know I love planners. I could talk about them for a million years. But I also when it becomes your business, like, what do you nerd out now that's not your business? Like, where did you redirect that?

Emily Ley [00:38:36] Substack. It is my business now, though. But I love it. It's like Twitter before it went crazy kind of.

Sarah [00:38:45] Yeah.

Emily Ley [00:38:46] It's all about words and not like making videos. I tried to get on TikTok. I think I am on TikTok, but I just push things over there. But I'm 42 years old; I don't want to be making content. I don't want to be a content creator. There are people who are good at that. And I don't want to do that. I want to write words. I love words. Writing is my first love and so I kind of nerd out over there. I love it.

Beth [00:39:15] Well, Emily, thank you so much. Speaking of Substack, we have time on the calendar with you to do a Substack live soon. So if people are listening and they have questions that we did not address in this episode, we'll have another chance to be together. And I'm super excited about that.

Sarah [00:39:28] Yeah, that'll be fun.

Emily Ley [00:39:29] I am so excited. I have to tell you guys too, before we end this, that I discovered you guys years ago when I was first really trying to be more informed about all the things happening with policy and our government and our elected officials. And I clung to your very beautiful way of sharing the truth. And so thank you for what you do because there are many of us out here who are really grateful to have voices like yours.

Sarah [00:40:02] Thank you so much.

Beth [00:40:03] Thank you so much, Emily. And right back at you. Thank you so much to Emily for sharing her story and for joining us again next Tuesday for a follow-up conversation. We'll also have a brand new episode next Tuesday, and all the links for birthday messages and Mother's Day gifts are in our show notes. We appreciate you being here. We'll see you next week. Until then, have the best weekend available to you.