Today we’d like to introduce you to Adela Mizrachi.
Adela, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
As an avid podcast listener, I use every opportunity to listen to a variety of content – I listen while I drive, while I cook, while I clean, and while I veg out. Often, I hear things that are so compelling that I find an opportunity to weave it into a conversation. I can’t tell you how many conversations I had that started with “so, I heard on a podcast recently…” It struck me how solitary podcast listening is. Much like reading a great book, you sometimes find yourself laughing out loud, crying with true empathy, or stunned by people’s (fill in the blank: kindness, ingenuity, audacity, etc.).
That’s when it hit me: book clubs exist for this exact reason – to make reading a less solitary experience. I needed to start a podcast club! I found some like-minded friends and we did it – we selected a set of podcasts to listen to, met for brunch once a month, and talked about what we heard. And that’s how Podcast Brunch Club was born. I then decided to see if other people wanted to do the same and now we have nearly 40 chapters across 5 continents!
Has it been a smooth road?
To be honest, I never saw it as a road. It was never a planned route. I just put one foot in front of the other and here I am. I am the type of person for whom a strategic plan may backfire – it just causes me to stress and think too critically about every single step. Going into things a bit more blindly and naively has worked well for me. If I take things in small pieces rather than trying to implement a large, complicated plan, I find that I’m much more successful. Sure, I ran into obstacles, but none of those obstacles felt high-stakes. I just self-corrected and moved on.
For example, all 40 of our chapters have local chapter leaders. Each of those people have a different style for managing their chapter. As I helped to launch each chapter, we would run into unique challenges. But every time we moved forward, I was able to advise the next chapter leader on best practices for how to overcome that particular obstacle. I have found that I really need to let go of control – each chapter is their own community that feeds into the larger PBC community. I think giving each chapter leader autonomy over how they manage their group, while providing some best practices as guiding principles has worked well. That being said, we’ve had a few chapters that haven’t taken off and we’ve had to shut them down. The first time this happened, I felt awful. But, once I put it into perspective and realized that chapter failing is not the tragedy I made it out to be in my head, I was able to shrug my shoulders and move on. I’ve learned to be more resilient through this process.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
Podcast Brunch Club (PBC) is like a book club, but for podcasts. We’re an community of avid podcast listeners and PBC is a way for podcast listeners to get together in person and online to talk about what they’re listening to.
Conversation and dialogue are at the heart of PBC. So, every month a theme is chosen and one member of the global PBC community will curate a list of 3-5 podcast episodes into a podcast playlist. Then, people meet in smaller groups around the world to discuss what they heard (like a book club, but for podcasts!). We have nearly 40 chapters across 5 continents, so it truly is a global community. We encourage cross-chapter conversations through the global Facebook Group, Twitter, and by commenting on the listening selection posts on the PBC website.
There is also the very meta PBC podcast. Every month my co-host and I will record our own in-the-moment commentary about the playlist that we are featuring that month. We’ll also include interviews with the creators of the featured podcasts. We also try to add as much commentary from the PBC community as we can get. It’s another way for the PBC community to interact.
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
I think Chicago is a great place to try something new. People are very open and there are so many opportunities to collaborate.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://podcastbrunchclub.com/
- Email: adela@podcastbrunchclub.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/podcastbrunch/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/podcastbrunchclub/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/podcastbrunch
- Other: http://podcastbrunchclub.com/pbc-podcast/
Getting in touch: VoyageChicago is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
